Ten Thousand Miles

Despite several line-up changes across more than two decades together, Danú, guided by button accordionist co-founder Benny McCarthy, has managed to retain their instantly recognisable signature sound: a poetic blend of unfussy virtuosity and delicately woven textures. Exuding a quiet charm and delivered with consummate gracefulness, Ten Thousand Miles is their first long-player since 2015's Buan and sees Tony Byrne replacing Dónal Clancy on guitar while the arrival of Ivan Goff, on flute, uilleann pipes and whistles, swells them to a six-piece. Singer Nell Ní Chróinín makes her band debut on disc here, her vocals lighter-grained than former singer Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh but no less alluring for that. She's delightfully playful on the joyfully realised ‘Fiach a Mhadra Rua’ (a tale from her native County Cork of a wily fox outwitting its hunters) and finds a plangent lyricism in ‘The Foggy Dew’. But it's in the instrumentals on this album that Danú's crafted ensemble sense comes most articulately to the fore. Byrne's guitar contributes a percussive heartbeat pulse to ‘Master McGrath’ and a lilting support to the title-track, alongside crooning whistle and feather-soft fiddle. A liquid, free-flowing coupling of reels (‘Cutting a Slide/The Fiddle Cushion’), a belting set of slip-jigs and some vivacious hornpipes round things off with customary finesse and flair.