I’m going to completely steal an idea from rigelkitty (and hope he doesn’t mind) and start a bit of an occasional series aimed at introducing people to some great music they may never have heard of. I’ll start out by saying that the music choices are from my personal collection, thus are subject to my particular whims and prejudices. My musical tastes lean heavily to Celtic- and folk-inflected music, and especially with music that tries to cross boundaries of various styles, such as Celtic rock.
With that in mind, here’s my first selection: Eileen Ivers’ “Crossing the Bridge”.
This is the title track from her 1999 album (on Sony Classical, of all labels) and it really has all the things I love – some traditional tunes, some great funky grooves, and some wicked fiddle playing. Eileen Ivers has been playing and recording for over fifteen years, including original lead fiddle for Riverdance, and was a founding member of Cherish the Ladies (and equally fabulous, but more traditional, band).
This MP3 will only be up on my server for a week or so – I’ll be rotating it off to make space for new selections. I only ask that you let me know if you download it and listen to it – did you like it, did you hate it, would you like to hear something else? Let me know, and that way I’ll know if I should keep putting up these selections.
(Update 7/29/02: Link to song removed to make space on the server. Sorry!)
*g* I’d love to play you Feast Or Famine ‘Brecon Beacon’ sometime 🙂
Cool!
Sounds good to me. The description of the music sounds pretty good, anyway. Pity I can’t listen to some of Ruane’s more contemporary recordings here atw ork, but I’ll check it out when I get home.
Having my roots in radio from some years back, I learned that the first guidance you have for an unknown record is the record label. Philo/Fretless has put out some fantastic stuff, mainly in the acoustic vein, so that gives me some idea of what to expect.
Oooh, I love this music! I always love more modernized strange celtic music. I’m assuming that’s what this is, of course. 😉
Yup, that’s it exactly. I’ll probably post some more like this in the near future.
Hmmm… interesting. I think it’s a little bit *too* modernized for me to REALLY like it, but it’s not something that I found myself sticking my tongue out at. 🙂
I think you and I have discussed music before, though, and found similarities in taste. 🙂
–M
Buh?
Ok, first, lemme admit I don’t know jack about Celtic music.
With that out of the way…THIS is Celtic music? It sounds like an upbeat gumshoe theme crossed with Riverdance and light jazz. I *really* like the modernized elements. While it’s a tad slow, I still think I’m gonna hang on to this one and add it to my retinue. It’s *movement* music (i.e. it makes you wanna move). 🙂
Thanks!
Re: Buh?
Well, it’s got Celtic elements, anyway. Otherwise it’s a complete mishmash of styles, slicked up with a lot of studio production work.
You’ve given me an idea for my next track to post, though – something with a little less glitz but something that makes you want to move!
OOooer… I like it a lot. Makes me think of a slower Vanessa-Mae.
Bizzare. It started out as something like techno/celtic fusion, and moved on to very different things. Weird. 😉