THE LENNON FAMILY: “Duchas Ceoil” (Gael Linn)

THIS IS an album for connoisseur and novice alike. Dúchas Ceoil is aptly translated: Dance Of The Honey Bees is precisely that, a celebration of every jig, step and slide that the four strings of the fiddle can conjure in an average day’s or night’s work. Ably embellished by guitar, flute, cello and the sean-nós singing of Charlie Lennon’s wife, Síle Ní Flaithearta, the entire Lennon family, root and branch, breathe new life into the older tunes and offer their original compositions to counterpoint the ones that came before.

Of the traditional tunes, many are already well-known but emerge like fresh blood under the learned tutelage of the Lennons (and a helping hand from Steve Cooney). Michael Coleman is surely grinning from ear to ear at the sweep of tunes they’ve adopted as their own: ‘Cherish The Ladies’, ‘Jenny’s Chickens’ and ‘Bonny Kate’, a jig and two reels that’ve been around the dresser more than once stand out like gleaming newcomers, their arrangements sparkling like new, the fiddles baiting one another with devilish hops and skips.

The slow airs too make a fair impression: Maurice Lennon, he of Stockton’s Wing, captures the ebbing hope and sheer despair of Brian Keenan’s ordeal in the beautiful, moving ‘The Captive’s Lament’ and ‘Cuaichín Ghleann Néifín’ would break the stoniest heart with Eilís Lennon’s fiddle and Steve Cooney’s guitar lovingly cradling this fonn mall.

• Siobhán Long