Singer, Composer, Vocal Coach

Hailing from the island of Guernsey, Lydia Jane Pugh is an award-winning composer specialising in choral and chamber music, with much of her work being inspired by the islands’ history, culture, and beautiful landscapes. Her music’s universal appeal has lead to performances around the world by several professional groups, including the ‘Ebor Singers’ (UK), and the ’Empire City Men’s! Chorus’ (USA). Her work has made the finals of several awards, including the National Centre for Early Music's Young Composer Award (UK), the Songdoor International Songwriting Competition, and the Australian Boys Choir Choral Composition Competition. Most recently she was awarded the Nathan Davis Prize in Composition at the Young New Yorker’s Chorus Young Composer Competition 2018 for her piece ‘Adiraï (Misplaced)’. She has also had the great joy of being selected to participate in several Composer Institutes, including the Lehigh Choral Composers Forum, the Choral Chameleon Summer Institute, and the Charlotte New Music Festival. Her chamber piece ‘Voul-ous enne p’tite goute?’, written for and recorded at the Charlotte New Music Festival was recently released by Ablaze Records on their compilation album, ‘Millennial Masters; Volume 9’. As a singer, she delights in exploring genres with a soaring range, writing original songs and creating insightful interpretations of modern day songs in the jazz idiom. Lydia’s music truly transcends genres, and gets straight to the heart of it’s listeners.

Founded in 2015, Stoney Lane is an inventive, independent artist-led record label, growing out of a whole host of musical inventions, collaborations, experiments, friendships and performances, centered around the city of Birmingham, UK. We focus on distinctive and exciting new music and people that we love, venturing wherever the music takes us – often with jazz at its core, yet crossing the eclectic worlds of improvisation to contemporary classical, electronics to world and roots-inspired music.

Stoney Lane supports and develops exceptional young UK musicians, alongside internationally touring and established artists, whilst releasing only a select number of albums each year as we strive to maintain the artistry, adventure and surprise of our records. We still produce lovely physical releases on both CD and vinyl, from limited edition hand pressings to experimental artwork and original design, alongside properly-nurtured HQ audio.

Already the Stoney Lane catalogue is home to recordings featuring the exceptional and thriving talents of Chris Mapp, Hans Koller, Mike Fletcher, Percy Pursglove and Sara Colman, to young musicians burgeoning from Birmingham and beyond, including Alex Woods, Ben Lee, Jonathan Silk, Mark Pringle, Xhosa Cole and Young Pilgrims, to leading lights Arve Henriksen, John O’Gallagher, Stan Sulzmann, Steve Swallow and the NDR Bigband. 

We produce an ongoing live programme of Stoney Lane artists at London's King's Place, and also run the official Cheltenham Jazz Festival record store for the six days of the festival each spring.  In 2020, we co-produced Around The Houses, an online jazz festival and musicians' fundraiser soon after the onset of the pandemic, with dozens of online performances, podcasts and four new commissions premiered with Jazzwise, bringing tens of thousands of views from over 30 countries worldwide.

2023-24 sees the adventurous new Stoney Lane Live series launching in Birmingham, supported by Arts Council England, bringing prominent UK, US and European artists to the city, spanning the musical roots weaving through jazz, improvisation, flamenco, Arabic, Eastern European and Indian music, alongside three new commissions, collaborations with Birmingham Royal Ballet, Flatpack Film Festival and Birmingham City University, and a strong line of musicians from the city playing and recording alongside visiting international artists.

Forthcoming 2023 releases include saxophonist Paul Dunmall’s Big Band recording; a beautiful new duo project from vocalist Sara Colman and pianist Rebecca Nash; the debut from guitarist Steve Banks; young pianist Dave Ferris featuring US guitarist Peter Bernstein; and the long-awaited Far Reaching Dreams of Mortal Souls suite from trumpeter Percy Pursglove.

Crescendo Of The Unconscious // Crescendo Of The Sacred // singer-songwriter-performer

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Maya Rae is a Singer-Songwriter hailing from Vancouver, British Columbia. Her sound is influenced by jazz, soul and folk music. She has been singing professionally since the age of 12 and has recorded and released two full length albums. Her second record "Can You See Me?" was released in 2020. Produced by veteran roots musician and multiple Juno Award winner Steve Dawson, it garnered rave reviews from CBC and went on to be nominated for two Canadian Folk Music Awards.  

Maya is currently attending the prestigious Berklee College of Music. In between studying and her solo career she has turned her attention to two musical collaborations. The first is "maya & ben", a feel good soul/pop duo with her cousin Benjamin Millman. The pair have independently released two singles and performed to an audience of 1500 as the opener for "Lawrence The Band". The second is a newly formed band "Tiny Habits". Composed of Maya and two other Berklee musicians, Cinya Khan and Judah Mayowa. The trio display their stunning harmonies covering popular songs and have found viral success right out of the gate. Their socials have grown to an extraordinary 70,000 on TikTok and 35,000 on Instagram in just a few short months. In 2022, the band will be performing their first, highly anticipated live shows and recording original music.

In the summer of 2021, Maya recorded her latest solo album at various studios in Vancouver. The album is set for release in Spring/Summer 2022 and will continue to showcase her true dynamic range as a gifted artist and performer. 

“Let It In” , the first single from the album, will be released on Friday, May 13th, 2022.

“Musicality, poise and ingenuity...Saunders is the real deal...a vocalist with a big future.”
[John Fordham, The Guardian] (4 stars ****)

“Emerging vocal star Saunders... a seductive, silky-smooth voice”
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