Jeana Leslie

Jeana Leslie, along with singing partner Siobhan Miller, are currently the holders of the prestigious BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Awards 2008. They can currently be seen in the line-ups of many prestigious UK festivals in 2008, including the Cambrige Folk Festival, Cropredy Fairport Convention, Towersay Village Festival and Ulverston Folk Festival. They have recently returned from a triumphant appearance at the Orkney Folk Festival.
Jeana and Siobhan have recently completed recording their debut album, In A Bleeze, which is due for release at the Cambridge Folk Festival.
Hailing from the beautiful island of Orkney, Jeana was brought up surrounded by music. In secondary school she joined a school fiddle group, Hadhirgann, run by Douglas Montgomery of Orkney duo ‘Saltfishforty’ and the band ‘The Chair’. This is what sparked Jeana’s love for traditional music.
Playing with Hadhirgann was great experience for Jeana. She played on the group’s Keep It Up CD and took part in the group’s appearances at the Scots Trad Music Awards at the Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh in December 2004 and Celtic Connections 2006. Both performances were to great acclaim.
Jeana was also a member of Hadhirgaan in June 2005 when the group toured Canada with the Kirkwall Grammar School Theatre Company. They presented a production illustrating the cultural links between Orkney and Canada through the Hudson Bay Company, its Orkney-born Arctic authority Dr John Rae and the pioneering company agent Isobel Gunn.
Other performing experiences include numerous apperences, both solo and with groups, at Orkney Folk Festival, the St Magnus Festival, participating in the Tall Ships Race and its concert tour of Shetland, Norway and North England in summer 2005, with musicians from Shetland and Newcastle Upon Tyne University’s traditional music course with Chris Stout of Fiddlers’ Bid heading up as musical director.
2006 saw Jeana perfoming at Celtic Connections for the first time in Donald Shaws ‘Harvest’ project, followed by an ‘Orkney Night' in 2007 with the Wrigley Sisters’, also playing alongside Kris Drever, Sarah MacFayden and ‘Saltfishforty’. In this year she also played in the Celtic Connections Youth Orchestra, performing pieces by Martynn Bennett and Dick Gaughan.
Jeana is currently in her third at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow, studying for her BA in Scottish Music, where she received the Jimmy Shand Scholarship for a promising student joining the BA Scottish Music course with a first study in fiddle or accordion.
Jeana is also busy with teaching in and around Glasgow. She is a senior teacher for the RSAMD YouthWorks programme, along with teaching for Glasgow Fiddle Workshops, Glasgow Cultural Enterprises and Celtic Connections workshops throughout the year.

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