Tom Oakes - Forge

Forge marks the return of multi‑instrumentalist Tom Oakes, expanding the ideas first explored in The Hearth into a new piece that blends traditional music with live composition, improvisation and spoken text. The work draws on archival broadcasts and newly commissioned writing by Kolbrún Björt Sigfúsdóttir, weaving together sound and story to explore moments of resistance — personal, political and cultural. Each performance evolves in real time, shaped by Oakes’ instinctive musicianship and the shifting interplay between melody, memory and recorded voices.

Building on a project that travelled from the Fringe to major festivals including Celtic Connections, Forge continues Oakes’ interest in how music can hold histories and spark new ones. The piece moves between intimate reflection and expansive soundscapes, using its blend of instruments, narrative fragments and improvisation to trace how stories are carried, reshaped and passed on. It offers audiences a chance to step inside a living musical conversation, where tradition becomes a starting point rather than a boundary — a space where past and present meet in the act of creation.