The Band
Renaissance meets traditional roots meets contemporary folk, this is lute-driven music for modern folk, in a unique blend of lute with vocals, bass, colascione (a kind of bass lute), violin, guitar and percussion.
The members of Ayreheart wield some of the most ancient instruments used in modern music. The band centers around the versatile lute textures created by Ronn McFarlane. Ronn conceived and founded the group in the wake of his Grammy nomination for the album Indigo Road, a compilation of his original works for lute. This was followed by the album One Morning, which formally introduced Ayreheart to the musical world.
Now filled out by bass and drums team, this staple rhythm section shows subtle surprises—fretless bass providing expressive foundation paired with percussion instruments from around the world. With Barley Moon, Ayreheart explores the intersection of folk and art music in Renaissance England, Scotland, and Wales.
With Heather Aubrey Lloyd (vocals, guitar, percussion), Ronn McFarlane (lute), Will Morris (bass, colascione, violin), and Mattias Rucht (percussion), Ayreheart brings fresh energy and rhythmic drive to ancient traditions and original music.
Band Members
Heather Aubrey Lloyd
- Vocals
- Guitar
- Percussion
Heather Aubrey Lloyd has spent two decades playing every state in the lower 48, in every kind of scene, with any kind of song that might set her up for a good story: bait shops, biker weeks, farmer’s markets, folk festivals, chamber music societies, and clothing-optional resorts. A recovering reporter, Lloyd’s love of the journey evolved into equally adventurous songwriting that “sits with fear, grief, and even absurdity until they yield not just resolution, but transformation.” Finger-picked guitar and hand percussion, influenced by Baltimore's diverse music scene, accompanies her “unmistakable, full-bodied instrument of a voice that channels grit as readily as vulnerability.” Her powerful, emotive, genre-fluid vocals show surprising range, and a downright refusal to settle into any one category alone. Best known as the co-front of alt-folk ilyAIMY (i love you And I Miss You), Lloyd's solo efforts have earned her recognition as a Falcon Ridge Folk Fest Most-Wanted Artist, National Women’s Music Fest Emerging Artist, No Depression-FreshGrass Finalist, Top 4 Telluride Troubadour, and Grand Prize Winner of the prestigious Bernard Ebb Songwriting Award. She was honored to open for the legendary Gordon Lightfoot on one of his final tours. 2026 finds her as the “Girlfunkel” in a wildly successful Simon & Garfunkel tribute, while also singing for lute-rock rebels, Ayreheart, featuring the Grammy-nominated Ronn McFarlane. Lloyd just released her second solo album, the “ambitious and unflinching” Panic Room With A View, “an alt-folk symphony, layering acoustic beauty with humor and hope,” says Amplify The Noise and MusicnGear.
Ronn McFarlane
- Lute
GRAMMY-nominated lutenist, Ronn McFarlane strives to bring the lute - the most popular instrument of the Renaissance - into today’s musical mainstream and make it accessible to a wider audience. Ronn is reinventing the lute for the twenty-first century, writing new lute music and performing in both traditional and non-traditional venues throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. Born in West Virginia, Ronn grew up in Maryland. At thirteen, upon hearing “Wipeout” by the Surfaris, he fell madly in love with music and taught himself to play on a “cranky sixteen-dollar steel string guitar.” Ronn kept at it, playing blues and rock music on the electric guitar while studying classical guitar. He graduated with honors from Shenandoah Conservatory and continued guitar studies at Peabody Conservatory before turning his full attention and energy to the lute. McFarlane was a faculty member of the Peabody Conservatory from 1984 to 1995, teaching lute and lute-related subjects. In 1996, Mr. McFarlane was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Music from Shenandoah Conservatory for his achievements in bringing the lute and its music to the world. He has over 40 recordings on the Dorian/Sono Luminus label, including solo albums, lute duets, flute & lute duets, viola da gamba & lute duets, lute songs, the complete lute music of Vivaldi, a collection of Elizabethan lute music and poetry, and recordings with the Baltimore Consort. Ronn has composed new music for the lute, building on the tradition of the lutenist/composers of past centuries. His original compositions are the focus of his solo CD, Indigo Road, which received a GRAMMY Award Nomination.
Will Morris
- Bass
- Colascione
- Violin
When smitten by classical music at age ten, the violin became the first in a long line of instruments taken up by Will Morris and still remains close to his heart. It was through the violin that he studied the mechanics of music. But having been bitten by the music composition bug at the age of 14, studying the violin was not enough. So as a teenager he took up piano, flute, saxophone, mandolin, guitar and learned how to play bass so that he could join the high school jazz band in which great strides of music study and composition developed, all the while keeping active as a classical violinist and earning pocket change as a pit orchestra musician for operas and musicals. Having become enamored with jazz as a teenager, he founded a jazz fusion group to perform and record with. This provided a great outlet for his modern compositions and provided fertile grounds from which bass skills could be stretched and refined. After a decade of intense bass playing Will gave it a rest to relieve stress on the hands and focus solely on the violin and string quartet composition. During this time he put his electric violin to work in a variety of live performing bands and studio recordings. In 2009 Willard took up the bass again to develop original music with Ronn McFarlane which combined the ancient lute with the modern electric bass, percussion, flute, harp and vocalist which became the group Ayreheart. While cultivating this music, he was cajoled to take on yet another instrument - this time reaching far back into the renaissance to bring forward the colascione, a bass cousin to the lute which provides an authentic foundational base by which early music can be realized by the ensemble. The violin and mandolin also make a few appearances in some of the instrumentals of Ayreheart.
Mattias Rucht
- Percussion
Mattias Rucht has been immersed in music his entire life. His father was a symphony conductor and his mother was a pianist. His first playground was in the midst of the orchestra and behind the stage. He started playing the drum-set at the age of twelve and began playing in southern rock bands at the age of fifteen. By college, he had advanced to jazz fusion. Mattias has been involved in multimedia development for many years. Mattias has composed music for animation, games, film & video and has had a computer based studio since 1984. At one point, all the instruments that he used were MIDI and electronic. Around 2002, Mattias started listening to some of the masters of world percussion and what they were doing with acoustic instruments. A simple tambourine or djembe could be more expressive than a rack of electronic instruments. This sparked his interest in world percussion and getting back to basics. Since then, he has discovered the joy of ethnic percussion and world music, bringing a wide range of influences to his playing style. For over 25 years, Mattias Rucht has been active in the Washington DC music scene as a drummer/percussionist, playing in various rock, jazz, folk and world ensembles. He has also performed in theatrical productions and accompanied dancers and storytellers.
