Rowan has grown up surrounded by traditional music and song. Her father is a maker of violins and banjos and her mother a dancer and musician too. It was not long therefore, until Rowan picked up a very small fiddle at the age of 5 and began to learn folk music of the British Isles, later taking lessons at primary school with Cath James. Rowan played in various groups and clogged with a children’s dance team throughout her childhood, and began to take classical lessons at the age of 10. From then on, Rowan continued to play classical repertoire alongside folk music and attended summer schools in Cambridgeshire, where she was taught by Catriona McDonald for a number of years.
Rowan recently studied music at A level and focused on the fiddle music of Europe for her final recital concert. While studying and researching for this, an interest in the fiddle traditions of Scandinavia developed and she has now been granted a place at Brenderup Hojskole in Denmark to study folk music in the Autumn of 2007. Rowan also writes songs and performs with her band of musicians based in Sheffield. Currently living in London, she has set up at folk quartet which plays mainly English traditional music and continues to play solo.

Rowan has participated in the Common Ground Scotland summer school week on various occassions since 2003