The Breath is Manchester-based guitarist Stuart McCallum and award-winning singer/flautist Ríoghnach Connolly. They met on the city’s gig circuit in the late noughties. An unlikely pairing though it was, he an acclaimed guitar whiz and a softly spoken Manchester urbanite, she a folk singer with a larger-than-life personality and a powerful voice to match. Their connection was immediate; they formed The Breath in 2016, a singer-songwriter duo to present their contemporary take on alt-folk. For them, it’s all about the song.
Connolly is a storyteller and their exquisitely crafted, honest, personal, heartfelt songs are as likely to touch on childhood summers and first love as cultural dislocation, post- colonial injustices and grief. But it’s Ríoghnach’s impassioned delivery and extraordinary stop-you-in- your-tracks voice, coupled with Stuart’s understated brilliance that is so engaging.
Ríoghnach entertained audiences on the White Rock main stage earlier this year at Le Grand Mardi Gras Ball where the BBC Radio 2 Folk Singer of the Year performed with band Honeyfeet.
“An affecting blend… McCallum provides the grandeur and artifice and Connolly the intimacy and purity.”
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