Fiddle Players: 3 to discover +bonus ideas

Fast paced dance tunes, quiet slow airs, thoughtful backing of singers, classical orchestras and string quartets, bluegrass bands and ceilidh bands: fiddle players show up in all these, other places too. Whatever your choice of style, spring and summer make especially good times to hear the fiddle. Many festivals are underway or upcoming.

In mid May each year World Fiddle Day is on the calendar, too, to remind about exploring the creativity to be found in the work of fiddlers. And violinists. It's the same instrument,

Ideas to get you started on that exploring, some players you may know and some artists who may be new to you.

Alasdair Fraser, from Scotland, began his career as a scientist. That career took him to California. One day, as he found himself writing out a fiddle tune when he was meant to be focusing on his science work, he realized what he really wanted was to play the fiddle, compose tunes, and share with others his joy in music.

These days, Alasdair does all those things, through a range of musical experiences and partnerships, and as founder and instructor at several top class fiddle camps..

One of his musical partnerships is with cellist Natalie Haas. They've appeared all over the world, and though they've recently announced that they will be working on individual projects going forward, they've made many fine albums still to be enjoyed.

There's a bit more to the the ongoing fiddle story for each of them too: Alasdair's son, Galen, plays in the duo San Miguel Fraser with his wife Maria San Miguel,. Natalie's sister, Brittany Haas, is part of the band Hawktail, and plays with other bluegrass and Americana groups and artists including the Punch Brothers, Crooked Still, and Carrie Newcomer.

Mairead Ni Mhaonaigh grew up in and Irish speaking area of Donegal in Ireland's northwest. Mairead learned fiddle early, and trained as a teacher, thinking that she and her husband, flute player Frankie Kennedy, would teach through the school years and in summers follow their love of playing music.

Call of music proved too strong though -- and also, they were really good at it.

Mairead on fiddle (she is a singer and composer too) and Frankie on flute formed the band Altan with several friends.

Band members came and went, Frankie took ill and passed on at a young age. Mairead, though, is still one of Ireland's top fiddle players and composers, leading the band Altan in sharing Donegal music across the world, and working on other projects, including String Sisters, T with the Maggies, and teaching lessons over the internet. Mairead's daughter Nia Byrne, herself a fine fiddle player, sometimes plays with Altan. >Hanneke Cassel is based in Massachusetts in the US. Her music is grounded in the sounds of Scotland (she's studied and taught there) and Cape Breton, with now and then hints of her US background and of other places she's traveled as well.

There are so many great fiddlers, from Ireland, Scotland, Cape Breton, the US who work in Celtic styles. If this sort of music is new to you, the work of the artists named above is a great place to started exploring. You will find more in the archives here, and I'll have more to share in future too

You might also enjoy learning about these players
John McCusker: Best of
Nicola Benedetti: Homecoming
Cape Breton Music: essentials for exploring

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Straw Against the Chill

Straw Against the chill: that is an image of winter, certainly, and perhaps, an idea of hope and future.

It is also the title Bob Franke chose for his story of winter an the Christmas season,

Kathy Mattea sings it here.

Among those who join her are her longtime musical collaborator Bill Cooley, and guest Joanie Madden of Cherish the ladies who adds whistles to the story Kathy sings.

Whether the Christmas is a season you celebrate or not, I think you will find ideas of human connection, of the quieter times of winter, and of the power of story and song as you listen.

May it be good companion to you through Advent, Christmas, and at the eyar’s turning.

You may also wish to see
Music for the peace of winter over at Wandering Educators, where this song is set in contect with others
A reflective winter song from Cara Dillon
About the album Calling Me Home from Kathy Mattea

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Advent: a song for reflection and a song for dancing

Advent.

It is a season of preparation, reflection, looking forward to Christmas and back at the year drawing to a close.

Perhaps Christmas and Advent are not of your faith or on your calendar of seasons.

Still it is a time of that invites reflection, that holds both solitude and connection.

Music is good companion to those different aspects of the season.

With that in mind, as Advent begins, a song for reflecting and a song for dancing, too.

The first day of Advent this year is also Saint Andrew;s Day. Saint Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland, so it seems only right to begin with a song from one of Scotland’s top musicians.

Emily Smith comes from Dumfries and Galloway in the southwest of Scotland. A few years back, she found herself snowed in at her home.

During that time she wrote Winter Song, which considers the quiet of that deep snow covered landscape and the passage of winter days and nights into the New Year.

Celebrating and being with others is a part fo the preparation and celebration of Advent too.

