Loading details…
Artist
Gwenael Kerleo
12+ albums
harpfolkcelticneoclassicalElven Music
about
Artist name is Gwenaël Kerléo. Gwenaël Kerléo, a Breton harpist and singer, was born in 1975 in Côte d’Ivoire (Africa), where she lived the first two years of her life. Back to Brest, in Brittany (France), she discovered the sound of the Celtic harp thanks to Alan Stivell’s albums, but also thanks to her first grade teacher, who one day brought her instrument in class. That is when Gwenaël Kerléo decided to start learning the Celtic harp. At the age of 9, she took her first lessons with Hervé Queffeléant (from the group Triskell). He taught her orally, leaving a lot of room to personal composition and improvisation. In 1992, Gwenaël Kerléo was awarded the First prize of the Music Conservatory, with first class honours. Nurtured on traditional tunes from Brittany and Ireland, and possessing a solid musical knowledge, the young harpist quickly decided to develop her own creations, and recorded her first compositions in 1994, together with traditional melodies. Two years later, in 1996, she released her first album, “Terre Celte” (“Celtic Land”), containing only her compositions. On the album, the Celtic harp was accompanied with a violin, a wooden transverse flute, and Scottish bagpapipes. “Terre Celte” recieved a warm welcome from the public and the press, and a programme on the artist was broadcast on France Musiques (national radio station). Eager to live yet new musical experiences, Gwenaël Kerléo contacted jazz musicians, and mixed the sound of her harp with the improvi
