The Blue Room

A fiddler with a characteristically delicate touch, Martin Hayes has won worldwide respect for his unique take on Irish traditional music. He is perhaps the Irish trad equivalent of Jan Garbarek, often taking tunes at a stately pace and experimenting with arrangements, while never losing sight of the fundamentals that underpin jigs, reels and hornpipes. His quartet features his long-term accompanist Dennis Cahill on guitar, alongside Liz Knowles (hardanger d'amore) and Doug Wieselman (bass clarinet). The latter is a New York-based composer, arranger and musician, and the gentle huffing of his clarinet is one delightful aspect of this album.

The album has a ruminative, ponderous tone throughout, at times reminiscent of the Michael Nyman Band, at times sounding like the charming soundtrack to an arty children's animation. It might arguably be more enjoyable to listeners unfamiliar with the Irish tunes that are the source material: some of them don't quite seem to warrant the pensive rubato treatment Hayes gives them, while the teasing glimpse he gives us of his more ‘standard’ Irish playing at the start of ‘The Humours of Scariff’ left me wishing he'd continue. That said, it's never less than an interesting listen, and Hayes does pick up the tempo, to toe-tapping effect, on ‘Tommy Peoples’ Reel' and the baroque-sounding ‘Paddy Fahy’s Reel'.