We are very happy to introduce Ernesto Góngora as the new 2nd piper of Celtica! Ernesto is an incredible bag piper playing with amazing sound, stunning perfection and –most important!- impressive musicality. Being Mexican citizen, he is the first bagpiper from South America to win the All Ireland Solos Championship in Dublin. Gajus, after recording with Ernesto bagpipe, flute and whistles for the upcoming album “Celtic Spirits” : “Working with Ernesto was one of the most creative and satisfying experiences in my whole life. I´m very thankful and glad about the music we created, and I can´t wait to perform with Ernesto as a new band member the Celtic Spirits- show live on stage!”

Just a quick video for “Jigging on the Rocks”, one of the tunes from the new Celtica-album “Celtic Spirits” (release spring 2020). When I, Gajus, was on Gran Canaria already some years ago, I thought that Roque (=Rock) Nublo is a spectacular place for a video-shooting – and now we could film some scenes up there! So Rock Nublo is the reference for the title, but also “Whisky on the Rocks” was an influence…;-) Please go to “Videos”…

For the first of two drums-recording sessions for the upcoming Celtica-album “Celtic Spirits” the top notch studio gosh-Audio was booked again. The sensational team around Stefan Kolber, with Tom Goethe at the sound controls created once more a world class drum-sound. Lukas Schlintl was the 1st time at a recording studio the drummer of Celtica: a truely awesome drummer with a perfect combination of feeling, power and perfection! Picture by Diana Makalova

We are looking for a video-filmer who could shoot some footage for a music-video for our upcoming album “Celtic Spirits” during our stay on Gran Canaria/ Canary Islands, on Dec. 28th+ 29th; We want to shoot at various locations, mainly outdoors, so a drone would be great as well. We have some budget, but any support would be appreciated…If you are interested please contact us by email to info@celticarocks.com; Thank you!

We are very glad, that after Jane´s Farewell, we have found a sensational successor: Geza Frank, one of the best Great Highland Bagpipe-, Uilleann-Pipe and Whistle-players! He has made the bachelor in Irish Music & Dance (honors) and master Irish Traditional Music Performance (honors), he is touring and playing concerts as well with Carlos Nunez as his own bands Fourth Moon and Event Horizon, and he is solist at „Hollywood in Vienna“; Geza is also the substitute of Eric Rigler (the top-piper in Hollywood, you can hear him play at Braveheart, Titanic, Avatar, Outlander, among others) at „Titanic live“ and “James Horner live“ and the substitute piper and whistle player of the Scottish top-band Manràn, too. He joined Celtica at the right time for the recording of the new Celtica-album „Celtic Spirits“: Besides the Great Highland Pipe Geza will play for the first time on a Celtica-album also Uilleann-Pipe and whistle and enrich the band-sound with these amazing Celtic instruments.

Exactly 10 years after our start in the pretty much very (wild) West at Phoenix, Arizona, Celtica got invited to the very East: We are very excited to perform at Asia’s largest college cultural Festival, in Mumbai, India, on Dec. 26th! We will make a road movie of this outstanding tour, so please have a look on our website and YouTube at end of December… Namaste! https://www.facebook.com/iitb.moodindigo/

As the new Celtica-US-Website is a big success, we will make a Facebook-page just for the USA as well. There you will find all US-relevant information, e.g. tour dates, and there you might send us messages according US issues. Notice: Under the new address “Celtica US” you will find the present FB-page, with all content of the last 10 years, also with all “likes”; Under the previous address www.facebook.com/Celticarocks you will find soon a completely new page with all not US-related  information, though it might take a few days, till this new page is online! We kindly invite all fans, to like this “new” page so that it soon has a similar amount of Likes as the new US-site. The cutover will happen on Sunday, September 15^th 2019 (a week from now)!

The last Celtica-performance in Europe in 2019 was one of their best shows ever: At the Mediaval-festival at Selb, Germany on September 7^th  Celtica got inspired by the impressive stage, the breath taking sound and mainly by the enthusiastic audience to perform a top notch high energy show. Maybe another reason was also that it was the last time for Jane and Tom to rock the stage with Celtica: Having memories of great years everybody wanted to give everything one more time. And the audience could feel the special energy: Already during the concert fans bought Celtica-CDs and shirts like crazy – in spite of the “generious reserve” nearly all items got sold out… Jane and Tom, all the best for your future! And from now we´ll work with full power on the upcoming new album! Working title “Celtic Spirits”, release: spring 2020!

