FARMINGTON -Talisker, a group of eight musical friends from the Farmington-Wilton area, will present a concert of British traditional music at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 24, in Nordica Auditorium at the University of Maine at Farmington.

Talisker performs folk and traditional music from England, Scotland and Ireland, using vocal harmonies and a large number of exotic instruments, such a krummhorn, bouzouki, penny whistles, viola da gamba and bodhran.

The music will include lively pieces such as “Black-leg Miner” and “Whiskey in the Jar,” ballads such as “She Moved Through the Fair,” and comic songs such as “The Baffled Night.” Some come from sources as much as 400 years old. Some were popularized by such groups as Steeleye Span and The Clancy Brothers.

Local performers Donna and Peter Campion said they got the idea for a larger group after they performed at a recent UMF noon concert. Joining them will be Katherine and John Sytsma, local specialists in early music; Joel and Patricia Hayden, well-known in the Farmington musical community; and Dan Robbins and Elaine Eadler, who perform with UMF’s Chamber Choir.

“Donna and I did not present everyone with finalized arrangements,” says Peter Campion, who spent many university weekends in England at folk club meetings at the local pubs. “We rather invited input, so that the songs started to take on a character of their own. We’d look at each other and marvel at a really nice six-part harmony here, a viola da gamba riff there.”

The concert is sponsored by the Arts Institute. Suggested donations are $5 for adults. For more information, people can call Donna Campion at 645-9517.