Ireland, Scotland, and Story: Allt from Julie Fowlis, Eamon Doorley, Zoe Conway, and John McIntyre

Music is story. Story told in word, stories held in melody and harmony, through voice, instrument, and language. Those are aspects of music that Julie Fowlis, Êamon Doorley, Zoe Conway, and John McIntyre investigate and respect in their recording Allt.

The stories they choose to explore for this recording come from the traditions of Ireland and Scotland. There are songs and tunes from history, alongside songs with words from contemporary and historic poetry for which the musicians have made new music, and new compositions of their own creation drawing on traditional style.

That may sound like quite a bit to pack into a cohesive whole on a recording of eleven tracks. It is, and if anyone is well qualified to take that on, it is these four.

Each of these musicians is well known for a particular aspect of their creative gifts. Those come into play here -- and they each go beyond those to share other aspects of their talents. Julie Fowlis is known as a lead singer; here she sings harmony and plays whistles as well. Êamon Doorley’s work on the bouzouki has marked him as one of the best on that instrument in the Celtic world. Here he sings and plays fiddle as well. Zoe Conway is well known and much in demand for her work on Irish fiddle and on classical violin; for this project her lead and harmony vocals and her skills on the whistles also come into play. John McIntyre, best known as a guitarist, steps up to sing here as well as adding in his piano skills.

As the recording opens, each takes it in turn to lead the music, and they each step in to support the others as the music progresses. Fowlis sings lead on Port Dannsaidh Hiortach the lively Saint Kilda Dance Song, which is paired with Deora Dé, a tune from Conway. You can hear Conway’s singing on Faoiseamh a Gheobhadsa, a gentle, searching ballad with words by Máirtín Ó Direáin whose title means I will Find Solace. McIntyre steps up for a song called An Ghaelige, which as its title might suggest is in praise of (and in part lament for) the language. This is followed by a set which sees two tunes by Doorley bookending one by Conway.

Those descriptions do not begin to do justice to the thoughtful, insightful way these stories are told through music, and the way the musicians support each other. Clearly these are artists who are deeply grounded in their own gifts and tradition, and well able to focus and listen to each other as the tunes unfold.

Add to that the way this project was recorded.

"Êamon and I were fresh from recording with Calum Malcolm,” Fowlis says “and I couldn’t see past working with him again!  I enjoyed working with him so much.  He is such an intuitive engineer and enjoys recording live, and in different settings.  As a quartet, we were keen to make this a live, honest and spontaneous recording.  And that’s what happened.  Calum set it up in such a way that we felt comfortable and inspired to play.  We used vintage mics, and recorded in the round. "

The project began from conversations between the two women.

Conway comes from and still lives in County Louth in Ireland. So does McIntyre. The two are married, as are Fowlis and Doorley, who come from Scotland and Ireland respectively, and make their home in the Highlands of Scotland.

Along with Irish musician Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh, Fowlis presents Port, a television series which traces connections among Celtic music and musicians. “Zoe and I worked together on one of the Port series on BBC ALBA.  She came to Ross Shire in the Highlands as a visiting artist, and it was then we really got chatting (and playing!) together,” Fowlis recalls. “Our paths had crossed before, on one of Bill Whelan’s performances in Belfast for example, but this was when we really got to know one another.  Sometimes you just really click with someone, and we both said that it would be great to do more together after that shoot.”

The pair stayed in touch and began discussing ideas. They liked the idea of writing new music together, and of honouring the languages and traditions of the landscapes they knew and loved. Support from Creative Louth, The Arts Council Of Ireland, and Iomairt Columcille allowed the four musicians time to research traditional and contemporary poetry they wanted to frame with new music, and to compose that music as well. “We searched out poetry to set music to, and ideas for tunes between us and started sending ideas back and forth,” Fowlis says. “We love the tradition but also the idea of adding to the store of songs and tunes and so we quickly settled on the idea of composing new music in a traditional style.”

There are fine lively pieces -- Dúirt Bean Liom in Irish paired with the tune Ríl Eóin and Na Hú Bhithinn paired with Hó Ró Na Priobaidean in Scottish Gaelic show the musicians’ joy in picking up the pace. A more reflective piece is Air an Somme, with words by Donald MacDonald.

There are instances of fine harmony work through many tracks on the project. This comes to the fore especially on the closing piece, An t-Earrach Thiar, a title which translates as spring in the west.

Bringing together tradition and inspiration, along with respect for language, history, and place: Julie Fowlis, Êamon Doorley, Zoe Conway and John McIntyre have created a lasting legacy with their work on Allt. "There are such beautiful poems out there, some hundreds of years old, some contemporary, and we felt really inspired to set these words to new music to bring them to life as songs, " Julie Fowlis says.

