The best folk albums of 2025: Jim Gilchrist names his top five

Dick Gaughan: Live at the BBC 1972-79 (Talking Elephant) Sidelined from performance by a stroke in 2016, the masterly singing and fiery guitar technique of Dick Gaughan made him a signal presence on the folk scene over four decades. These ten BBC live recordings from the Seventies, when the gruff passion of his singing seemed to emerge fully formed, come as a foretaste of a seven-CD plus DVD box set due for release in February. Listeners familiar mainly with the powerfully conscience-tweaking protest repertoire of his later career may find these largely traditional songs a revelation. Here are Gaughan classics such as a peerless Flower o’ Northumberland and a gorgeously tender Rashy Moor. From Floo’ers o’ the Forest, recorded with members of Boys of the Lough, to his haunting, a cappella declamation of MacCrimmon’s Lament, their distinctive narrative power imbued with a quintessential humanity.

Liz Overs: Nightjar (Own Label) This poetic and atmospherically charged debut solo album from Sussex-based singer-songwriter Liz Overs reflects immersion in tradition, folklore and the natural world, right from her opening solstice invocation, Prayer to the Year: “East of the sunlight and west of the moon.” Mixing her own, often beguiling compositions with traditional song, her breathy and at times eerie intonation is expertly complemented by guitarists and multi-instrumentalists Neill McColl, David Tomlins and double-bassist Ben Nicholls, the latter also playing banjo and concertina. Traditional ballads include Cruel Sister, her delivery ethereal yet compellingly spinning the fateful tale, its unspooling ushered along by guitar and bass which – here and in Overs’s own Honeysuckle on the Vine – are strikingly reminiscent of classic Pentangle. Other compositions include the lovely Snow Moon with its ethereal multi-tracked vocals, and the mysterious nocturnal whisperings of the title track.

Sarah-Jane Summers & Juhani Silvola: How to Raise the Wind (Eighth Nerve Audio) This strikingly characterful album from Norwegian based Highland fiddler Sarah-Jane Summers and guitarist Juhani Silvola finds them accompanied by a string quintet including such luminaries as Seonaid Aitken and Patsy Reid. The demonically skittering strings of the opening Trolls Resent a Disturbance undoubtedly reflect its title, and also that this is no ordinary fiddle album. Vividly inspired by Scottish and Norwegian folklore, traditionally accented tunes undergo dramatically contemporary transformations. Thus the ominous Visitor from the Sea sports distinct touches of Pink Floyd, while a swooping, Irish-sounding air, The Enchanted Sons of Kings, also features desert blues-style guitar. Let Me Stay Till I Dance This Reel does just that, with smeddum.

Karen Marshalsay: Edarainn a’ Chruit – Between Us the Harp (Cramasie Records) Harpist Karen Marshalsay’s second album vividly showcases not only her musicality and compositional skills but also the three particular harps associated with Scottish music. One lovely set on lever harp features two Burns classics, Sweet Afton and Ae fond Kiss, and a venerable lute tune, Adew Dundee, introduces the weirdly buzzing bray harp, the buzzing doubled when she’s joined by her mentor, harpist Alison Kinnaird for MacDonnell’s March. The earthy vocals and smallpipes of piper and scholar Allan McDonald join Marshalsay’s singing in the ever-mysterious Uamh an Òir, “The Cave of Gold”, while the bell-like ringing of the clarsach chimes out variations of the piobaireachd The Little Spree in utterly hypnotic measure.

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