Folkworks Summer Sessions 2025 - Tutor Biographies
Dave Gray
Hailed the smiliest man in folk by Radio 2’s Mark Radcliffe, Dave Gray is an enthusiastic and experienced melodeon player. He is also a highly skilled and committed educator – recently being appointed Artistic Director of Folkworks Adult Summer School at the Glasshouse, Gateshead.
Dave began working with Katie Doherty on the multi-award winning musical ‘Beyond the End of the Road’ in 2018, and has been performing with Katie since. Alongside fellow Navigator Grace Smith, Dave is one third of traditional French dance band Cri du Canard.
A graduate of the Newcastle University Music Degree, Dave has returned as a tutor from Autumn 2022. In addition to regular private teaching, he continues his work as mentor for Ethno music camps, the international programme for young musicians playing folk, world and traditional music. He has taught for EFDSS, National Youth Folk Ensemble and also the Glasshouse Folkworks summer schools.
Photographer- Amelia Reid
Karen Tweed
Born in London in the early 1960s to an Irish mother and an English father who both loved dance music of any kind, it was no surprise that Karen took up the accordion at the age of 11. Having been voted the All-Ireland Accordion champion on five occasions before the age of 19, Karen finally turned professional in the late 1980s after studying art (printmaking) in Leeds. Orkney is now her creative home and she continues to inspire with her music, artistic and creative ideas, firmly established as a leading light in performance, creative collaborations and teaching internationally.
She has appeared on over 70 albums and is known for being deft and dexterous as a musician; wacky and enchanting as a performer. She is sought-after internationally as a composer, arranger and collaborator; shining in the Secret North (2016/17) and Accordionesse (2018) projects. She performed at The St Magnus International Festival in 2021 with her commission ‘visitors’ and in the same year devised a 30 minute video showcasing her music and art within the Orcadian community for the Siamsa Tire (National Theatre of Ireland) series of videos from great creatives in Irish Music. This toured theatres nationally around Ireland and was organised by women under the age of 30. Meanwhile, she continues to be equally in demand as a teacher of music, accordion, arrangement, composition and more recently, artistic skills.
As a tutor at universities, workshops, summer schools and master classes in the UK, Ireland and Scandinavia, Karen also teaches privately and online, opening her ideas to students worldwide.
Her methodology has proved to be inspirational and confidence-blooming as she seeks to bring out and develop the uniqueness of each student. Her knowledge and openness in relation to broadening repertoires and improvising styles, technique and performance is second to none and she has become a legacy as a true rôle model for musicians and artists alike. In Orkney, she is exploring events which combine her music with green energy consultants, painters, poets, Orcadian writers, knitters and scientists. . . . in fact, anyone who can inspire her to weave the threads of her music and pencils closer together!
She has also written and edited 4 music publications and her own sketchbook.
A complete professional, yet an approachable and likeable artist, her effervescent playing reflects her wide and varied personal musical tastes. She moves effortlessly from emotive and soulful melodies to vibrant, dynamic and occasionally wonky and offbeat musical lines.
Her whole approach is informed by tradition yet crucially breaks convention and takes acoustic music into a new realm.
Karen Tweed simply dismantles any myth the accordion may have previously held. Karen’s is a no-limits creative while her music will inspire memories you never knew you had.
Photographer – Caorunn Mitchell
Jock Tyldesley
Jock Tyldesley is perhaps best known for his fiddling in Cajun bands such as The Flatville Aces and the Bearcats, as well as more off-the-wall antics with The New Rope String Band and The Chipolatas.
He also nurtures a long-time passion for Southern Appalachian old time fiddling for many years and has spent more time concentrating on this, whilst touring worldwide with his regular bands and US acts such as The Dirk Powell Band, Eddie LeJeune, Martha Scanlan and many more.
He is much in demand as a private and workshop tutor and has taught for several years at Folkworks Summer School, Sore Fingers, Music in the Mountain, The Burwell Bash as well as being a visiting tutor at Blazin’ in Beauly, The London Fiddle School and the Folk Degree course at Newcastle University, plus many international festival workshops.
Jock is an instinctive tutor, teaching by ear and concentrating on the feel, rhythm and bowing patterns of the music as much as the tune, and trying to bring out the ‘drive’ in peoples’ fiddling.
Jack Rutter
Yorkshire folk singer Jack Rutter has established himself as one of the standout voices of the folk, roots and acoustic music scene in recent years.
A hugely engaging stage presence, his soaring vocal, powerhouse guitar and bouzouki playing and masterful arrangements of traditional songs and contemporary covers have enthralled audiences from the largest festival main stages to the most intimate folk clubs.
This year sees the release of his critically acclaimed third album This Is Something Constant, a compelling and spellbinding showcase of gripping story ballads and upbeat festival-stage firecrackers, perfectly pitched and delivered with soaring, crystal clear vocals that breathe new life into ancient tales.
Sarah Hayes
Sarah Hayes is a singer, flautist and keyboard player from Northumberland. Based in Glasgow since 2005, she leads a busy and varied musical life performing, writing and recording with Admiral Fallow, Field Music, Laura Jane Wilkie, Birdvox and more. Sarah released her solo album Woven – a studio recording of her Celtic Connections New Voices commission – to widespread acclaim in 2015.
She is a member of songwriting and production collective Hen Hoose and recently composed the music for Hold Fast, a circus show created in collaboration with Superfan Performance. Sarah teaches privately and in community settings, and has been a tutor for Folkworks Summer Schools, National Youth Folk Ensemble, Tinto Summer School, Edinburgh Youth Gaitherin’ and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Nancy Kerr is an award-winning violinist, singer and composer with over 25 major folk releases in her discography and multiple commissions including from the BBC, the Houses of Parliament and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. She has been described as “One of the finest songwriters in English folk” (Songlines). She was Professor of Composition at Leeds Conservatoire in and is currently Lecturer in Folk and Traditional Music at Newcastle University and researcher on the AHRC project Music, Heritage, Place: Unlocking the Musical Collections of England’s County Record Offices. Nancy currently performs solo and with James Fagan, Martin Simpson, Sawol, Melrose Quartet and The Magpie Arc.
Photographer – J Fagan
