A night of Scottish, Irish and North American acoustic roots music with Grammy-winning performers and a house band led by Aly Bain and Jerry Douglas.
Transatlantic Sessions comes to the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall on Wednesday 3 February 2027, starting at 19:30. It's a night of Scottish, Irish and North American acoustic roots music, and if you've come across the name before, it's because this is a perennial highlight of the Celtic Connections festival and its annual tour. It's been running for 21 years, and the shows have a track record of selling out.
The format is always the same: a small group of guest singers paired with a seasoned house band. They interweave original material with age-old tunes, working through the shared roots of the three traditions and finding new common ground along the way. The house band is fronted by Scottish traditional music legend Aly Bain on fiddle and roots master Jerry Douglas on vocals and guitar.
Among the guests this time are Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Allison Russell, whose album The Returner won best American roots performance; Nitty Gritty Dirt Band founding member Jeff Hanna; Gaelic singer Kathleen MacInnes; and acclaimed Irish songwriter Declan O'Rourke, whose song 'Galileo' Paul Weller called possibly the greatest song written in the last 30 years. They're backed by a full house band including John Doyle, Michael McGoldrick, Tatiana Hargreaves, Allison de Groot, John McCusker, Donald Shaw, James Mackintosh and Daniel Kimbro.
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It's a big line-up for one stage, and the whole thing is built around the house band supporting the guests rather than each artist taking their own separate turn. The show starts at 19:30 at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall.
