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CD Review
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No Eyed Bird, CD Review >>
Julie Fowlis is a Gaelic singer from the island of North Uist, in Scotland. In Scottish Gaelic tradition, individuals compose little songs to reflect the events and mundane business of daily life. Fowlis in this album Cuilidh puts together a collection of 12 songs taken from the compositions of others on the island. Slightly rustic, and intensely personal, the album is a deep dive into the oral story-telling tradition of the culture. The melodies are moving and the characters memorable, and weave together a small microcosm of the people on the edge of the world. All the songs are sung in Gaelic to preserve the original forms, but the booklet luckily provides English translations for everything, allowing the general audience to peer into a language that is now spoken by about only 60,000 people in the world. Deeply touching, the songs touch upon lost love, hard lives of patriotic war vets, long journeys at sea… Track 2 “Mo Ghruagach Dhonn” for example is a love song lamenting a man’s lover going abroad to Australia. A beautiful ballad, the song reminds me of the medieval troubador music of Bernart de Ventadorn and his song “La Douza Votz” with their similar themes of lost love and acceptance. Track 9 “Oran Nan Raiders” is a song about a group of men who were promised land if they fight in the war (WWI). However, they are betrayed by the government and they decide to take matters into their own hands by attempting to seize the land themselves. Track 6 “Set Of Jigs” sounds like something straight from a medieval village, drawing from traditional European dance music structures. A big chunk of 6/8 time music, joyful tracks like these offset the more bittersweet and more tragic songs on the CD. Traditional and personal, the album is immediately accessible to the general listener with its focus on how folk music can fit into modern pop acoustic. (Believe me, medieval ballad/troubador music influenced a LOT of modern music!) 08/10/08 >> go there
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