It was a wonderful summer night when we played at Sommerszene Gänserndorf the last of the 3 shows in Austria in 2019. An amazing combination of great location, perfect weather and enthusiastic audience made easy for us to rock the stage and have a party: Thank you, Gänserndorf!

Please feel invited to listen to sound samples under “Releases” and to watch a short video at “Videos”. You can pre-order now in our shop. We´ll ship your orders in Europe on Mon. Dec.11th, in the USA on Thu. Dec.14th.

Thanks for the awesome reaction on our ticket sales! Just to push it even more, we will raffle 3 x 1 Celtica Shirt among the  tickets ordered till Oct. 31st. Also the already paid orders participate a this raffle, and it is per ticket -the more tickets ordered the higher the chances…. The pricewinners will  be informed by email and can choose their shirts the very evening. Good luck…! ;->

Fri. Nov. 3^rd at Local, Vienna, www.local-bar.at Heiligenstädterstr. 31, Bogen 217, 1190 Vienna; Doors: 7pm, 8pm support act Frozen Heart, http://thefrozenheart.com/, 8:45 pm CELTICA; Tickets: 15.-, early bird: 12.- and special deal: 1 ticket + 1 Celtica-CD to your choice 22.-; Early bird: Transfer your amount to ERSTE Bank, Austria, Kontoinhaber: Heinrich Stappen, Josefstädter Str. 87, A-1080, Vienna, Austria, BIC: GIBAATWWXXX, IBAN: AT802011129033341003, Pls. add your email-address! If the amount can be mistaken or if you don´t get a confirmation please send an email with the detailed order to Info@celticarocks.com;

The short, but intense US-summer tour started with 2 awesome shows in Colorado: at Fort Collins and already for the 2nd time at the impressive Hard Rock Cafe Denver. Since Wednesday we stay in Milwaukee, where we have played 2 great Shows so far at the incredible Milwaukee Irish Festival. We are looking forward to rock the festival again tonight and tomorrow!

We are very glad that last weekend we could perform our 350^th show and that we have got more than 17.000 Facebook-fans! To us it is not just numbers as every concert is a challenge trying to reach the heart of every person in the audience with our music and our energy, and the increasing number of FB-fans shows us how successful we are. Thank you for coming to our hundreds of concerts, for thousands of FB-followers and for the millions of people watching our videos!

Since several weeks Celtica is in contact with Mrs. Mª Francesca Lazzeroni, Direttrice of Unione Corale Senese Ettore, to prepare the unique performance of Celtica with a classical orchestra at Montelago, Italy, on August 4^th. Gajus and also Harald wrote arrangements for their tunes, ending up with a score of over 1000(!) pages of music for strings, brass, timpani and vocals. Last week was the “moment of truth” as Gajus went to Siena to meet the musicians for the 1^st time in person to rehearse with them and also to record the new arrangements. With unbelievable musicality and passion Maestro Concetta Anastasi led the top class musicians the way to the right interpretation of the arrangements. It was an incredible experience to see and hear the arrangements come alive in spite of all language-problems and the different approach of Rock- and classical trained musicians. Gajus after these v intense days:” I´m very happy, as I do know now, that the show at Montelago will be an absolutely outstanding, brilliant performance, the best concert by far I have ever played – and we will capture it on DVD…!”.

We just noticed that our video of Smoke on the water/ Scotland the Brave, filmed at our concert in Croatia in 2010, hit the 1.000.000 views-mark! Thanks for all people all over the world for watching it! It has several hundred positive feedbacks, and less than 2% who didn´t like it…We definitely can live with that…😉 Our official videos have together more than 2 millions views…

Last weekend was the 1st Celtica-show in Europe in 2017. In spite of several technical problems, terrible rain and missing Aya and Harald it was great to rock the stage again. Mille grazie to all fans who watched our full show in the pouring rain!

Our latest official Video, Megawatt, filmed at the Old Tucson Studios during the Wild Wild Wild West Convention 2017 got released at https://celticarocks.com/video/. Enjoy a colorful Steampunk extravaganza!

Thank you for the insan St. Paddy´s night at the Piper Down, SLC: You were an amazing crowd, you definitely know how to party and you rrrock!

Performing at the Wild Wild West Convention in Old Tucson on Friday, March 3^rd, we will shoot also a video for our tune “Megawatt”. The 2 main filming spots are on Friday, March 3rd at the Chapel at 2pm-4pm and at our concert at the Saloon from 8:45-10:30pm. We´d love to invite all fantastic, cool, sexy, crazy, funny Steampunk people, aliens, pirates, belly dancers –simply YOU! – to join our video shoot, best by doing the dance presented in this short video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL7IXQ4JzzM Let´s have a crazy Steampunk party and turn it into a cool music video!

