About Me
Darren MacLean (23) is one of Scotland’s leading young Gaelic singers. Born into a family of singers – his great uncle Calum Kennedy was an internationally renowned doyen of Gaelic song – Darren began singing as a youngster at home in Roag, near Dunvegan on the Isle of Skye.He competed at his first local mod at the age of four and within a year he had won his first competition, an achievement rewarded with entry into the National Mod, where he came fourth and received the trophy for the highest marks in Gaelic. He won his first National Mod competition when he was ten, in 1993, and won the silver pendant, the premier accolade for boys under sixteen, in Portree in 1998.On leaving school Darren took a degree in Scottish music at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama in Glasgow. While at the RSAMD he toured Southern Scotland, Germany and Denmark with his year group, Sperin, and in 2003, just after his twentieth birthday, he won the An Commun Gaidhealach Gold Medal at the National Mod in Oban, his greatest achievement to date. He also won the prestigious Seo Seinn competition in 2003 and 2004, has reached the BBC Young Scottish Traditional Musician of the Year final on three occasions and was nominated in the Up and Coming Artist category in the Scots Trad Music Awards in 2005.A widely experienced performer, Darren has appeared at events ranging from small-scale ceilidhs to main stage concerts at Glasgow Royal Concert Hall. His many festival appearances include The Jura Music Festival, Celtic Chaos and Celtic Connections, where he has featured in the Master and Apprentice series with Arthur Cormack and in the Young Tradition: Gaelic Song celebration with Julie Fowlis. He has also sung alongside respected singer, folklorist and author Margaret Bennett and sang backing vocals with the former Runrig frontman, Donnie Munro, in a concert at Portree High School. Darren’s recording credits include appearances on James Graham’s Siubhal, Gary Innes’s Hows the Craic?, Sandy Meldrum’s Piano Fusion and Deoch n Dorus’s first album and his many radio and television broadcasts include Air an Urlar, An Urlar, Bard nan Oran, Guthan nan Gaidheal, Ceol aig a Chaistal, The Reel Blend, Travelling Folk, Cuirim Ciuil, Mire ri Mor and Take the Floor.
