Eden Court Theatre, Inverness, Friday 11 June 2004

THE HIGHLAND FESTIVAL provided an opportunity for the Inverness audience to catch up with two works originally premiered elsewhere. An excerpt from Hamish Moore’s Na Tri Seudan had been included in the Gaelic Society of Inverness’s Gala Concert at this venue in January, but the rest of it was new to the city, as was the whole of An Tarsainn.

In the case of An Tarsainn (The Crossing), the music performed here was part of a larger week of celebrations which took place on the Isle of Skye last summer, and marked the 200th anniversary of the so-called Selkirk Emigration from the island to Prince Edward Island in Canada in 1803. Four musicians from Skye, Emma Swinnerton, Neil Campbell, Blair Douglas and Hector MacKenzie, and two from Prince Edward Island, Roy Johnstone and Steve Sharratt, were commissioned to write music inspired by the events in general, and specifically Calum Ban MacMhannain’s poem written on the voyage, ‘Imrich nan Eileamach’.

The poem, recited by the musical director of the project, Gaelic singer Anne Martin, provided a linking thread between what were quite diverse pieces of music that ranged from solo airs on fiddle to the full nine-piece band, complete with electric guitar and electric keyboards. Roy Johnstone’s ‘The Skye Suite’ depicted the whole voyage from the farewell to Portree through to the welcoming ceilidh in Canada, while other writers focused on specific elements, as in Neil Campbell’s ‘The Skye Pioneers’ or Hector MacKenzie’s evocation of the emigrant ship, ‘Polly’s Pride’.

Anne Martin sang Blair Douglas’s lovely ‘Eilean an Àigh’ in characteristically beautiful fashion, while Steve Sharratt contributed an English vocal to his own ‘Sugar from Trees’, a reference to the maple syrup the emigrants anticipated with relish in their new home (this was not a forced emigration in the manner of the clearances, but rather an opportunity seized to make what they saw as a new life away from landlords and hard times). Three teenagers from Skye performed a step dance as part of the programme.

The musicians from Prince Edward Island brought their own distinctive tang to the music, not only in Sharratt’s singing, but also in the style of ornamentation employed by Roy Johnstone, which provided a subtle contrast with Emma Swinnerton’s home-based approach. Good, too, to hear Blair Douglas perform, something of a rarity these days outside of Skye.

Hamish Moore

Hamish Moore’s Na Tri Seudan (The Three Treasures) grew out of his long-held conviction that the late 18th and 19th century dominance of the military and Victorian mores imposed from outside had radically altered the three treasures of the title, the indigenous language, music and dance of Scotland.

Moore attempted to restore the original raw vitality of the folk culture in the songs and instrumental music which made up Na Tri Seudan. More than most projects, this needed a bit of explanatory context which was not supplied in any detail in either the introductions or the programme, and it if it is ever to be recorded, that might be an opportunity to present it in an appropriate historical and musicological context, explaining the hows and whys of the differences which Moore seeks to expose and amend.

The performance was on a smaller scale than in its premiere at Celtic Connections, with a Highland pipe ensemble of five players augmented by solo piper Allan MacDonald (on small pipes) and the fiddles of Karen Steven and Mairi Campbell. Allan MacDonald and Fiona MacKenzie, the Mairi Mhor Gaelic Song Fellow, contributed songs, and three of the players – both fiddlers and piper Donal Brown – also step danced in skilful fashion.

The combination of these two pieces made for an enjoyable and intriguing show, although it was hard work for them to generate much atmosphere in the Eden Court’s scantly-populated auditorium.

© Kenny Mathieson, 2004