Paul Hutchinson & Karen Wimhurst

As half of the much-missed Belshazzar’s Feast, Paul Hutchinson had, and occasionally enjoyed, 25 years of touring in the UK, and appeared on television and radio as well as receiving a nomination for Best Duo at the BBC Folk Awards in 2010. He is regarded as one of the top accordionists in the country because of his unique, refreshing, and at times ‘classical’ approach to playing and is an experienced workshop leader.

Paul also has a keen interest in 17 th  and 18 th  century dance music which has resulted in appearances at festivals in UK, Europe and America. In 2019 Faber Music published his book – 60 Country Dance Tunes 1786 – 1800.

His love of fusion music originates from his days in the renowned Celtic jazzers, Hoover the Dog. Pagoda Project was the next exciting chapter in his musical journey providing a vehicle for his own compositions with more than a helping hand from the wonderful jazz clarinettist and improviser, Karen Wimhurst. Recently they have been joined by the multi-instrumentalist and singer, Anna Tam, to form Coracle.

During the various lockdowns of 2020, Paul completed Petrichor, an album of his compositions with musicians from around the world.

Karen Wimhurst is a widely commissioned composer ranging from chamber works to music theatre and large-scale, collaborative productions.

​Eclectic in nature, her own distinctive music manifests diverse traditional and jazz influences alongside a strong grounding in contemporary classical music. Latest works include Synthetica, an online opera in collaboration with MoDiP; Freedoms for mixed choir and cello; a Song for Dorset as one of the featured composer in the lockdown A Song For Us project and Jump, a solo work for clarinets, insect and amphibian sounds, recently premiered at Ento 2022, touring 2023 and 2024 featured at the British Library event Small but Perfectly Formed hosted by Martha Kearney.

As a clarinetist, her duo with accordionist Paul Hutchinson, Pagoda, brings together a unique blend of traditional folk music with improvisation and classical undertones to create a warm and dynamic sound. Their debut CD Clarion received 5 star reviews from Folkroots and Songlines and was featured on Songlines Top of the World CD. With their latest collaboration Coracle, a trio with singer and multi string instrumentalist Anna Tam, they have just released their new album Murmurations and are on a UK wide tour of cathedrals with the Ralph Vaughan Williams project Pub to Pulpit. Coaracle were recently featured on In Tune, Radio 3 July 23.