That’s something Suzy Bogguss and her husband Doug Crider took inot full account when they were writing the song Two Step Round the Christmas Tree. Whether or not Christmas is your holiday or not, whether there’s a Christmas tree about or not, if you know how to dance the two step well or never heard of it, you will be drawn into the lively spirit of the song. Likely you will find yourself joining in on the singing of it, and perhaps dancing as well.

Quiet reflection, lively dance steps: both are good ways to begin and to refresh spirits as Advent begins.

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Also...

If you enjoy what you are reading here, I've begun publishing a newsletter at Substack with more stories about music, the people who make it, and the places which inspire it. Come visit and explore!

You might also like to see
Another song of the season, about preparation, and a cat
Music for Starry Winter Nights, at Wandering Educators
About One More Christmas, from Christine Albert and Chris Gage. RIP this Chritmas, Chris.

Celtic Colours and Catching Up

It has been a bit quiet here. With all the noise going on in the world perhaps that’s been needed.

Time for a bit of catching up though. I do have great music coming up to write about for you here and in other places.

Right now, though: if you are new here, welcome. If you are regular reader, thanks for sticking with me. Music Road turned nineteen this past summer.

First, you’ll want to know about great concnerts you can tune in to live this week (10-18 October) or watch on replas through 31 October.

These are happening at the Celtic Colours International Festival on Cape Breton in Nova Scotia. Lots of Cape Bretoners, of course, and artists from Ireland, Scotland, Northern Ireland, the US, England, and many places across Canada also.

Next, a few greatest hits and stories you may have missed here at Music Road, followed by news of and several links to other related projects.

Spell Songs II: Let the Light In
Irish music, Irish landscape
Cathie Ryan: Through Wind and Rain
Music and Mystery: Carrie Newcomer

Over at Substack, I’ve begun a newsletter. It’s called Along the Music Road. Different or additional perspectives on artists you’ve met here and others you’ve yet to meet here, along with other related stories. There are subscriptions at no cost and paid ones if you’d care to support my work (hint: you can subscribe for as long or as short a term as you’d like) and you can also follow if you do not wish to subscribe.

Sunday Sessions: Traverse
Sunday Sessions: a song about hanging in through hard times
Songs of Protest, part 4: Onward

At Wandering Educators, I write a once a month (usually third Monday of the month, though this can vary slightly) series called Music for Shifting Times.

Music for Autumn's Connections, from an earlier autumn
The backstory of the series, along with links to all episodes, oldest first -- scroll all the way fown the page for the most recent

I’ve also several other sorts of stories in the archive at Wandering Educators, among them an interview with Rosanne Cash, a look at the story of Putumayp World Music, and a conversation with Scottish fiddle player and composer Sarah-Jane Summers.

At Perceptive Travel I write three stories a month, usually.
Travel as seen through music, history, and the arts, most often.

A preview story about this year’s Celtic Colours Festival
Passim: Music and History on Harvard Square
Glasgow in Six Statues
Northern Ireland: 4 Songs to Help You Understand

I hope you will enjoy exploring the archives here and learning about these others projects. Thank you for being here. Whether you are new to Music Raod or a long time reader, I invite you to stay tuned as explorations continue.

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Scotland's music: John McCusker --The Best Of

John McCusker: perhaps you’ve seen him play his fiddle on stage backing up folk singer songwriter Eddi Reader or rocker Mark Knopfler.

Could be if you follow Scotland’s music, you may recall his longtime stint as a member of the Battlefield Band as is career began, or his continuing presence as part of the ’hoose band’ backing musicians at Transatlantic Sessions at the Celtic Connections Festival in Glasgow and on the road.

McCusker is in demand as a producer and composer as well. He’s worked with Roddy Woomble, Eddo Reader, Heidie Talbot, Cathie Ryan, and others as producer and composed music for soundtracks for Heartlands and for Billy Connolly’s Tour of New Zealand, among other projects.

John has composed tunes for his own recordings as well. Among those recordings are Goodnight Ginger and Hello Goodbye.

Thinking about all these experiences and aspects of his work went into John’s thinking as he chose tracks for the recording John McCusker -- The Best Of.

It’s an interesting journey. There are tunes and songs, four newly composed pieces along with well known favorites and lesser known pieces, all sorts of collaborations alongside solo work.

There’s a lot to listen to and take in, to be sure. If you do not know John’s work, taking the tracks as he’s set them out will serve you well. Seeking out pieces which included your favorite guest artists is also a worth while way to begin.

That said, I’ll point out the sets Brian’s Jigs and Sadenia’s Air/Baron’s Air (Eddo Reader guests on that) as two varied ways to enjoy waht John does. ‘s Tusa Thilleas with Julie Fowlis is another to look out for, as is The Wishing Tree Set from the trio of McGoldrick, McCusker, Doyle. Listen out for the solo track Leaving Friday harbour, too.