Celtica is the headliner on Friday March 3rd at the Wild Wild West Convention at Old Tucson. We will use this opportunity for filming our new video “Megawatt” and are looking for you, all the creative, cool, fantastic, sexy, funny Steampunk-people to participate! There will be some scenes with actual acting, some with dancing, some mass-scenes and some single shots. We soon will publish more detailed information and a video showing our (easy;-) choreography.

Please help us to get the award “Best Video 2016” for Full Steam Ahead! Just follow this link: celtic-rock.de/umfragen/index.php/535265?lang=en If you have voted already: Thank you! Maybe you have another email address or friends who might support us, too? If you havn´t voted yet: Please do it know…Thank you all so much!

Please help us to make our video “Full Steam Ahead!” Video of the Year at celtic-rock.de, one of the biggest celtic platforms in Europe. Unfortunately it is a bit complicated, so here is a detailed list how to vote (you can skip 1 or 2 and go directly from 3):

1. Open either www.celtic-rock.de or go directly to
2. https://celtic-rock.de/die-alben-songs-und-videos-des-jahres-eure-stimmen/ (Here you find listed all nominated Albums, Songs and Videos, scroll down and click on the link next to your preferred language
3. or even skip all that and open directly: https://celtic-rock.de/umfragen/index.php/535265?lang=en
4. There you have to fill in only your email-address (name is NOT necessary) and send it; You will get an email with the link to the voting, please (double)click it.
5. The 1^st page is just general information, press continue.
6. You will get to the vote for Album of the Year; You can place up to 3 votes, but you have to pick at least one to continue;
7. Next: Song of the year, same as above: at least one vote…
8. NOW you come to Video of the Year: Please vote for Celtica/ Full Steam Ahead! (If you use also the 2 other possible votes, you reduce our chance to win the award…).
9. You will get a confirmation email from celtic-rock.de.
10. THANK YOU! You can repeat this with any regular email-address (you need to be able to receive the confirmation email!). Poll is open till Dec 20th 2016! Which album and which song you vote for doesn´t influence the voting for the Celtica-video. Results will be published around Christmas.
11. No worries: You don´t get any newsletter etc. from celtic-rock.de (unless you ask for it)!

Please repeat with any working email address, and invite friends to support Celtica! Thank you so much!

We just added all dates at MPS for 2017 to our tourplan. Please find these dates and all other confirmed shows on this website at “Tour/ Upcoming”. We are looking forward to see all fans and friends again in 2017!

Like in the previous years, the well established Celtica-logo gets adapted to the current album and live show. The new “Celtic Spirits”-design attracts attention by the large celtic knot in the capital letter and the Celtica ornaments on the t-sword. Iron, recognisable by the rusty spots, reflects the extremely durable iron the Celts made for their swords, and which was highly coveted by the Romans(!). Musically the title “Ferrum Noricum” on the new album refers to that as well.

What an adventure, what an experience! We really enjoyed our 1st show ever in Mumbai/ India/ Asia! Hopefully soon some pictures, and also the full video, that we shot at Mumbai for the 1st tune of “Celtic Spirits” (we don´t even have a name yet, but we played it at Moody…😉 should be ready in 3-4 weeks…stay tuned!

We met Peter, an absolute avid Celtica-fan, the 1st time in 2012 after our concert, and since than  we were over all the years in contact till the end. Our first emotion was compassion with his fate,  but once we got to know him a bit better it soon turned into admiration and friendship. It was impressive indeed to see how his brilliant mind handled it to be prisoned in an invalid body. In his last eMail from begin of January he had so many plans, e.g. how to help to make Celtica more popular in Germany, and he was looking forward to hear the new album and to meet “his group” at the next concert. 11 days ago he was brought to the hospital because of pneumonia, but just 4 days ago there was an unexpected serious problem with his heart. Mentally fully aware he suddenly had to face his soon death. He wanted to fight for his life and rejected morphine for a long time. He was listening to the music of Celtica till the end as it gave him comfort and confidence. Against all medical prognosis he survived another night, and so it was possible for me to tell him a few words on the phone. Soon after that his body lost the fight, and on Saturday around 2:30am he passed away. We are left behind in disbelief and grieve with the members of his family for an outstanding person.

