About Us
The Bubblyjock Collective, formed in 2023, is an ensemble dedicated to promoting and performing music by composers born or based in Scotland. The collective has three main aims:
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to revive forgotten and neglected works from archives
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to commission new works from Scottish composers
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to tell the story of art music in Scotland: the composers, the pieces, and the performers!
We focus on music from the 19th century to the present day - click here to read about our repertoire and the composers we're interested in.
Meet the Collective!
Biography
The Bubblyjock Collective are an innovative chamber ensemble dedicated to reviving interest in the music of neglected Scottish composers. They are Rosie Lavery (soprano), Anna Michels (piano) and Neil Sutcliffe (classical accordion). Since their launch, they have championed the music of composers such as Ronald Stevenson, Marie Dare, Isobel Dunlop, Buxton Orr and Erik Chisholm, to name but a few, performing across the UK and at festivals such as Loch Shiel Festival and the 50th St Magnus International Festival.
Alongside their research and championing of historical repertoire, the Bubblyjocks regularly collaborate with contemporary Scottish composers. Since their formation, they have commissioned works from Padruig Moireasdan, Lisa Robertson, Eva Smeddle, Jennifer Margaret Barker, Greg May and Kit McCarthy. These range from settings of iconic Scottish Gaelic poetry to a song-cycle in the voices of 5 women from Scottish history. The ensemble is dedicated to platforming the music of young composers, giving repeat performances of new repertoire and exploring the unique soundworld offered by their ensemble.
Praised for their progressive programming, and enthusiastically received by both conventional and new audiences to chamber music, the Collective are setting the standard for inclusive and bold programmes that celebrate the wealth of music coming out of Scotland. In the words of Alan Riach, writing in The National: “Scotland's music is indeed being well-served by three young people, musicians of the first order, devoted and dedicated…”
Founding Members:
Rosie Lavery
Rosie Lavery, sometimes known as ‘The Ginger Soprano”, is an opera singer and conductor born and raised in Glasgow. She is a graduate of the Alexander Gibson Opera Studio at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and is a regular soloist and recital singer, performing across the UK and Europe. She is currently preparing for performances with Scottish Opera, Oxford International Song Festival and CoAlign Arts in collaboration with ENO.
She has a passion for performing unknown and occasionally wacky repertoire from across the world and is a keen linguist. She speaks French, German, Italian and has been learning Scottish Gaelic for two years now.
Anna Michels
Scottish-Dutch pianist Anna Michels has performed internationally as a soloist and collaborative musician.
She was one of the first students to be awarded a double bachelor degree from Maastricht Conservatoire in the Netherlands, studying both piano and music theory. As an alumna of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Anna earned a Masters and Artist Diploma under the tutelage of Aaron Shorr.
She currently teaches at St Mary’s Music School and is an accompanist and lecturer of free improvisation at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Neil Sutcliffe
Neil Sutcliffe is a classical accordionist from Stirling, and is passionate about promoting his instrument in the music scene in Scotland. Since completing his Bachelors degree at the Royal Conservatoire of Glasgow in 2021 with Djordje Gajic, he has been regularly performing, teaching and working with with composers, storytellers and dancers.
Research and activism are central to Neil's approach to music, telling the stories of neglected Scottish composers and collaborating with contemporary composers to commission new works.. As well as working as a freelancer, he is an Archive Manager at the Scottish Music Centre, which holds the world's largest archive of Scottish classical music. In 2023, with Rosie Lavery and Michael O'Rourke, he released an album with Toccata Classics of previously unrecorded works for accordion by Ronald Stevenson.
How we got our name...
bubbly-jock, n. Scots for a male turkey
Our rather curious name comes from a poem by the great poet of the Scottish literary renaissance, Hugh MacDiarmid (real name Christopher Murray Grieve,1892 - 1978). MacDiarmid's poem Bubblyjock is a dry satirical portrayal of the turkey standing in the sun, struggling to make a beautiful sound.
In 1966, Ronald Stevenson (1928-2015), one of the better-known Scottish composers of the 20th century, set this text as a song, and it's one of the first pieces of Scottish repertoire we ever performed.
There's lots of lovely Scots language in this poem -raxed, bouks, blether - and although on some level it's a humorous poem, we also feel there's a curious allegory with the way Scottish classical music has struggled to break through into common repertoire and awareness.
We aim to get out all the richt notes, with or without bagpipes!
Hugh MacDiarmid, poet
Ronald Stevenson, composer