Altan

Altan are amongst the premier league of roots orientated bands. More traditional than some, more contemporary than many, the band are at their best when chopping and changing between songs from their heritage and the songs they are leaving for the future.

Powered by a fiddle style that draws on Irelands links with Scotland and visa versa Altan's sounds and roots are as deep seated as the lake they are named after. The results are a band that can draw upon Ireland's Fay influence as easily as it can gritty reality; heartfelt ballads about people long departed with songs about things that just might be.

As with so many musicians in the roots world, the members of Altan were born to it. Mairead, lead vocalist and fiddler, picked up the habit from her father and has continued to get her fixes from playing.

The scope of Altan is summed up in the energy. Jigs and reels, songs that you can dance to, briefly give way to ballads to allow a set to build again. That those ballads are in Gaelic only add to the experience. It's because you don't know the words that you have to live the feel of the song and revel in it's emotion.

Arguably, the title of the band's "Runaway Sunday" album sums up a great deal about the band's philosophy. Runaway Sunday is the last Sunday before Lent and is the name of a feast celebrated in Inishowen, a peninsula in Donegal.

In July, the youth of Inishowen would go berry picking on Slieve Snagatha, a local mountain. Whilst collecting berries, courtships would begin. Come Runaway Sunday these courtships would come to fruition or end in a simliar way to hamfasting.

Altan's works are of a similar nature. Some songs are celebrations of what is, others lament what might have been, whilst others still yearn for what might yet be.

It means that an Altan set is always something of a surprise. Mood or moment might take the songs down different roads and with a good number of years behind them, Altan have more than enough material to ensure whatever road they travel that day it's going to be an interesting one."
                            The Cambridge Folk Festival

Altan CDs