Advent Reflection: 2 Songs

Advent. It’s the season of four weeks leading up to the celebration of Christmas.

If Christmas and/or Advent are not part of your faith calendar, this time in December is a good season in which to make time for reflection and for a bit of rest, perhaps, however busy your schedule might be.

Advent is a time for looking forward and for looking back.

It has been and continues to be a hard and uncertain time for many of us. All the more reason to look for the quiwt Advent may bring.

Music is good gateway and a good companion for this.

Sally Barris has a song called Magnify.

It was, she says, written during a time she was facing a number of challenges in her life.

In the song, she sings of making choices, of choosing, for instance, to focus on -- to magnify -- the hand held out to help rather than the hard stuff that led to needing that helping hand.

Sally, who is originally from Minnesota, has been based in Nashville for some time. Many artists turn to her cataloue of songs when they are looking for thoughtful, well crafted, and creative songs to cover.

At this writing, I am not aware that Sally has put Magnify out as a recording; it’s a relatively new song.

She has a number of her own albums out though well She is also well respected as a mentor, teacher, and member of Nashville’s music community.

Another good listen for your reflection this season is called Another Reason.

Aoife Scott sings lead; she and her partner, Andy Meaney. write the song several eyars back to celebrate the birth of Aoife’s first niece.

Good advice, good material for reflection in this gentle song. Aoife and Andy come from Ireland. You will find the song recorded on Aoife Scot’s album called Homebird.

You may also wish to see

Sally Barris website

Aoife Scott website

More about Aoife’s album Homebird

Over the years I’ve written quite a bit about music to listne to during Advent, Here’s a look back at one of those Advent listening ideas.

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Seeing Ireland: 3 music videos

Landscape and the love of it run deep in the heart of the music of Ireland. Whether you are dreaming of, remembering, or imaging a visit to the island of Ireland, here are three music videos that will help you see aspects of the place.

“This is what I believe that we bring to our audiences” says Mairead Ni Mhaonaigh. to her long time friend Moya Brennan, “that they can sense the beauty of this place.” The two are walking in Donegal where they both spent time growing up and where Mairead lives.

They go on share a memory and a song about the lights in the windows you see a at Christmas. Perhaps you are reading this at another time. It is a fine song nonetheless, good to enjoy at any season. As Ni Mhaonaigh and Brennan remark during their conversation, you are going to want to bring a heavy coat with you when you come to Donegal anyway...

You may find the song Soilse na Nollag/The Lights of Christmas, recorded on the Windham Hill collection called The Very Best of Celtic Christmas. You may find more of NI Mhaonaigh’s work on recordings by Altan, and of Brennan’s with Clannad.They each have solo albums out as well.

The Wild Atlantic Way has become the descriptive name for the many landscapes and places you will meet along the west coast of Ireland, all the way from KInsale in Cork to Malin Head in Donegal. There are six regions and, indeed all sorts of things to aexplore and all sorts of great music to hear as well.

Aoife Scott and Enda Reilly wrote the song All Along the Wild Atlantic Way, and with her partner and fellow musician Andy Meaney along for the journey Scott brings quite a bit of the place to life through this video as well as in the lyrics and melody.

You will find the song recorded on Scott’s debut album Carry the Day, and she has a second one out now as well, called Homebird.

There is much of the landscape of Ireland which lends itself to myth and legend, and many stories to go along. The stories may be true or may not, likely some of both in most cases. The song Port na bPúcaí/The Fairy Tune is one such. It comes from the Blasket Islands, which lie off the coast of west Kerry. Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh lives in the Dingle peninsula and across from the Blasket Islands.

The song, she says, was given her by her father, who told her the story that a Blasket Islands fisherman heard the music on the wind one night and played it on his fiddle. Some say it was a whale song, others that its origin was from the otherworld. The words are a story of a woman captured by the fairies. There is an otherworldly aspect to the landscape of the west Kerry shore where this video was filmed, and to the sound of the music, as well. Billy Mag Fhloinn constructed (after a concept of Gorkhem Sen) and plays the acoustic instrument called the yaybahar to compliment Nic Amhlaoibh’s singing. You will find the song on Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh’s recording Thar Toinn/Seaborne.

You may also wish to learn more about
Altan’s album The Gap of Dreams
Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh’s Foxglove & Fuschia
Another Irish musician who draws on landscape in her work to learn about
One of the most loved stories at Music Road: Irish music, Irish landscape

From the Music from Shifting Times series at Wandering Educators
Music for Connection and Contemplation, with music from Aoife Scott, Matt and Shannon Heaton, Cathie Ryan, and others

Photographs by Kerry Dexter, Thank you for respecting copyright.

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here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this. Thank you for considering.

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Ireland's music: Aoife Scott: Homebird

Aoife Scott opens her album Homebird with a song called Another Reason. It’s a song of hope and welcome and celebration, written by Scott and Andy Meaney for the birth of their niece Kitty.

It’s a song both gentle and lively at once. It begins a path into fine and varied storytelling through the tracks which follow.

Scott has a a warm and lovely voice, and well knows how to use the colours of it in the stories she chooses. Whatever sort of story she offers in a song, her love and respect for being a singer and sharing music come through clearly.