Thanks to Village Voices for great recordings! A big thank you to all the singers of the Village Voices and especially to their conductor Andrea Wiesinger for the amazing recording session last Saturday. Within 8 hours we created amazing choirs for the upcoming Album “Celtic Spirits”…

After a short interruption the previous Facebook-page “Celtica – Pipes rock” is online again – but without the old contents and without the old likes (both has moved to the new Celtica-US-FB-page). Please like us (again) as having already over 25.000 likes we have to start it from the scratch again…Thank you for your support/ likes!

We are glad to announce that we have released a brand new website for all Celtica US-related information and performances in the USA: https://www.celtica.us/tour; This way it will be much easier for all US-fans to find immediately the next live-dates and any other just for the US important information. It gets easier for us, too, to assign any promoter- and fan-requests and to reply faster. Of course, everybody is welcome, to visit both websites…

After thinking it over for a long time, Jane will leave Celtica at the end of the year. She asked us to post this message to her fans (slightly shortened): ”Celtica has been a huge part of my life for the past several years.  It’s been great fun but full on and very hard work. It wasn’t an easy decision but I feel it’s my time to leave Celtica at the end of the season as I just want to go on and do other things.  I will miss Celtica and the people who make up the band –we went through so much together, and this bond will never ever be broken.  I thank all the fans, friends, extended family, promoters and sound crew, who made everything possible and amazing. So many people came into our lives and helped us, hosted us, fed us and became our local tour guides… Thank you for the crazy good times!  I love you all and look forward to performing for you again in another format some day soon! I am going to still play and record and be in your face.(Sorry)😀 I will still play for Celtica If they ever need a sub of course.  So you may see me from time to time… Xxx” (Find the full text athttps://www.facebook.com/The-Phantom-Piper-1404744276424319/) We are very sad that Jane will leave the band, but we understand her decision. For several years Jane was an important part of Celtica as well as an outstanding bagpiper and performer as a true tour mate and friend. If you want to see Jane perform a last time with Celtica in Europe, you have to come to at least one of these shows: Aug.8^th, Toulouse/ FRA, Aug. 9^th, Gevaudan/ FRA, Aug. 10^th, Bremen/ GER, Aug. 17^th, Eppstein/ GER, Aug. 18^th, Glasgow/ UK, Sept. 7^th, Selb/ GER; All the dates of her US-farewell-tour are posted on the brand new US website https://www.celtica.us/tour and on Facebook. Jane, we will miss you – all the best for the future!

I´m very sorry for my late posting, but we have received the Australian Celtic Music Award already 3 weeks ago! We are very proud to be “Artist of the Year” and see it as our goal to be worth it!

We are very honoured and very happy about the overwhelming, enthusiastic reviews we got so far for our double album “Live at Montelago”! Here are some quotes, please find the full reviews at https://celticarocks.com/explore/reviews/ Folk-metal.nl: The quality of the performance is spectacular! I hope …to be able to continue listening to great releases like “Live at Montelago”. Le Canard Folk, Belgium: This Celtic rockband… is phenominal, with an incredible power. You won´t have time to catch a breath while listening! celtic-rock.de: A band, that is setting the benchmark in the scene, creates a new genre: Symphonic Celtic Rock! In my car the sound was absolutely brilliant, fat beats, clear sound –…goosebumps! crossfire-metal.de: The international line up sets loose with their original composition Dantes´ Inferno and that is rewarded with an absolutely fanatic audience. For anybody who is into Celtic Mediaval

As for steep demand we have reordered copies of the Celtica-calendar. It is available at a slightly reduced price –as it is already mid January- directly at Karin Schedler, karin.schedler@icloud.com; This way you have the best of all pipe-rockbands with you all through the year…;-)

https://youtu.be/6FeVrrXauIE

Like every year we want to thank all people who have worked with and for us, all promoters who have booked us, all musicians we had the honour to share the stage with, all sound – and light technicians who made our shows sound and look great, to all photographers for awsome shots, to all customers for buying our CDs and Shirts, and to YOU, our fans and friends all over the world: Thank you for your love and support…

Yesterday we got asked if we could come one day earlier to Dortmund and perform an additional day at the Phantastische Lichter Weihnachtsmarkt. After a few pretty stressful hours we could confirm -at least partly: Unfortunately our ladies can´t make it, so on Friday it will be “all guys Santa Claus hohoho-power”. On Saturday and Sunday we will play the 1st time with full line up at the PLWM and the last show of the year. For Friday please get prepared for a definitely not  Silent Night, but a loud Knight…

Today the mixes of the concert recorded at Montelago Celtic Festival on August 4^th 2017 got finished. The brilliant sound technicians at GOSH Audio, Stephan Kolber and Tom Goethe, and Gajus as the producer spent a lot of time to polish up the live-tracks featuring the classical orchestra “Compagnia della Piuma”, to catch not only every note played but also the fantastic atmosphere at this unique night. The first copies of the album will be available begin of December, in a few days we will present sound samples on our webshop and the option to pre-order it: Right in time for Christmas…

In October and November some smaller shows in France, Germany, Switzerland and Austria will be performed in compact line up: Rocking some smaller stages between the big festivals!

