Strathclyde Suite, Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, 19 January 2010

Colin MacIntyre (Photo - Paul Kirsop)

IS THERE another arts centre in Scotland which could muster a night of such quality and range of contemporary music as The An Tobar Sessions? I doubt it, but it’s no accident that An Tobar in Tobermory, the only arts centre in Argyll, could do so because in recent years all three bands on stage were commissioned to produce new work by its director, Gordon Maclean.

It’s not just the Wombles, Balamory, whisky and wildlife watching that have put Tobermory on the map, as the kilted presenter of the show, ‘Uncle Eric’ MacIntyre, reminded us, but the ability of An Tobar to attract and inspire artists, both visual and musical, of the highest calibre.

The innovative verve of the much-loved Martyn Bennett, who mixed much of his genre-crossing music in a garret of this former primary school, lives on in the jazz composition Shops by the Dave Milligan Trio, who were first up here; the ground-breaking An Tobar Suite of the Aidan O’Rourke Band who followed them; and the free-flowing melodies of Colin MacIntyre and his band, who finished the night.

The Dave Milligan commission centred around Tobermory’s shops, not just as subject and venue for the finished work, but as an eclectic source of found sounds which became integral to it. Duncan’s (outdoor clothes shop) featured a finely controlled drum solo by Tom Bancroft, whose driving beats at times threatened to overpower Dave’s understated piano and Tom Lyne’s coaxing and caressing double bass playing, but the balance was much better in If You Need a Painting in an Emergency that was so sweet you could almost see the paintings on the local artist’s gallery walls.

The inherent humour in the situation of a shop-inspired jazz trio performing in incongruous places like Tackle and Books and Catriona’s (Unisex Hairdressing Salon) came across in the interviews and found sounds that opened both numbers. Refrains like “What’s the strangest things you sell? Bloodworms” and “Isn’t there some awkwardness of men working in a beauty salon? Of course there is”, were accompanied by everything from bird cheeps to noisy hairdryers and in Brown’s Hardware Store we were conducted by Bancroft’s drumsticks in shouting out its name throughout the piece.

Looking like a saner version of Bill Bailey with hair, Dave Milligan pointed up the surreal classification of matter into tackle and books, and the irony of playing jazz to ladies sitting under hairdryers who were engrossed in their magazines. His seemingly effortless piano mastery with Bancroft on bodhran on Closing, which was composed by Tom Lyne, beautifully finished the set with the kind of weary rumination on the day that had gone of which Arkwright in Open All Hours would have been proud.

Aidan O’Rourke’s An Tobar Suite also featured strong jazz influences in the sax playing of Phil Bancroft and backing tracks by his Lau buddy Martin Green “on accordion and other strange noises” in the title track, and in One for Martyn and Sea, which was part-written on the Mull ferry.

In each case the traditional ear-worm tune first set out by Aidan on fiddle, Catriona McKay on harp and Martin O’Neill on bodhran and percussion was taken deep into new territory somewhere between the Balkans and Chicago, leapt around in these foreign parts, and returned all the more powerfully for having made the journey.

It’s always fascinating to watch this most energetic of fiddlers ducking and reeling as harp and fiddle, fiddle and sax played off each other intimately, while Martin Green sat Buddha-like holding on to extended chords. By turns lyrical and dark, plaintive and evocative, together they created a wonderful kaleidoscope of sounds and tempos light years ahead of your familiar medley of jigs and reels.

There’s little doubt that with An Tobar Aidan O’Rourke has pulled off the elusive feat of crossing genres and breaking new ground, and that it was the commissioning of the Suite by Gordon Maclean to mark the Centre’s 10th anniversary that gave him the opportunity to do so. All the more surprising, then, to be told that this was the first time it had been performed in over two years, and one must hope that the band’s forthcoming April-May tour with the Dave Milligan Trio will feature it in its entirety.

Tobermory’s own Colin MacIntyre, aka Mull Historical Society, and his tight young acoustic band brought yet another dimension to the An Tobar experience with his finely crafted songs and hip persona. With the rangy Gordon Maclean on double bass and his son Sorren on lead guitar and excellent harmonies, Seonaid Aitken on fiddle and Danny Grant on drums, it had all the feel of a real Mull house band who knew each other well, and how to play to their strengths.

Interspersed with some of his hits like the anthemic You’re a Star, the songs came mainly from the Island album which MacIntyre composed and recorded at An Tobar in his former school classroom with the same floorboards “regularly stained by one of my classmates”, and produced it in the head teacher’s wee room upstairs where Martyn Bennett mixed his music.

He introduced You’re a Star with a reading of his “pretty pathetic” school report card made up mostly of Cs in which he “spends too much time showing off to others” and rightly tossed it away before doing just that.

Best in my book were Cape Wrath, No Ordinary Queen (about Eliza, the girl every island has who never leaves it) and Stay Something (inspired on Calgary Beach) where he integrated intriguing features of land- and sea-scapes into his wistful love songs. Even more personal and poignant was his solo rendition of Samuel Dempster R.I.P about his Granny Tait’s loved one, whose child she carried as she waved him off to World War One and who never came back.

This encore and the final one, Ned’s Song (Brother), with all three bands on stage building the night to a rousing climax, wouldn’t have seen the light of day had it been up to some over-zealous Concert Hall jannie who put the lights up soon after the last set number, The Mull Historical Society, but true to form Gordon Maclean saved the day by coming out to tell us they had all these great musicians backstage ready to play some more for us.

Every arts centre needs someone with the vision and passion of Gordon to make things happen and it’s great that not only has all this terrific music come out of An Tobar but that it’ll be touring Scotland and elsewhere in the months to come. Definitely not to be missed.

© Norman Bissell, 2010

Links

• An Tobar
• Celtic Connections