Aidan O'Rourke

Aidan grew up in an Irish family in Argyll and learned fiddle in Oban in the West Highland style. His roots are in Scottish and Irish music but he has a tendency to roam the edges of those traditions.

Lau came together in 2006 and have ventured a new sound in progressive, politically-charged folk music. The trio have released five studio albums, multiple live albums and EPs and a 2017 retrospective charting their first decade. They won Best Group at the BBC 2 Folk Awards an unprecedented four times.
In life outside Lau, Aidan joined The Caledonia Ramblers aged 14 in 1989; formed the duo Tabache with Claire Mann in 1994; became a member of Blazin’ Fiddles in 1998; founded the quartet Kan with whistle player Brian Finnegan in 2010; formed a duo with jazz pianist Kit Downes in 2016 and joined Donal Lunny's new collective Atlantic Arc in 2017. He performs with Brìghde Chaimbeul and produced her debut album The Reeling in 2018.
Solo albums include Sirius (2006), An Tobar (2008), Hotline (2013), 365: Vol 1 (2018), Vol 2 (2019), Best of 365 (2020), and Iorram (Iorram). Aidan was named Musician of the Year at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards in 2014. As a composer he has written for Scottish Ensemble, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Sage Gateshead, Celtic Connections, the Tolbooth in Stirling, An Tobar, Cottier Chamber Project, Capella Nova and is three-time awardee of the PRSF New Music Biennial commission at London’s Southbank Centre. In 2017 he wrote the official opening music for the new bridge across the Firth of Forth (the Queensferry Crossing).
A major project of recent years was the epic tune-cycle 365. In response to a short story collection by James Robertson, Aidan wrote a fiddle tune every day for a year, and the result is (yes!) 365 tunes which he recorded with Kit Downes, guitarist Sorren Maclean and harpist Esther Swift. In 2019, Aidan and Kit wrote a new work for Scottish Ensemble inspired by the poetry of Edwin Morgan. According to The Herald, “rarely has this land’s musical community spoken as eloquently of an outward and forward looking approach to its roots and heritage”.
Aidan wrote the music for the first ever feature-length Gaelic cinematic documentary, Iorram, which premiered at Glasgow Film Festival in 2021. The Guardian labelled the film “a feast for the ears”. In the same year he was presented with a Paul Hamlyn Award for Artists.
Aidan collaborated with Australian contemporary circus company Gravity and Other Myths on the multi-genre, multi-nation collaboration Macro which opened both Adelaide and Edinburgh International Festivals in 2022.
That same summer his vast Edinburgh International Festival curational project A Great Disordered Heart culminated in his film The Ballad of a Great Disordered Heart . This is a collaborative film made with filmmakers Mark Cousins and Becky Manson. It premiered at the Edinburgh International Film Festival and made the selection for the Irish Film Festival London and the Victoria Film Festival.
As curator, he programmed events at Edinburgh International Festival and has co-directed multiple editions of Lau-Land festival in Edinburgh (Queen’s Hall, Summerhall), Glasgow (CCA), London (King’s Place), Gateshead (Sage), Bristol (Colston Hall). He reincarnated the Scottish Enlightenment drinking hole Lucky Middlemass’s Tavern for Edinburgh’s Burns and Beyond Festival.
Aidan teaches at University of Ulster where he is a PhD researcher in composition.

“Few contemporary musicians in any category can match either his artistic ambitions or his achievements in bringing them to fruition” (The Scotsman)
“O’Rourke’s music – both his writing and playing – is unfailingly strong and imaginative” (The List)
“Lau are a remarkable band - exquisite and hypnotic, musicianship at its best” (The Guardian)