GLASGOW students join their American peers in two moving new musicals which are wowing audiences and critics alike at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

It is the result of a transatlantic collaboration between two world-renowned performing arts institutions – the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland here in the city and the American Music Theatre Project (AMTP) at Northwestern University, Illinois.

Legacy: A Mother’s Song has been written by Glasgow singer and songwriter Finn Anderson, who explains that music and motherhood are at its heart.

“We wanted to look at the folk singing tradition which has travelled across the Atlantic, from Scotland, via Ireland,” explains Finn, who lives on the south side of Glasgow.

“The score is mostly original, contemporary music. We have 15 voices so it is a full sound with lots of rich harmony.”

He adds: “The starting point for us was family, so we decided to look at parenthood, and the choices that women have made over the generations in relation to motherhood in particular.”

Finn’s research put him in touch with renowned Appalachian singer and storyteller Sheila Kay Adams, who is working hard to keep the oral ballad tradition alive.

He explains: “It’s been really fascinating looking into this rich tradition of songs, passed down from person to person. Sheila Kay Adams talks about her grandmother knowing something like 500 songs – she just knew them, they weren’t written down anywhere, and these have passed on from generation to generation.

“I find it amazing when she sings songs I recognise, that clearly come from Scotland, which are now being sung on the other side of the world.”

Legacy: A Mother’s Song, set in modern day New York, spans three generations of women linked through the transatlantic ballad singing tradition. Its partner musical, Legacy: The Book of Names is set around immigration station Ellis Island, and it shows how one day can change a lifetime.

The Fringe partnership was forged in 2017 when the two institutions took two new works to the festival – Atlantic: A Scottish Story and Atlantic: America and the Great War – which earned a string of five star reviews.

Each year students from the Royal Conservatoire’s Musical Theatre Masters programme perform three fully-produced works as part of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, including one main stage show at the Assembly Hall – this year, it is Dirty Rotten Scoundrels - and two new works which receive their world premieres.

The cast of Legacy: A Mother’s Song comprises mainly young women, at a time when women across the world are speaking up on a range of issues.

“These young actors are very politically engaged which has inspired Tania and I to create a story focusing on three women at different points in history, in different places in the world, who find connection in the songs that have passed between them,” he explains.

“Each on the brink of motherhood but each in very differing circumstances, this connection helps them all to move through turbulent times and make difficult life-changing decisions for themselves and the next generation.”

Director Tania Azevedo says: “At its core, it’s a story about family, specifically motherhood, and how you honour the legacy left by those before you. In the current climate, it excites me to be telling stories exploring women’s agency throughout history.

“We hope audiences will connect and be moved by the musical storytelling."

Finn, who grew up in Fife, spent his early teens staging self-penned theatre productions at the Byre Theatre in St Andrews.

Using the profits to build a home recording studio, he had released two EPs before leaving school aged 16 to study music. He went on to complete an MA in Musical Theatre Writing at Goldsmiths, University of London.

Alongside his musical theatre work, Finn has also created music and songs for a diverse range of performance, film and art projects throughout the UK and internationally.

After Legacy, Finn is continuing the cross-cultural theme, and his working relationship with Tania, for a new musical called The Bowmaker with the National Theatre of Scotland and Dundee Rep.

“In the current climate, I feel that speaking between countries, enjoying our shared humanity rather than talking about differences, is the right thing to do,” he says.

“It wasn’t a conscious decision, to look at the headlines and think, can we make a show out of that? There is a lot in the news about women’s rights, abortion and immigration. I feel quite humbled that the story we are telling should resonate so strongly with that, in a way it perhaps wouldn’t have done a year ago.

“It’s always quite special, when things align in that way.”

Making the musical has made Finn think more deeply about his own personal connections and family.

“If you’re going to write a musical about motherhood, of course you speak to your mum about it,” he laughs. “My mum has always loved Scottish folk music and dance and spent a lot of time as a teacher and choreographer, developing those traditions.

“Doing the show makes you realise how lovely it is to be able to leave some kind of legacy, and it has definitely allowed me to explore my love of traditional Scottish music again.”