There’s a lot more to explore of John McCusker’s work on this recording and in his other work.

I was fortunate to attend the release cocnert for this recording in Glasgow. It both was amd was not as expected. Was: a lot of great music, many guest musicians who appeared on the recording joined in. Was not: didn’t follow the list of tunes that appeared on the album at all -- which you’d rather expect of John anyway, in truth.

Some pieces from the recording, to be sure, but favostures from the guests. John persuaded Eddi Reader to sing her classic hit Perfect, for instance, with everybody on stage at City Halls and most in audience joining in.

It turned out to be a fine celebration of music, creativity, talent, and friendship.

You could say that of the album John McCusker: The Best Of-- as well.

You may also like to know that there’s a book called John McCusker: The Collection which includes 100 of John’s tunes.

Photographs by Kerry Dexter. made with permission of the artist and the venue. Thank you for respecting copyright.

You may also enjoy

A story about a song from Eddi Reader
Another fiddle player to know
More music from Scotland to explore

Your support is welcome, and needed, as Music Road is a reader supported publication. Thank you for considering...

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Eight Songwriters and a Scientist: The Darwin Song Project

Eight somgwriters were invited to take on a creative challenge...

When you think of Charles Darwin — should you think of him at all — you might call up images of the tropics in the Galapagos Islands, or the harsh climate of Tierra del Fuego at the tip of South America, or possibly monkeys and courtrooms in Tennessee.

All of those have connections with the nineteenth century scientist, but with the exception of five years spent voyaging around the world on the HMS Beagle, Darwin spent most of his life and did most of his groundbreaking thinking and writing at home in rural Shropshire, in the English midlands, not far from the border between England and Wales.

It was there that eight songwriters gathered, in a farm house that was already old in Darwin’s time, to create a group of songs to mark the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth.

That in itself would have been challenging enough. Added in to The Darwin Song Project: although each musician was an accomplished writer and performer in the folk music world, for the most part they did not know each other at all.

In addition, they’d have to perform the songs at an already sold out concert at the end of the week they’d spend together, a concert which would be recorded for an album and taped for a program to be broadcast on the BBC.

A full set of challenges, then...

It seems only right that the song they decided on to open the concert and the recording was called Trust in the Rolling Ocean. It finds Darwin jumping head first into voyages to unknown lands.

That song was a collaboration among four of the writers, Karine Polwart, from Scotland, and Jez Lowe, Rachael McShane, and Stu Hanna, all from England.

Many of songs the group created are collaborations, while a a few, such as American Krista Detor’s meditation on time, change, and mystery called Clock of the World, were written by a single artist.

The flourishing strangeness and attraction of tropical lands comes up in another song, Turtle Soup. Darwin is on the run in the western outlaw style ballad We’ll Hunt Him Down, and From Miss Emma Brawley finds an indignant woman setting Darwin straight on man and monkeys.

Deep questions of faith, family, and facing change come into play beyond the science and the controversy, as well.

Mother of Mysteries, written by American Mark Erelli along with Karine Polwart, puts Darwin the questioner front and center. Erelli has a master’s degree in evolutionary biology, “but I felt that stuff was tangential to any songs we were going to write. It was really more about the man than the theory,” he said.

That’s a conclusion to which all of the artists came, although they each did differing sorts of research while preparing for the project.

“I wasn’t too bothered by the science side of things,” Emily Smith said. “I don’t grapple with evolution, it’s not really bothered me about where we come from or how old we are and what not.”

Smith, from Scotland, mixes both traditional material from Scotland and her own original songs in her work. “I was much more drawn to his personal life,” she said, “and his relationship with Emma and the children.”

Darwin and his wife Emma shared a deep love, and deep differences over ideas of faith.

Smith, along with Stu Hanna and Jez Lowe, get to the heart of that elegantly yet directly in Save a Place :

Farewell my love

Close though you be

Your mind is many many miles away

From your children and me

The world you spent traveling is here

at your feet:

Is there a way to make it all complete?

At the end of the week, all the songs, styles of collaboration and co writing, and differing voices and instruments came together for the live concert, and live recording at Theatre Severn, in Shrewsbury.

“The stage was brand new, too, and the day we had the concert, the theatre staff, the sound guys, us, the music — everybody was literally finding their feet everywhere, “ Smith recalled.

“There was such potential for things to go wrong, but I think there was such huge hope in all our hearts for things to go smoothly — and I’m still amazed at how good the recording sounds. If we’d gone into a studio, you wouldn’t have gotten that energy to it.”

A fine energy, indeed, excellent leads, creative backing vocals and instrumentation, and a range of thought provoking songs which reach beyond the specific details from which they arose.

