Old Blind Dogs

Living Traditions Presentations and the Flagstaff Arts Council are pleased to present Old Blind Dogs in concert Friday, September 13th at the Coconino Center for the Arts in Flagstaff. Doors for the show open at 7pm and the concert starts at 7:30pm.

Since forming in the early 1990’s, Old Blind Dogs have stood on the cutting edge of Scotland’s roots revival. The band has developed its own trademark style with an energetic mix of songs and tunes. Dynamic percussion, polished vocals, soaring fiddle and stirring pipes fuel the delicately-phrased melodies and traditional songs.

“The Old Blind Dogs play with a compelling energy and intoxicating rhythm,” says The Scotsman, “as players and audience seem to share a wild ecstasy of emotion.” Sixteen years is a long time in the life of any band and most who reach that milestone are content to rest on the tried and true formulas that have worked in the past. Not so for Scotland’s Old Blind Dogs whose newly released Four on the Floor takes them bravely in many new directions.
The Dogs, one of Scotland’s most highly touted traditional folk bands, are not known for shying away from change. A strong, shared musical vision has allowed the group to ride out inevitable line-up changes to the extent that the only original member still with the band is Jonny Hardie (fiddle, guitar and vocals). The Dogs popularity has never dimmed though and the current foursome of Hardie, Aaron Jones (bouzouki, guitar, vocals), Ali Hutton (Border pipes, whistles, vocals) and Donald Hay (drums, percussion) have proven more than capable of carrying on the tradition of the band that the Montreal Gazette called …a Scots neo-traditional supergroup with a bracingly modern musical attack. Together, in varying line-ups along with past members Buzzby McMillan (bass, bouzouki, vocals), Davy Cattanach (percussion, vocals), Fraser Fifield (saxophone, small pipes), Paul Jennings (percussion), Fraser Stone (percussion), Rory Campbell (Border pipes, whistles, vocals) and singer/guitarists Ian Benzie and Jim Malcolm, the Dogs have released eleven albums and have won numerous awards including the prestigious title of Folk Band of the Year at the 2004 and 2007 Scots Trad Music Awards. Their album ‘Four On The Floor’ picked up the IAP ‘Best Celtic CD’ Award and their last CD, ‘Wherever Yet May Be’ was nominated for the same award.