NCH Presents in Association with RTÉ Radio 1: PILGRIMS

Paul Noonan & Brian Crosby

Pilgrims is the new collaboration between Paul Noonan and Brian Crosby, two musicians whose creative relationship stretches back to their teenage years. Their debut album Wintering was released earlier this year, marking their first full project together in 16 years.

Noonan and Crosby first formed Juniper (with Damien Rice) before becoming founding members of Irish indie band Bell X1. In the years since, both have developed singular careers: Noonan through Bell X1 and other projects Printer Clips and HousePlants (with electronic producer Daithí), and Crosby via acclaimed film and television scores and his solo piano and ambient work. Wintering brings those two sensibilities back into close conversation.

Written across 2024 and 2025 and recorded at Crosby’s Treehouse Studios in County Wicklow, Wintering is a restrained, piano-led record, centred on voice, space, and atmosphere. Many of the songs began as instrumental pieces by Crosby or lyrical sketches by Noonan. The project took its name and form while the pair were performing early versions of the songs in small rooms last year, just piano and voice, testing how the material landed in front of a live audience. That live setting proved decisive.

Expect to hear some songs from Wintering, alongside selected material from the early Bell X1 catalogue.

**** Early contender for album of the year… - The Irish Times

**** Album of the Week – Mail on Sunday

Album of the Week – RTE Radio 1

“A powerful soundtrack for quiet reflection” – Hot Press 

Presented by NCH