Welcome to Edinburgh University Folk Society.
About us!
Edinburgh University Folk and Trad Society – the society where you can play, sing, listen to, and just generally appreciate folk and traditional music from Scotland and all around the world!
We hold regular music sessions (bring any instrument and jam together – all abilities welcome, even if you’ve never played trad music before), have our own ceilidh band which members play for events around Edinburgh, and a song group where we share songs together. We go on regular trips around Scotland, England and Ireland too!
Get involved with some of the great things we have going on during the week:
Ceilidh Band Practice – Monday 8-10pm
FolkSoc has its own ceilidh band, and you can join, and get paid gigs! On one condition: you come to ceilidh band practice, to learn our sets. You could also learn to call the dances, which will get you more gigs.
Location: Munro Room, Pleasance
Tune Teaching – Tuesday 8-9pm
Every week before our session we have tune teaching where one of our members will teach a tune by ear to the group. So if you feel you need a new tune in your life or don’t know any yet, come along and learn some of our favourites!
Location: Munro Room, Pleasance
Session – Every Second Tuesday 9-11pm
Once 9pm hits we start our main session where we all play tunes, sing songs and generally have good craic. You could lead a set, join in or just listen if you fancy. Check our instagram page – @folksoc – for a schedule of which weeks we will be session-ing after Tune Teaching! On weeks where we do not have access to the Cabaret Bar, we often stay in the Munro Room for a shorter session – so hang around after Tune Teaching!
Location: Cabaret Bar, Pleasance
Song Group – 8-10pm
Would you like to learn some songs and sing them in a group? Then by all means, come along to Song Group! We usually have a theme each week, and each bring different songs.
Location: Lomond Room, Pleasance
If you’re interested in joining our ceilidh band, make sure to head to the ceilidh band practice sessions on Monday! Once you’ve learnt some the sets, you can start joining in at charity gigs. The sheet music and recordings of all the sets are on the Ceilidh Band Backstage Facebook page, which you can join here if you’re a Folksoc member.
At these gigs, there will be 3 mic’d up ceilidh band members, and anyone wanting to join the band can play along with the sets, unamplified. When you’re confident with all the ceilidh band sets, you can start getting allocated to gigs as a fully fledged band member! All the upcoming gigs are on a google sheet on the Ceilidh Band Backstage page.
We will also be running some calling and PA set-up workshops on some of the Monday ceilidh band sessions – being able to set up the PA is really important for all band members, and learning how to call will help you book more gigs!
If you have any further questions, feel free to message us on Facebook, or send us an email at band@eufolksoc.org.uk.
Membership is £5 for students, and £8 for non-students, and is payable to the treasurer at a Tuesday session or via the EUSA (Edinburgh University Students’ Association) website:
You can also subscribe to our Newsletter, like us on Facebook and follow us on Instagram to keep up to date with what’s happening in FolkSoc.
