Folk Column: Espana In The Works

Most of us will occasionally slip off into that dream where we move to Spain and carve out a whole new life for ourselves. Well some people do more than dream.

Having released a couple of well received albums here in the mid-’90s, Garrett Wall decamped to Madrid where he began to integrate himself into that vibrant city’s musical life and build a whole other career for himself. He has stayed true to his acoustic roots and although last year’s Daylight Nighttime was as slickly produced as any pop record, its key strength was still the fact that it’s packed with brilliantly written songs. This year, however, he has gone back into the studio, fired up by the sheer enjoyment of working with a new live band and made Sky Pointing, an incredibly direct record which more than ever showcases that glorious voice of his. Recorded live in the studio over the course of a couple of days in early July, the record takes the live ensemble of guitar, bass, trumpet and cajon and breathes life into a clutch of Garrett’s best songs, from the inspirational ‘Wait’ to the achingly beautiful ‘So Glad’.
Having taken the record and the band to the Edinburgh Festival to further tighten up the performance Garrett is paying a visit home for some shows kicking off on Sunday September 30 in Mullarkey’s of Clifden with a show in Galway’s Roisin Dubh the following evening, Dolan’s of Limerick on Tuesday October 2. On Wednesday October 3 he travels to Dundalk’s Spirit Store before travelling down to Kilkenny the following evening for a show in Cleere’s Theatre. The tour winds up in Waterford on Friday October 5 with a show at Electric Avenue.
Although they played Whelan's a couple of years back, The Duhks are embarrassingly under-represented in terms of record sales and ticket stubs in a country that prides itself as the spiritual home of acoustic roots music (hint – you’re just about to get the chance to remedy that). The five skilled, high-energy, tattooed 20-somethings from Winnipeg, Manitoba, have been stopping audiences dead in their tracks and building a cohort of diehard fans across North America and around the world since forming in 2001.
Since the release of their self-titled, Bela Fleck-produced album in 2005, and the consequent re-release of their Canadian debut, Your Daughters And Your Sons, as well as this year’s Sugar Hill release Migrations, the band has won admirers as diverse as David Crosby, Dolly Parton, and Doc Watson. This is hardly surprising, given their unmistakeable and unrepeatable blend of soul, gospel, North American folk, Brazilian samba, old time country string band, zydeco, and Irish dance music, and the attack they bring to these interwoven acoustic styles — which might as well be called sheer rock and roll. They’ve even proven their pure rock and roll chops by jamming out ‘Whole Lotta Love’ live onstage with John Paul Jones.
On the eve of their second major North American release – Migrations - the international acceptance and excitement generated by the band was still fresh enough to be something of a heady surprise for the group. As founder member Leonard Podolak puts it, “It still blows my mind that yeah, we made a record, and now 40,000 people have it, and so a lot of times now we’ll go to a gig in a town where we’ve never been before, never played a festival, but they know what we do — and they’re pumped!”
That record’s title, Migrations, seems to speak for itself. The Canadian prairie band has toured relentlessly, playing everything from rock clubs to theatres to festivals, making the world their home. Migrations was produced in Nashville by bluegrass and folk veteran Tim O’Brien and co-produced, as was their last disc, by Grammy award winning engineer and producer Gary Paczosa. The band members are quick to agree that this album is both the strongest representation of their regularly electrifying live act yet—and a record that’s also more direct and tooled to hone in on the songs’ meanings and emotional core. All of this was picked up with ease on the road by newby vocalist Sarah Dugas (who replaces departing member Jessee Havey) who adds her own elements and influences to the songs. You’ll have a chance to roadtest all this theory when their flight pattern takes them to Belfast on Sunday September 30 as part of the Open House Festival, to the Glens Centre in Manorhamilton the following night and to The Cherrytree in Walkinstown on Saturday October 6.
On Tuesday October 9 Roscommon Arts Centre will be welcoming back The Alan Kelly Quartet to the arts centre for what they’re predicting will be another sell-out gig. Alan’s debut album Out of the Blue exploded onto the traditional music scene in 1996 with such impact that he is generally credited with ‘making the piano accordion hip again’ in Irish traditional music. In the 10 years since, Alan has recorded and played all over the world with the likes of Alison Brown, Eddi Reader, Michael McGoldrick and De Danaan. He has released two further albums, the brilliant fusion that was Mosaic and the beautifully forthright and traditional Fourmilehouse with his brother John. This performance will echo the spirit of Fourmilehouse, as he is joined by three great traditional players – his brother John Kelly on flute, Arty McGlynn on guitar and Tola Custy on fiddle.
One of the finest exponents of the Sligo flute style which he honed with regular summer trips to his father’s homeplace in Culfadda, Sligo as a youngster, he’s possibly slightly better known for another of his talents. Oh yeah, we’re talking about Michael Flatley here. He has weighed in behind the upcoming Sligo Live festival with his not inconsiderable promotional muscle, launching the festival from the W.B. Yeats Memorial in the North-Western town with Sligo’s mayor and various musicians who’ll be taking part in the festival.
Jim Page is best know here as the writer of the Moving Hearts favourite ‘Hiroshima Nagasaki Russian Roulette’ but he has been crafting songs across a 30 year career and he’ll be condensing the best of those into one evening when he visits Dundalk’s Spirit Store on Sunday October 14.
As usual, the Return to Camden Town festival will be packing an improbable amount into their ten day programme but surely one of the most significant events of the musical year falls under the auspices of the festival as Patrick Street founder member Jackie Daly plays his final concert as part of one of Irish music’s seminal acts. For a short period he has been playing alongside his replacement John Carty who will be injecting flute, fiddle and banjo where there was once accordion but following this concert on Friday October 19 in London’s Irish Centre the band will once more revert to a four-piece. Also part of the festival and making it a must for aficionados of the box is the appearance on Thursday October 25 of legendary accordion maestro Joe Burke who will be accompanied in this instance by Brian Conway and Felix Dolan.