Randal Bays – a 2007 Jack Straw Artist Support Program participant – is an American musician who's been deeply involved in the world of Irish traditional music for over 30 years. He played various instruments starting at age 8, was involved in band and orchestra through his school years, then majored in music theory and composition at Indiana State University. Randal discovered traditional Irish jigs and reels in his twenties, took up the fiddle, and eventually became an internationally known performer on that instrument as well as the acoustic guitar. He has a string of highly acclaimed recordings to his credit, is a well known performer and teacher in both North America and Ireland, and is the founder of the Friday Harbor Irish Music School, now in its eighth year in Washington's San Juan Island.

Although the Irish musical tradition is a very ancient one, it's also a living tradition and new music is being created and added to it all the time. Randal is the composer of a number of noted recent tunes that have been absorbed into the communal repertoire shared by Irish trad musicians around the world. He'll discuss how that process works for him and will perform examples of recent (the last 50 years) compositions as well as older ones.