The Mask and Mirror
Loreena McKennitt drew her inspiration for this album from 15th century  Spain, where the cultures of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam coexisted  uneasily, tied together by a common tradition of religious mysticism. McKennitt  reflects the multi-culturalism in arrangements that mix the half-tone intervals  and familiar instruments of the Aryan north with the quarter-tone intervals and  dumbeg, oud, and tamboura of the Semitic south. The results are often  intoxicating, even if the composer consistently prefers slow-moving tempos.  There's a tension and density to this music that safely removes it from the new- age category. McKennitt's attempts to evoke medieval mysticism in her lyrics are  less successful. She fares best when she draws her texts from other sources:  Prospero's closing speech from Shakespeare's "The Tempest," Yeats's  "The Two Trees," "The Dark Night of the Soul" by the  medieval Spanish mystic St. John of the Cross, and the traditional narrative  ballad, "The Bonny Swans." One these numbers, the shadowy, mesmerizing  atmospheres conjured up by McKennitt's music are enhanced by the words rather  than spoiled by them.--Geoffrey Himes