The Lark’s Call

Born and raised in France, now ensconced in Dingle, County Kerry, where he has attracted attention as the uilleann piper with FourWinds, Tom Delany steps into the limelight with his solo debut on disc. The Lark’s Call is impressive and hugely enjoyable, drawing with undisguised relish on his early vinyl encounters with the generation of 1970s pioneers including Planxty, The Chieftains and the Bothy Band.

The brimming sense of ensemble inherited from such immersion is tellingly inked in by a choice cabal of collaborators. Delany’s FourWinds concertina colleague and duo partner, Caroline Keane, is joined by Alan Murray (guitar and bouzouki), Conor Lyons (bodhrán), Brian O’Loughlin (flute), Camille Philippe’s mandolin and Laura Kerr’s dancing fiddle. There is something immediately fresh and fizzing and feisty about Delany’s playing in an effervescent collection of jigs, reels, hornpipes and a set dance that marks him out as something special. But it’s in the two familiar slow airs that his gift for the poetic and eloquent technique is most articulately showcased. ‘The Wounded Hussar’ is an aching, beautifully detailed lament with discrete guitar accompaniment, ‘Valentia Harbour’ an extended threnody of hushed pain voiced against throbbing, low-lying drones. Ex-Lúnasa guitarist Donogh Hennessy’s production serves Delany perfectly.