Jennifer and Hazel Wrigley are an international

folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has b ...

duo playing

fiddle A fiddle is a bowed string musical instrument, most often a violin. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including classical music. Although in many cases violins and fiddles are essentially synonymous, th ...

(Jennifer) and

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

(Hazel). They are twin sisters, born 16 August 1974, who grew up in

Orkney Orkney (; sco, Orkney; on, Orkneyjar; nrn, Orknøjar), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago in the Northern Isles of Scotland, situated off the north coast of the island of Great Britain. Orkney is 10 miles (16 km) north ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. They started to play when given instruments on their 8th birthday and soon joined the Orkney Strathspey and Reel Society in Kirkwall. In their early teens they were playing, often with their older sister Emma on accordion, at local concerts and ceilidhs around Orkney. There they were spotted by Orkney's only recording studio who launched them into ''Dancing Fingers'', their first album, recorded between the ages of 13 and 16 years (i.e. between 1987 and 1990) and released in 1991 when they were 16 years old. The success of this album moved them into the UK folk circuit, but this proved arduous (

Cornwall Cornwall (; kw, Kernow ) is a historic county and ceremonial county in South West England. It is recognised as one of the Celtic nations, and is the homeland of the Cornish people. Cornwall is bordered to the north and west by the Atlantic ...

Middlesbrough Middlesbrough ( ) is a town on the southern bank of the River Tees in North Yorkshire, England. It is near the North York Moors national park. It is the namesake and main town of its local borough council area. Until the early 1800s, the a ...

in back-to-back gigs), and eventually they moved to Edinburgh after launching their second album, ''The Watch Stone'', in 1994. In Edinburgh they became part of the city's folk scene and fronted a six-piece band called

Seelyhoo Seelyhoo were a Scottish folk band based in Edinburgh, with band members originally from Orkney, Isle of Lewis. Seelyhoo were fronted by songwriter, vocalist and tin whistle player Fiona Mackenzie. Their music has been described as belonging ...

, which recorded two albums. Playing at

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

Barbican Centre The Barbican Centre is a performing arts centre in the Barbican Estate of the City of London and the largest of its kind in Europe. The centre hosts classical and contemporary music concerts, theatre performances, film screenings and art exhi ...

in 1995, they were spotted by a

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

music scout who invited them to play at the

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

Folk Festival, which prompted the twins to organise a three-month "world tour" in 1997. At about that time Jennifer won the UK's premier accolade for new folk talent (

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board ex ...

Young Tradition Award The BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award is an annual competition for young folk musicians in the United Kingdom. It was first awarded in 1988 as the Young Tradition Award, taking its present name in 1998. Recent winners of the award include Brighde C ...

) which helped boost the tour and their international reputation. Working without a manager, they organised a second world tour in 1999 and issued a third album ''Huldreland'' (in the

Folk Roots ''fRoots'' (pronounced "eff-Roots", originally ''Folk Roots'') was a specialist music magazine published in the UK between 1979 and 2019. It specialised in folk and world music, and featured regular compilation downloadable albums, with occas ...

top ten of 1998). Four transatlantic trips in 1999 cemented their place on the international folk scene. In 2001 they issued an album ''Skyran''. In 2005 they returned to Orkney and acquired premises in Kirkwall where they launched ''The Reel'', a music/social centre offering an instrument/music shop, lessons to aspiring musicians, and a coffee shop where sessions could often be heard. ''The Reel'' was shut down in November 2020 having been closed since March 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Discography

Jennifer & Hazel Wrigley

* ''Dancing Fingers'' (1991) – Attic Records ATCD026 * ''The Watch Stone'' (1994) – Attic Records ATCD038 * ''Huldreland'' (1997) –

Greentrax Records Greentrax Recordings are a Scottish record label that specialises in Scottish traditional music. History The label was founded in 1986 by former police inspector Ian Green, who played the bagpipes and was responsible for arranging folk music ...

CDTRAX148 * ''Mither o' the Sea'' (1999) – Greentrax Records CDTRAX182 * ''Skyran'' (2001) – GeoSound Records GSCD01 * ''Idiom'' (2011) – GeoSound Records GSCD02

Collaborations and compilations

* The Wrigley Sisters with David Campbell – ''Orkney After Sunset: Tales and Tunes'' (2000) – Attic Records ATCD057 * Orkney Folk Festival – ''The Millennium Concert'' (2000) – Mariner Music MMCD0001 * ''The Orkney Sessions from The Reel'' (2005) – Attic Records ATCD070 * ''Orkney Folk: traditional music from the islands'' (2007) – Orkney Folk Festival 25th year – Orkney Folk Festival Records OFFCD025 * ''Gems from the Attic: Spanning 25 years of recordings from Attic Records'' (2007) – Attic Records ATCD072

Seelyhoo

* ''The First Caul'' (1995) – Greentrax Records CDTRAX102 * ''Leetera'' (1998) – Greentrax Records CDTRAX160

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wrigley, Jennifer and Hazel People from Orkney Scottish folk music groups Scottish twins Twin musical duos