Formed by Grammy-nominated musician and record producer Simon Emmerson, Afro Celt Sound System are a European and African based collective who’ve been a ground-breaking force in music ever since they started. With sales now topping one and a half million albums and two Grammy nominations to date, Afro Celt Sound System celebrated their 20th Anniversary with a stunning new album, ‘The Source’ released in April 2016 on ECC Records.

Described as a “colossus of an album” by fRoots, ‘The Source’ is undoubtedly their most ambitious album yet and one that takes their cross-cultural collaboration and acclaimed live performances to another level.

Afro Celt Sound System is a live music spectacle featuring a host of outstanding musicians. They have announced a huge tour for November 2017 with special guests, their label mates and friends The Dhol Foundation, who will themselves release a brand new studio album ‘Basant’ later in the year.

Simon Emmerson recalls the creative spark that occurred from his early-’90s work with celebrated singer and guitarist Baaba Maal in Senegal, and a meeting of minds with Dublin-born musician Davy Spillane.

It led to a jam session of African and Irish musicians laced with electronic beats at Peter Gabriel’s Real World studios in Wiltshire from which Afro Celt Sound System’s debut album took flight.

‘The Source’, is perhaps the most expansive and exuberant Afro Celt Sound System work to date. Its track-listing brings together core members Simon Emmerson, Guinean vocalist, kora and balafon virtuoso N’Faly Kouyate and charismatic dhol master Johnny Kalsi. It also sees the return of long-standing collaborators such as Davy Spillane and Emer Mayock on uillean pipes and whistles, Moussa Sissoko on djembe and talking drum, and members of Scottish folk fusion Shooglenifty (who contributed to the very first Afro Celt album).

There are also welcome newcomers to the family, including the gritty, witty rhymes of Gaelic rapper, musician and language activist Griogair (an exponent of “ghetto- croft”, with a nod to his off-grid base in the Scottish Highlands), and the hauntingly soulful delivery of Armagh-born vocalist and flautist Rioghnach Connolly (Real World).