Saint Bridgid's day: music & legend

Fire, poetry, healing wells, and highlands -- that’s a good group of things to be involved with. Saint Bridgid of Ireland, whose feast we celebrate on 1 and 2 February, is said to have influence over all of those. Many stories which have grown up around the biography of the fifth century saint are likely later additions, and it's likely that attributes of the pagan goddess Brigid have been added to the saint’s reputation. She is, whatever you think about all that, a figure of power and source of solace through Irish history, and a woman who was known for both her common sense and her holiness during her lifetime. Her feast day is also marked as the day to start looking for the first stirrings of spring in Ireland, which considering the nature of Irish weather, is often more in promise than in fact.

She is known as Bridgid of Kildare, for the most prominent abbey she founded there. Bridgid was born, though, in Louth, a place where the landscape lends itself to legend and mystery. There are schools, churches, pipe bands, football teams, and children named in her honor from Australia to Alberta. Next time you visit the National Museum of History in Dublin, you might keep an eye out for the pair of Bridgid’s shoes they have there.

Gabhaim Molta Brighde is a hymn of thanks to the saint which has come down through the centuries. in honor of Saint Bridgid’s feast, I invite you to take a look at the work of these musicians

Mary Black: 25 years 25 songs

Another Fine Winter's Night: Matt & Shannon Heaton

Cathie Ryan: Songwriter

reflections with Maura O'Connell

Dual: Julie Fowlis & Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh

Liz Carroll & John Doyle: Double Play

A way to support: you could

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heidi talbot: cathedrals

Heidi Talbot is working on her solo career after a stint as lead singer with the well known band Cherish the Ladies. Just now she's on tour opening for Scottish singer Eddi Reader, and singing backup with Eddi as well. Soon we'll have an interview with Heidi here at Music Road. Meanwhile, give a listen she sings one of her favorite songs, Cathedrals.





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heidi talbot: in love light

Voices: Cherish the Ladies
intersections: words, music, and Robert Burns -- and Eddi Reader

heidi talbot: in love + light

In Love + Light.

 

Songs that she could sing with conviction, stories that she really wanted to share with her audiences, and ones that she could live with and work with over time: these were things that Heidi Talbot took into consideration while working on her solo album, In Love + Light. She had another consideration in mind, too: though she’d had an enjoyable career as lead singer with the the internationally renown band Cherish the ladies, she knew it was becoming time to strike out on her her own. With the dozen songs on In Love + Light, Talbot draws together the threads of her career to the present moment, and builds a song case for transition into a flourishing solo act.

Those musical threads Talbot waves into the tapestry hear include a Tom Waits song, one from Boo Hewerdine and Eddi Reader, a traditional Scottish song, and one from Appalachia. What ties them all together is the quality of Talbot’s singing, in a soprano that is at once light, expressive, and conversational, and the quality of the songs she’s chosen. They are all real stories. fiction or true, poetic or down to earth, they’re filled with emotion, connection, and interest that lives on be on beyond the end of the song. Some, like Cathedrals, might raise more questions than they answer, while others, such as Everything or The Music Tree, are filled with hope and celebration. It’s a fine journey that talbot leads, one well worth taking along with her. Hewerdine produced the project and sits in on most tracks. There’s a duet with Orcadian singer Kris Drever on The Blackest Crow. Donald Shaw, John McCusker, and John Doyle are among others who back up Talbot through the project.

Here's a bit of video of Talbot singing one of the songs she's recorded on the album, with Kris Dever on guitar, John McCusker on concertina and fiddle.
The song is called Bedlam Boys.


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