Blackthorn: Irish Love Songs
The many faces of love, as life-affirming bliss, soul-killing obsession, or bitter-sweet renunciation, as undoing, plaything, goad, or inertia, provides the focus of this album. To create the traditional yet subtly exotic textures in the arrangements, the Irish-born contralto traveled between her adopted home of New York City, Ireland, and the Basque Country and Asturias in Spain. Periodically shadowed by Róisín Chambers' warmly idiomatic mezzo, McKeown is accompanied by South American harp, guitar, bouzouki, mandolin, flutes, and Dana Lyn's droning, Scandinavian-flavored fiddle and viola, plus supportive bass and percussion. On "Paudeen's Woman," a tale of a woman maddened by jealousy, the frisky-sour rhythmic itch of thetrompa, a Spanish mouth harp, seems to drive the singer to the brink of murder and beyond. Singing primarily in Gaelic, McKeown weaves a potent spell, eloquently describing 12 facets of an emotion as old as the ages but as new as the next sun. But not every tune deals with passion between adults; the charming children's song "Déirín Dé, Déirín Dé" recalls the selfless, indulgent affection of a parent watching over a child at play. --Christina Roden