Such an esteemed gathering of the clans as Lau fiddler Aidan O’Rourke, Scottish folk singer-guitarist Alasdair Roberts, Trembling Bells drummer Alex Neilson and Bradford-based folk singer Stephanie Hladowski can scarcely fail to prove a compelling combination. Such an esteemed gathering of the clans as Lau fiddler Aidan O’Rourke (below)And indeed this one-off Celtic Connections show is full of joyously free and wide-ranging collaborative treatment of traditionals, originals and improvisations, all imbued with plenty of good Glaswegian spirit.
Death and the Lady – an ancient-sounding English danse macabre, shrilly sung by Hladowski, following in the footsteps of, among many others, Shirley Collins on her new album Lodestar – makes for an incongruously bleak opener. “We thought we’d start with our cheeriest number,” jokes O’Rourke. The lilting Baron of Brackley and a version of tumbling drinking song Jock Hawk’s Adventures in Glasgow, learned by Roberts from Aberdeenshire folk singer George “Lordie” Hay, establish the set’s more playful centre ground.
An O’Rourke instrumental composition, inspired by James Robertson’s experimental short story book 365, at one juncture featuring a spoken-word reading by Hladowski, gives Neilson free rein to variously bash, brush and caress his kit; you could gladly sit and watch a creative player as Neilson drum all night. Several rakish Scots tragicomedies, Irish ballads and a cappella laments later, and Matt McGinn’s funny oddity Gallowgate Calypso gets tacked on as a crowd-pleasing encore. Its sunny melody and merry tale of drunken rapscallions spilling out of the pub is juxtaposed in time-honoured Glaswegian gallows-humour tradition with a Taggart-worthy reference to “murder polis in the Gallowgate”.
-
Celtic Connections festival continues until 6 February. Box office: 0141-353 8000.
.jpg?w=600)
