THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Richard Youngs (b. 1966, Cambridge, England) is a musician based in Glasgow, Scotland. In a career spanning more than 35 years, his prolific output defies the existence of any definitive discography.
His work is an ongoing experiment in sound and song form, straddling the traditional and avant-garde, encompassing every genre and no genre. Primarily recognised as a solo artist and writer of extended song, he is also an active collaborator working across experimental music, improvisation, folk and disco. Stewart Lee described him as: “The junior member of a cabal of prolific and puritanical English musician-mystics, including The Fall’s Mark E Smith, Van der Graaf Generator’s Peter Hammill, Martin Carthy and The Clangers’ composer Vernon Elliot, and still his nature will elude you.”
His collaborations are diverse in style and origin, stemming from a human connection that defies place and practice. Musically these include: AMOR (Scotland/Norway), Tony Bevan (England/Scotland), Neil Campbell (England), Chris Corsano (U.S.), Alastair Galbraith (New Zealand), Jandek (U.S.), Makoto Kawabata (Japan), Damon Krukowski (US), Donald WG Lindsay (Scotland/Ascension Island), David Maranha (Portugal), Raul Refree (Spain), Chie Mukai (Japan), Frans de Waard (Netherlands).
He has worked with artist Luke Fowler on his film The Poor Stockinger (2015), designer Fabio Quaranta’s show at Milan Fashion Week (2020) and was commissioned by Ilan Volkov to write an orchestral work for the BBC SSO (2014). Richard has been the recipient of Creative Scotland funding for a choral work (2015) and was selected as one of the artists representing Glasgow in a British Council-funded project Mix In The City (2018).
Initially a rare live performer, he has embraced the stage, playing both in intimate venues and festival arenas across the globe. His current hiatus from live performance was interrupted on 2 April 2022 at Counterflows in Glasgow, when he teamed up with Sophie Cooper to present the debut live performance of CXXI, released on Oren Ambarchi’s Black Truffle label in 2021.”
