Review: Celtic Connections

2 days ago , by Richard Lutz

RICHARD LUTZ takes his pew for a three week bash

I first saw Rhiannon Giddens nine years ago when she was a young rising star guesting with the Transatlantic Sessions group that fuses music from both sides of the ocean. She was remarkable, the voice of an angel and deeply rooted in her local Carolina music.

Well, almost a decade later, here she is at The Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow. And while she’s headlining on one side of town with her solo act, the Transatlantic Sessions supergroup, still active, are on the other side of the city chugging along nicely with its fifteen member band.

Giddens voice now has deepened and matured and she’s more confident as she delves into gospel, blues, folk arcana and r&b. She’s a true Americana star. Helped no doubt by her training as an opera singer.

As for Transatlantic Sessions itself, well, it’s still hitting the stage after 3 decades, fronted this year by lyricist Loudon Wainwright. As is traditional, Transatlantic Sessions signs off the festival’s glut of gigs, and is the annual centrepiece. It sells out the city’s modern concert hall (no back lane boozers or sleazy bars here) and I’ve seen this ever changing jam session for years now and though polished and proficient, there’s always an air of smugness about the show- a shtick of ‘aren’t you lucky to buy expensive seats and see us..lucky you.’

The voice of falling snow

But moan as you will, Transatlantic Sessions does deliver, year after year, January after January, Wainwright with his fifty year palette of irony, self flagellation and cuteness headlines. But the outright star is Hebridean vocalist Julie Fowlis, described by one commentator as having the voice of falling snow. It’s an apt metaphor and, adding in the Gaelic language (made in heaven for the human voice), her two sets raise the bar considerably.

Another act to mention is Special Consensus. It’s a bluegrass quartet that’s been jangling and jingling for half a century. You think of bluegrass, your mind does wander to Bill Monroe. And while this performance at the Oran Mor bar did give a nod or two to the Tennessee superstar, there’s a full salute to Canadian musicians that so richly embroider the Americana landscape.

The quartet, from the mid west (Illinois, Missouri) shines a sharp northern light on country tunes, country picking and jazz riffs that decorate the eye-raising banjo work by Greg Cahill and the voice of Greg Blake whose singing is as clear as a Christmas church-bell, part Lester Flatt, part Willie Nelson….a voice from the polyglot musical heart of America, indeed.