There is Ireland’s Hour of Need, in which the singer connects heroes from Ireland’s history to the present. It was written by Barry Kerr. On a somewhat related theme, Scott and Meaney wrote Fuel I Need. The idea there, Scott writes in the sleeve notes “is to know that your own strength and power will prevail,” as you turn anger in a better direction.

Irish Born, which Andy Meaney wrote, has a lively tune with a memorable sing along chorus. The words talk of experiences of the many Irish people who travel and live far from home.

There a gentle contemporary love song in Irish, Do Mhuirin O, and The Night Visiting Song from the tradition.

There a song from another tradition, too: a family tradition. Aoife is the daughter of Frances Black; her aunt is Mary Black; and many other Black family members are musicians too. It was her Granny Black who taught all of them how to sing, Scott says, but it was from her Nana Scott that she learned the sprightly song The Dublin Saunter. In Nana Scott’s honour and memory, she sings it here. Through her rendition you can see a lively atmosphere of a walk in Dublin on a spring day, and perhaps hear a bit of the love and joy Nana Scott shared in teaching the song to her granddaughter.

There are more tracks on the album; all of them are keepers and well worth your listening more than once. Scott brings things to a reflective close with a quiet take on a song by Briege Murphy called The Sea.

Ron Block (yes, that Ron Block, of Alison Krauss + Union Station) produced Homebird. He plays banjo on the album as well, along with Nashville compatriots Stuart Duncan on fiddle and Sierra Hull on mandolin. The contingent of Irish musicians in addition to Scott and Meaney includes Cathal O’Curran on bodhran, Floriane Blanke on harp, and Mary, Frances, Martin, and Michael Black along with next generation Black family members Roisin O, Danny O’Reilly, and Eoghan Scott on backing vocals.

You may also wish to see
Aoife Scott’s web site
Listening to Ireland:Patrick Season
About Aoife Scott’s album Carry the Day
Ireland’s music: Foxglove & Fuschia from Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh

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Ireland's Music: Aoife Scott: Carry the Day

“It’s my love letter to the West,” says Aoife Scott of her song All Along with Wild Atlantic Way. That it is, with visits to places from Croagh Patrick to Dingle, framed in the happy memories of a woman long gone from the area. There’s a bit more to that imaginative story -- it’s a love story between husband and wife across time and place really -- but the lively melody and Scott’s fine voice will draw you in however much of the story you catch on to or not.

It makes an excellent choice with which to open Scott’s debut album Carry the Day, showcasing her songwriting ability along with the colors of her voice -- and the fact that she knows well how to use her gorgeous voice in service of a song and its story.

That’s equally true when she moves to the rather more serious tone of We Know Where We Stand, as with All along the Wild Atlantic Way a song she wrote with musical collaborator Enda Reilly. It’s a song appropriate for and as Scott writes in the liner notes, somewhat inspired by the marking of the the centenary of the Easter Rising. In just a shade more than three minutes Scott and Reilly call forth many aspects of that hundred years and beyond, with images both familiar and new. “We stand on the hill of Tara with our hurleys in our hands” -- there’s resonance in that image for anyone with a connection to Ireland.

Down by the Shelleybanks is a quiet gem, a reflective piece in celebration of an area near Dublin which Scott knows and loves well. It’s framed in specifics, yes, but will reach all who have found a place to go for quiet reflection and the healing aspects of the natural world.

These are the first three tracks of a dozen Scott offers on the recording. About half the songs are originals. One takes a song her brother Eoghan wrote as a rock song into a folk/country direction. There’s Slan Leat, an original in Irish which is sort of a goodbye but our paths will cross again idea, and a bit of Irish too in Fásaim, a song inspired by her brother’s wedding. Songs by Si Kahn, Adrian Lawlor, and Sharyn Dimmick continue Scott’s interest in story told through character. A standout among these is Briege Murphy’s The Hills of South Armagh with its thoughtful take on the emigrant experience.

Aoife Scott has a fine voice and a clear understanding of ways to use it to tell stories she creates and admires. Though this is her first recording as a solo artist, she is not new to the music business. She has toured with the band The Outside Track and has appeared with Cherish the Ladies, Altan, and the RTE Concert Orchestra among others.

Though Scott originally thought she’d have a career behind the scenes -- and did, working successfully in television production for several years -- eventually music won out.

One reason for that might be family background. Aoife is the daughter of renown singer Frances Black. Her aunt is international star Mary Black, and her uncles Shay, Michael, and Martin have all worked professionally in music. Her brother Eoghan is a guitarist and producer. Her cousins Danny O’Reilly of The Coronas and singer songwriter Roisin O are making own marks in the music business as well.

With Carry the Day Aoife Scott continues to stake out her own place as a creative singer and songwriter in the next generation of ever evolving Irish tradition, and in the next generation of her family legacy as well.

Photo of tree in Dingle by Trevor Rickard
Photo near Poolbeg Lighthouse, Dublin, by Doug Lee

You may also wish to see
Aoife Scott's website
Ireland's music: two voices: Mary Dillon and Frances Black
Music, time, memory: Mary Black
Michael Black: music, family, friends
Cathie Ryan: Through Wind and Rain

-->Your support for Music Road is welcome and needed. If you are able to chip in, here is a way to do that, through PayPal. Note that you do not have to have a PayPal account to do this. Thank you.