Thank you for the wonderful time we had at Milwaukee! We gladly come back any time we are invited…!  

We enjoyed playing the European Harley Week 2016 and were honoured to meet Bill Davidson there in person and to take a picture with him. He invited us to “say Hello” the next time we would be in Milwaukee, so, when our performance at the Milwaukee Irish Fest was confirmed, we finally had the chance to accept this invite and had a great day at the museum. Thank you so much Bill, Paul Hoff and Jaqueline Miller for this really awesome experience!

Maybe for the public winter and eve the last weeks looked pretty quiet, but behind the scenes it was and still is a extremely busy time. The main project 2017 will be the filming of a very special Celtica-Live performance at Montelago/ Italy on August 4^{th ,} trying to to capture the full energy of our live shows on DVD. Besides the awesome festival, the outstanding land scape and the amazing audience, we are very happy to announce that we could get a classical orchestra and choir, the amazing musicians of “Voices and Orchestra Compagnia della Piuma” from Siena, Italy, to perform with us and to bring our sound to a tremendous Level!

If you are inPisa,Italy, or around come to the SteamCon at the Old Slaughterhouse, headlining CELTICA tonight at 10:30pm: We gonna rock this historic town! Please don´t blame us if after our concert the Tower has collapsed – it was already inclined before our performance…

We had a wonderful time at the WWWC in Old Tucson. Thanks to all the awesome people who contributed their creativity and energy to make our video of “Megawatt” a fabulous, phantastic visual sensation and for rockin´Old Tucson in the evening! We gladly come back any time. The video will be released in something like 4 weeks.

We created an easy dance for our tune “Megawatt” and we would love to see you dance it anytime we perform it! Please have a look at this short video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dL7IXQ4JzzMWe hope you enjoy it as much as we did -unfortunately we cannot do it when we play our instruments live on stage, so it is up to you… You can find more detailed information “How to dance Megawatt” at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhC2Uc6lMLI

We open the new year with a compact US-live-tour, starting with a concert and video-shoot at Old Tucson/ Arizona: The Wild, Wild West Convention, America’s first and only Steampunk convention and festival that takes place in a western-themed town, is the perfect place for our next Steampunk-themed video! Old Tucson is followed by the Sonora Celtic Fair, where we are invited already the 4th time in 5 years. The big party finale is 2 days St. Paddy´s weekend at the piper Down in Salt Lake City: Great to be back at this awesome pub!

We just got the information, that the Celtica- video of “Full Steam Ahead!” got nominated in the category “Best Video of the Year” at celtic-rock.de, one of the biggest Celtic platforms in Europe. You can vote between Dec.10^th till 20^th. As soon as the voting starts we will post the link and how to vote. So, if you like the video and if you want to support us please help us to finish 2016 with an award…Thank you! If you like to watch the video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ie2tSQV4Nuw

We finish the phantastic season 2016 in Europe with a little Germany tour (Illingen, Potsdam and Worpswede). Our new CD and live show Steamphonia got enthusiastic applause, the new sound and look became a huge success: Thank you! Also our current video “Full Steam Ahead!” got rave notices from experts and fans (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ie2tSQV4Nuw). Soon we´ll head for the USA, from Ocean Shores in the very North, close to the Canadian border, to Salt Lake City and Tucson at the Mexican border. The tour end at wonderful Hawaii… For those, who want to see as in 2016 a last time, there is a chance at the awesome Phantastic Winter Lichermarkt at Dortmund, GER, on Dec. 3^rd and 4^th

It was very exciting to present the brand new video „Full Steam Ahead!” live at the atmospheric Pauluskirche at Dortmund, GER, on September 23^rd. We played the tune live while the video was projected on a huge video screen. The enthusiastic reaction of the audience was a wonderful proof that all our work (and all the fun we had wearing wigs and false beards…;-) was truly appreciated: Thank you! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ie2tSQV4NuwFoto by Peter Bernsmann: Thank you!