Whether science, family, history, or creativity is your focus, the songs these musicians created for The Darwin Song Project will make good companions.

Another version of this story first appeared at Perceptive Travel. It is no longer available so it seemed a good time to bring The Darwin Song Project here, especially as you’ll find other stories about several of these artists here at Music Road.

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Scotland's Music:Energy Islands from Fara

Orkney has long been a crossroads of travel, or connection, of commerce, of culture, of contacts, of creativity.

This group of islands is part of Scotland’s Northern Isles, lying off the north coast of Scotland’s mainland county of Caithness.

Orkney’s landscapes and stories, and those of nearby Assynt in Scotland’s north mainland, are sources of inspiration for the creativity of the four musicians of the band Fara.

That’s especially evident in their album called Energy Islands.

There is music inspired by wind turbines, an early day business woman not to say witch who sold fair winds to sailors, waves, shipwrecks, and those winds, the light and dark in this northern land, and ponies, to mention a few things.

The four members of Fara each write music as well as play it and arrange it, so you will find songs and tunes from all of them on Energy Islands. At times, too, they use words from other Orkney artists as lyrics in their songs. They each took part in producing the album and invited top string player,composer, and arranger Seonaid Atlen to join them in that. She also guests on two tracks.

Jeana, Kristan, Catriona, and Rory each bring diverse ranges of interests and experiences to the music they create.

The three women grew up as childhood friends in Orkney. Each went away to study music, pursuing degree studies at RCS, Royal Academy of Music, Royal Northern College of Music and Strathclyde University.

Classical music, traditional folk, improvisation, and contemporary composition were among the areas where their various academic interest led them.

Back in Orkney, the three with longtime friend Jennifer Austin on keyboards, performed as Fara, opening a set at the late night after hours club at the Orkney Folk Festival.

“The Orkney show was originally only meant to be a one-off, but we had such great fun, we thought we’d try doing a few more,” Kristan said.

Ten years on, they’re still at it, with awards and welcoming audiences on an extensive touring schedule, festival apperances, and recordings. Energy Islands is the most recent of those at this writing.

When original member Jen Austin moved on to other projects, the three frontwomen invited Rory Matheson to join in. A past finalist in Scotland’s Young Traditional Musician of the Year award brings jazz and blues interests along with his strong background in traditional music to the band. He comes from Assynt in mainland Scotlands far northwest.

Matheson finds that the fiddle led arrangements of Fara work well for piano accompaniment. “It’s also really interesting to explore the parallels between Orkney and Highland music – and to create new ones,” he said. “And being the token male seems pretty good so far – I get a room to myself wherever we go...”

I’ve had the chance to see Fara in both smaller venues and headlining main stage at Celtic Connections when they hosted and collaborated with internationa artists from Africa, the Caribbean, Quebec, and elsewhere. Fara are always worth seeing in performance. If you have the chance to do so, take it.

Listening to Energy Islands is a fine way to learn about or refresh your knowledge of Fara;s music.

On the recording they offer song and tune drawn from the natural world of Orkney, its connections with the sea, and its stories, history, and legends.

For the set Wind Dancers, there’s a tune Jeana composed when she was commissioned by the Saint Magnus Festival to create music inspired by a particular verse from the poem Fiddlers at the Harvest Home by Orcadian poet George Mackay Brown.

The verse is called Corn. The tune is Called Chinook Winds. Jeana drew her music from imagining the chinnok winds rippling through corn fields at harvest time. Orkney is not short of wind -- wind turbines power things at many places on the islands. That wind is not always a gnetle guest though.

In her tune Turbine Down, Harv takes note of this, dedicating it “to all the domestic wind turbine ownersat home who spend a great deal if time attending to the consequences of our infamous ‘light breeze,’ which often proves too much for the poor machines!”

Fiddles and piano take on arrangements for lively and more reflective tunes and songs threaded through with connections to landscape, story, and the natural world.

In the set White Horse Power, tunes from Rory and Harv draw on the ideas of waves -- tthe white horses of the sea -- and are joined by Quicksilver, a tune Catriona wrote thinking of a real horse, her childhood pony Silver.

The songs in this well paced album featured words from Orkney writers adapted and put to music from members of Fara.

There’s a thoughtful story about the Northern Lights, and another about making it through dark nights with a song to hang onto until day breaks.

There’s also a lively song from a legengs about a woman (amybe a sorceress?) who sold fair winds to sailors. Energy Islands is creatively, thoughtful refreshing music, informed by sea and story. Well worth repeated listenings to unpack the treasures within.

You may also wish to see

More music from Scotland...

Another artist from Scotland whose album you may enjoy learning about

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