With Scottish music as a starting point, and linked by a common interest in the whole range of the musical spectrum, CAUSEWAY TRIO bring a unique take to Scottish traditional music. Through shades of minimalism, jazz, Brazilian and Eastern European music they create a refreshing sound world within the intimate setting of accordion, piano and guitar which is at once very new and very familiar, and was described by Alexander McCall Smith as a "burst of swelling, joyful music". This music comes from the meeting points of the members varied musical backgrounds. Accordion player and master sheep-herder Pàdruig Morrison, who hails from the Isle of North Uist in the Outer Hebrides, was raised speaking Gaelic and playing traditional Scottish music, as well as tinkering with tractors on his croft. His experience in traditional music has seen him play and teach throughout Europe in Germany, Austria and Holland, while his interest in classical music placed him as a finalist of the 2014 Edinburgh Competition Festival Concerto Competition and has seen him play solo recitals across Scotland. Currently both living in London and studying at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Peter Thornton (guitar) and David Swan (piano) have been friends since playing together in the National Youth Jazz Orchestra of Scotland as teenagers. Peter's far-reaching musicianship has led him to lead a dual life as both a trad guitarist and a trombonist, playing everything from big band to renaissance music and working with leading international brass players (John Kenny, Simon Wills), while David's flexibility as a jazz pianist/keyboardist and composer/arranger has catapulted him through worlds such as contemporary classical, free jazz and neo-soul, working with jazz luminaries such as Sun Ra Arkestra director Marshall Allen and Jazz at the Lincoln Centre Orchestra and as composer-in-residence for London-based experimental trombone quartet Aeris Brass. After meeting as young music students in Edinburgh in 2012 and finding an affinity for each other's musical tastes, they spent the next two years playing ceilidhs around central Scotland, while delving further into traditional music and each individual's playing by rehearsing their own tunes in various dingy, badly lit practice rooms. The following summer, after spending a reclusive tea and Cream Cracker-fuelled week at Pàdruig's croft refining their ideas on reworking the forms and melodies of the Scottish tradition, they successfully applied for Creative Scotland's Youth Music Initiative project, through which they recorded their debut EP "Causeway Trio" at Castlesound Studios (of Frightened Rabbit, R.E.M. and Karine Polwart fame), which was released in 2014. The release of the EP at Henderson's, Edinburgh was followed that summer by an all-encompassing tour of Scotland in which the trio brought their music to the Outer Hebrides, the Highlands and their spiritual hometown of Edinburgh as part of the 2014 Edinburgh International Book Festival. In 2016 the trio were finalists in the BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award 2016, as part of which they spent a weekend with noted folk duo Nancy Kerr & James Fagan (Best Duo BBC Folk Awards 2003/2011) and played a live set from the Royal Albert Hall broadcast on BBC Radio 2 as part of Mark Radcliffe's Interval Show. The trio also appeared at the Fishguard Folk Festival (Wales) in May and as part of noted composer James MacMillan's Cumnock Tryst Festival (Scotland) in October. Early in 2017 the trio have played in Celtic Connections 2017 as part of Ceòl’s Craic and Gaels le Chèile's joint event at the Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow. They are looking forward to further live dates and other events in the coming year.