You may also wish to see
Julie Fowlis and Muireann Nic Amhloaoibh made an album exploring connections between songs in Scottish Gaelic and Irish called Dual.
Alterum from Julie Fowlis
Êamon Doorley is a member of the band Danu. Learn about their album Buan.

Photograph of Zoe Conway and John McIntyre and Julie Fowlis courtesy of the artists. Photograph of Eamon Doorleys by Kerry Dexter. Thank you for respecting copyright.

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Music & Mystery: Conversation with Carrie Newcomer Continues

Songs come to musicians in all sorts of ways, and they make notes and shape ideas and work out words and melody in all sorts of ways. “If you line up eleven songwriters and ask them their process, they’ll give you eleven different ways,” says Carrie Newcomer. “For me there’s a kind of literary bent to it, I guess, where I do a lot of poetry writing, and short stories, and essays. From those pieces, songs emerge.”

She isn’t thinking about the songs while she is immersed in other sorts of writing, though, not directly. It is, rather, the ideas and characters and flow of things she is working on -- or working out.

“I might have to write the whole essay to get to the one line that starts a song,” she says. “Also, a lot of it is how I process -- people say I’m pretty prolific, as a songwriter, but I think it’s just how I process my world, and my life. So I’m always writing, and I do a lot of poetry.

“Once I have the poem or the essay or maybe even a series of poems,” she continues,”I have all this language, and all these ideas I’ve been musing with -- it’s like I have this whole palette of stuff to work with, and I’ve thinking about it, mulling the idea over. Then when I go to write the song I might have some language I’ve been thinking through, but the words and the music happen together.”

What has also happened recently is the publication of Newcomer’s first book, called A Permeable Life: Poems & Essays. It is a companion piece to her album A Permeable Life. Newcomer turned to community funding for this recording, and at first was going to put together a small collection of poems to thank those who had helped make the album possible. “I had started a blog and begun posting some of my poems, so there was some interest in seeing a collection, so I thought I was going to put together a few poems that people might see as having a connection to songs,” she says. “But as I was doing that and we started sending them out, the response I was getting was really wonderful, really heartwarming, and we decided -- actually, my husband really encouraged me, he said you know, let’s just release this as a companion piece to the new album. So I said, yeah, sure, let’s do that!” Newcomer says, laughing.

”I’m used to putting out albums, and there’s a certain kind of thing that happens whenever you put out an album, or a song.You’re taking a certain kind of risk -- whenever you put yourself out there artistically, there’s certain kind of vulnerability to it. I’ve done enough albums now that I’m expecting it -- that doesn’t mean it gets any easier, it’s just that you’re familiar with it,” she says. “ But I had never put out that kind of art work before.”

There are thirteen essays and twenty six poems in the book. It is not necessary to know Newcomer’s work as a musician, or to have heard the songs on the album A Permeable Life, to appreciate what she’s doing as a poet and essayist, though the ways she tells stories and the ideas she choose to emphasize, and the language she chooses, do cross points and paths across the two projects. There are some pieces which relate directly to songs, and some which do not, or for which the connection is less clear. What is clear, however, is that Newcomer’s gift for observation, for including details of the natural world, and now and then bringing in her wry sense of humor come through whichever art she is practicing. So, too, does her gift for making the personal universal, and the thread of finding the sacred in the ordinary. In the essay called In the Sitka Pines, for example, an experience of the wilderness of Alaska and learning about Alaskan salmon forms the gateway into thoughts on transformation, in a piece that’s slightly longer than a page and all the more powerful -- and all the more leaving room to draw the reader in -- for its brevity.

Transformation, the idea of thresholds, and the practice of being present are threads which run through the songs on the album A Permeable Life and in differing ways through the material in the book A Permeable Life: Poems & Essays as well. The poem To a Titmouse finds transformation anchored in connection to an encounter on a snowy walk; Dharamsala, a poem begun after an experience while visiting India, suggests presence, connection, thresholds, and the possibility of transformation as well -- all done through an account of a procession and those watching it.

As a songwriter and singer, Newcomer has command of her tools and uses them to invite community, reflection, and the asking of good questions about life, faith, and change. These too are present in what she creates with her essays and poetry.

Countless prayer flags lifted in the mist
It was like music,
Light and fleeting,
LIngering in the quiet,
Filling the world with longing
And our own good intentions.
~excerpt from Dharamsala copyright Carrie Newcomer

Update: Newcomer has published other books of poetry -- and released several more albums -- since this article was first published. One of those books is

You may also wish to see
Music and Mystery: Conversation with Carrie Newcomer
India to Indiana in song and image
Ireland's Music: The Small Hours: Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh
Ireland's Music: Cara Dillon: A Thousand Hearts

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