An Lanntair, Stornoway, Isle of Lewis, 21 May 2009

Maggie MacInnes

PERFORMANCES by Maggie MacInnes have for this writer always had something of a qualitative difference from those of other singers performing songs from the Scottish Gaelic tradition. The difference stems entirely from Maggie’s direct family relationship to a tradition of song which evolved in the Islands of Barra, Vatersay, Mingulay, Eriskay and South Uist and which stretches back for more than three centuries.

Maggie’s repertoire comes largely from the songs she learned from her mother, the great Gaelic singer from the Isle of Barra, Flora MacNeil, who, of course, in turn had heard and learned the songs from her own mother, her extended family and from the island community in which she grew up.

Although largely drawn from the song traditions of that small archipelago at the southern tip of the Outer Hebrides, Maggie constantly turns-up surprises in her performances in the form of unfamiliar if not totally unique songs; unfamiliar variations of now familiar songs in the contemporary Gaelic repertoire; and familiar songs that only became familiar to us as a consequence of her mother’s resilient preservation of them.

But the uniqueness of the repertoire, although of great interest for those who love this tradition of song, is not the only element of the Gaelic tradition that Maggie has acquired, and in which she herself is now firmly placed.

Maggie performs these great and rare songs with an emotion and an intimacy that surely can only come from her in-the-blood proximity to these songs in their original domestic rather than concert hall setting. Many of the songs she sings, just like her mother before her, have been a part of her real lived life for as long as she has had a life. The songs, of course, continue to evolve and live in their contemporary setting, but the idea of what a performance is, is surely different between those who have the songs as a part of their lives and then sing them on stage and those who learn them as one might learn lieder, however much the singer might love the learned material.

This brings to her performance an uncontrived naturalness and at times a raw heartfeltness that is nothing short of captivating.

The trio of Maggie singing and playing clarsach, Brian MacAlpine on keyboards and accordion and Anna Massie on guitar (with or without the wandering capo) generate a subtle yet emphatic pallet of accompaniment, at times sparse, at others gently swinging with lilting syncopations, and then with rapid-fire reeling.

Maggie at times utilises the clarsach in this mix for cross-rhythmic phrases and punctuations that add a different colour dimension to the arrangements, so much so that this trio perform with impact of at least a quintet. But then, in Brian and Anna, Maggie has chosen wisely from amongst the crop of the very finest musicians in contemporary Scottish music.

The set, which apart from its foundations in the environs of Barra, testified to the extent to which this is a diverse tradition of songs largely by and about the experiences of women, focused on Maggie’s recent project exploring and recording the songs of Mingulay, which is now available as a new CD – A Fagail Mhiughalaigh (Leaving Mingulay).

Two songs in particular from this sequence (which also have Vatersay connections), the fishing song Leis an Lurgainn and Oran Na Raiders Bhatersaigh (Song of the Vatersay Raiders), testify to the sheer struggle for existence that the community endured before the final clearance of the island in 1912, and both also document the fact that Mingulay had its own local versions and variations of many songs.

Another song with Mingulay connections, the Luadh Cha Teid Mise, was given a particularly forceful and spirited performance.

The set also included Sraid Na h-Eala, A Fhleasgaich Oig is Ceanalta, Thig an Smeorach as t-Earrach (which Maggie’s mother learned from the singing of the great Lewis Gaelic singer, Joan MacKenzie), Dh’eirich mi gu moch Diluain, and Gradh Geal Mo Chridh (aka The Eriskay Love Lilt, here sung in a traditional form), along with two Burn’s songs (in English) that included an arresting version of My Heart Is In The Highlands, and closed with a contemporary Gaelic song of great beauty, Blair Douglas’s Solus M’aigh.

The theatre space at Stornoway’s An Lanntair arts centre is particularly well suited to this scale and type of performance, ideal for what was a real celebration of traditional and contemporary Gaelic culture in its heartland.

© Peter Urpeth, 2009

Links

• Maggie MacInnes

• Maggie MacInnes on MySpace

• An Lanntair