About this item

New Traditions is a collection of pipe music, electronic music, mouth music and folk music from five emerging and prominent Scottish artists.

It started in Sutherland with a recording of The Waters of Kylesku. “Do you learn any Gaelic at the school?” asks Hamish Henderson of Christine Stewart. “No,” she answers. “That’s a shame,” he responds, “Isn’t it?” she says. Then she sings. Her voice is of the peat itself, grown from the earth as the language was. It soars raptor-like above drenched ground and scoured pink rock.

Next, to Nancy Dorian, a linguistic missionary of sorts, who came from America to watch a language die. She charted the decline of Gaelic in a cluster of Sutherland villages from 1963 to 2020 when the terminal native speaker passed. Gaelic has origins in nature, with each letter of the alphabet named after a tree. It seems significant that the land of the north is now all-but devoid of forest.

Enter Alan Lomax, who travelled the world documenting indigenous music. Material from his archives feature on (fucking) Moby’s platinum selling Play. Despite the record’s worldwide commercial success we know very little of the music he essentially exploited.

Then musician Martyn Bennett, who built tracks around Lomax recordings of Scots and Gaelic voices, and did so with love that shared his blood with the cancer that killed him. His records both popularised and preserved obscure indigenous Scottish music.

This collection of tunes has similar intent: to consolidate ephemeral words in physical grooves - real as the rigs that still scar the earth - but also a desire to interpret. These versions have the greatest reverence for the originals at heart, but like the architecture of a great gallery, serve to protect and elevate.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Nice Calendonic (see what I did there) selection of out-there music that perfect depicts the glorious escapism and sense of expansive freedom that only the Scottish countryside can conjure up. There's a real sincerity and lineage to the folk traditions of old, mixed with contemporary recording and production techniques. Mega!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Hoch Ma Toch - The Waters Of Kylesku
A2. Norman Willmore - A Call, An Answer
A3. Brìghde Chaimbeul - Naidheachd Mu Easgann Agus Òran
A4. Harry Górski-Brown - Tha Sneachd Air Druim Uachdair
B1. Mother’s Favourite Tongue - Oidhche Na’ Mo Chadal Dhomh
B2. Isa Gordon - The Parting Glass