How many band leaders are also professional circus performers? Not many, I imagine. I only know of one: Katrina “Tree” Stewart is both a trapeze artist and the founder of the prog and symphonic rock band, The Emerald Dawn. The band’s latest album, The Land, the Sea, the Air, was released in digital formats on 7th October (vinyl will be available in early 2026). And, in addition to her music and performance art talents, Tree also paints the pictures for the album artwork.

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The Emerald Dawn is a four-piece band with a fairly conventional mix of instruments.

• Tree Stewart: vocals, keys, 12-string guitar, flute and percussion
• Ally Carter: guitars, soprano and tenor saxes, keys and backing vocals
• David Greenaway: fretted and fretless 6-string basses
• Tom Jackson: drums and percussion

There’s plenty of scope for variety of moods and textures there, and the band makes full use of it. Tree has a beautiful, silky voice; the keyboard instruments paint atmospheric backgrounds and embellish them with sprightly melodies; the saxes add a little raspy spice here and there; sometimes the guitars sing sweetly, sometimes they cry out in anger or despair; the bass and drums bind it neatly together with their own pretty ribbon ties.

The compositions are varied, too. The four tracks range in length from under 6 minutes to over 16. The longer pieces are constructed from distinct passages with their own motifs: a keyboard run, a guitar riff, or a rhythmic pattern. There are artful changes of tempo and texture, too. The album is brimming with ideas, all brought together to form a single, harmonious work of art. It’s a delight to the thinking musician’s heart and ears.

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The Emerald Dawn will be performing at The International in Leicester during Danfest on 29th November. If you are in the area, you like prog, and you’re up for another festival, I’m sure it will be worth the price of a ticket. Travel arrangements may be limited, though. The nearest airport is East Midlands (from where you can get the Skylink bus to Leicester), but that’s an expensive and environmentally ruinous mode of transport. The venue is slap bang in the middle of the country, about as far as you can get from the sea, and the Grand Union canal isn’t wide enough or deep enough for ocean-going vessels. So, I would go over land, if I were you, and help to bring about the emerald green dawn that Tree and her bandmates so fervently want for the world.