By Bob Keefer

Listening to a couple tracks from Dervish’s upcoming album “Travelling Show,” you’re probably expecting something along the lines of the Chieftains.

Sure enough those plucked strings start up and singer Cathy Jordan’s lilting voice comes in and — wait ...

We’ve heard those words somewhere before:

“Gypsies.”

“Tramps.”

Holy cow, she’s actually singing a Cher song, “Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves.”

The thing is, when Jordan starts singing she could make Hawaiian music sound Irish.

We called her at home in Sligo, Ireland, to see just what it was that made her embrace the music of Cher.

“At the time I was just listening to a lot of music and finding folk songs in the most unlikely places,” she said. “Sounds like Dire Straits’ ‘Brothers in Arms.’ Songs like the Rolling Stones’ — hmmm — ‘take me to the airport’? — ‘No Expectations!’ Songs like that, that seemed, even though they were written in a contemporary genre, they could have been from the last century. OK, apart from the word ‘airport,’ I suppose.”

Dervish will play Friday at the Shedd, undoubtedly working Jordan’s nicely nuanced version of Cher into the show.

“One day I heard Cher’s song. I had heard it years ago. But I didn’t listen with the same ears back then. It is like a little folk song screamin’ to get out. I played around with it in the house. We started doing it at shows. It went down really well. People really loved it.”

Dervish was started in 1989 by five musicians who cut an album they called “The Boys of Sligo.” They later chose the name “Dervish” to describe themselves as enraptured by music. Jordan signed on in 1991 and the band soon began touring. The second Dervish album, “Playing with Fire,” hit No. 1 on the Irish folk music charts.

They have performed with the likes of James Brown, the Buena Vista Social Club, Oasis, Sting, REM and Beck.