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THE HELEN FLAHERTY BAND - Gazing At The Moon 

THE HELEN FLAHERTY BAND - Gazing At The Moon 
Appel Rekords APR1385 

Led by Antwerp-based Scottish singer Helen Flaherty, this foursome plays mostly Irish and Scottish repertoire but includes quite a few contemporary items, with the emphasis firmly on songs rather than tunes. Helen and her bodhrán are accompanied by fiddle (Siard De Jong), flute (Isaac Muller) and guitar/cittern (Philip Masure). The group sound is light and airy, allowing the vocals to breathe and the words to be heard. All band members are expert musicians as well as good singers with a fine grasp of harmony.

Here Helen and her colleagues tackle traditional ballads like The Outlandish Knight and Fair Flowers Of The Valley, in a gently animated fashion that might be said to emulate the Transatlantic Sessions approach. These tracks are balanced by Braw Sailing On The Sea, the melancholic The Old Churchyard, a lyrical, reflective Scotland The Brave and a few contemporary songs (e.g. Maurice McGrath’s Winsome Ways, Kieran Goss’s All That You Ask Me, James Keelaghan’s Cold Missouri Waters, plus – new to me – a Guido Piccard opus, Edith’s Lament, concerning a Flemish soldier in WW1). Midway through the disc, the pace picks up with a lively tune-set.

This is one of those consistent discs where every track is pleasing, well managed and polished – the slight drawback being that a certain sense of homogeneity may be heard to creep in over the course of a whole album. However, the easy, flowing, assured nature of the performances is still more than sufficiently attractive to ensure a high likeability rating among listeners.

David Kidman


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This album was reviewed in Issue 126 of The Living Tradition magazine.