The Haar – The Haar
Nimbus Records / Extinct – 5 June 2020
One cannot help but think of this album as part of a trio of works released within the last year and all involving fiddle player Adam Summerhayes. Last spring’s Stone Soup was his splendid ‘pre-meditated’ recording with bodhrán player Cormac Byrne and following that in March this year was Adam’s totally improvised and spontaneous Ciderhouse Rebellion Untold album with accordionist Murray Grainger, a beautifully loose and intuitive set of two long pieces and one epilogue. For The Haar, a word meaning a sea mist or fog from the North Sea, Adam, Cormac and Murray join forces as an instrumental power trio and add the vocal talents of Irish singer Molly Donnery. The concise but informative liner notes tell us that Adam and Cormac were in a crowded pub in the west of Ireland when they became mesmerised by the voice of Molly and it inspired them to film a trio performance of the traditional song ‘The Lark’ on the Plassey, a shipwreck on the Inis Oírr coast. The film, which premiered on Folk Radio last year, is beautiful and led to them bringing in Murray Grainger to complete a quartet, focused on breathing new life into traditional songs about love, poverty and oppression.
One of the most exciting aspects of Stone Soup and Untold was their improvised nature, which delivered unpredictable and daring music in the safe hands of highly skilled musicians. The Haar also takes this philosophy and creates music that is just as intangible but, crucially, set to and underpinned by a strong narrative vocal, which shifts the whole dynamic into a totally new and thrilling direction. Molly’s voice is a structure absolutely solid, and it gives the trio behind her plenty of room and freedom to express, while always providing that focal point to return to. Take as an example ‘The Creggan White Hare’, a lively and upbeat tale of a legendary and elusive hare that slips any trap planned for it. Molly’s narrative is sung with sinew and passion, but she leaves space between verses for her musicians to unleash and provide the story with plenty of colour and then respectfully reining it in before the vocal continues. It’s a splendid balance of swirling instrumental magic and beautifully sang narratives that have already stood the test of time.
But starting things off is ‘The King’s Shilling’, an anti-war song written by Scotsman Ian Sinclair, which opens with Adam’s strings entering as softly as the fingers of the eponymous sea mist and waiting for Molly’s sombre tale of the cheap destruction caused by war, a timeless trouble, to gather speed. As Cormac’s bodhrán adds drama to the vocal through its beats, the fiddle and accordion settle in to provide drone notes during the song and ramp things up after the verses. Molly’s vocal is splendid here too, moving from angry for the most part to defeated in the last verse when she almost sighs the final ‘take the King’s shilling, and you’ll die’. Her voice shifts again for ‘The Green Fields of Canada’, a more bittersweet tale, into a far softer timbre, appropriate when narrating a sad tale of sacrifice and promise. Our narrator bids farewell to ‘the groves of shillelagh and shamrock’ and resigns himself to a new and healthy homeland, much to the chagrin of his family. The sparse beat of the bodhrán combines with high fiddle notes to begin this one before lower tones of the accordion add a different perspective. The music here is understated when compared to the first song, each instrument staying within its own confines, which works well with a beautiful vocal blending sorrow, resignation and strength.
Acting as a centrepiece to the album is ‘Siúil A Rún’ (‘Go, my love’), which is the longest tune here at eight minutes. It begins with a quite leisurely plucked violin line that is soon joined by a perfectly poised percussion line by Cormac before Molly begins a traditional Irish tale, partly sung in the native tongue, of a woman’s lament for her lover, who has departed from the country with the military. I especially love Murray’s accordion here, creating the sorrow felt through the use of deep drone notes, while the strings and percussion evoke the loneliness running through the narrative. Another departure is told of in ‘The Emigrant’s Farewell’, although this is more in keeping with the underlying optimism or strength of ‘The Green Fields of Canada’. Here our narrator leaves the shores of Ireland with a full heart and appreciation for their homeland, which the more buoyant notes of fiddle and especially accordion beautifully illustrate. Murray’s playing here is wonderful, his instrument dancing through the piece and injecting it full of life. It leads us nicely into final track ‘Craigie Hills’, another tale of seeking pastures new, this time played to a gorgeous melody by Adam. Molly’s voice lifts for this framed narrative of spring, opportunity and simple gratitude. The singing is again beautiful, but for music and melody, this is a highlight, with each instrument lending texture and emotion to a piece perhaps most perfectly demonstrating the ability of each player and collective power. It is a stunning song and a very lovely note to finish the album on.
As I have said numerous times before, often of late when talking about the efforts of Adam Summerhayes, Cormac Byrne and Murray Grainger, the art of creating improvised music always manages to spark excitement that carefully planned and produced material cannot match. There exists in this kind of playing an energy that has been left undiluted by several takes and tweaks. For those reasons, The Haar is a perfect companion piece to both Stone Soup and Untold in that it works on that ‘one and only take’ dynamic and exhilarates with its improvised structure. However, the addition of Molly Donnery’s robust and rangy vocals singing tales that still resonate gives the album a wonderful feel of the romantic and old that sets it apart, while keeping it related. The Haar is also a very evocative record, bringing senses of the pain and futility of war and the salt of the ocean, as well as the beauty of the land and the strength of human relationships through its words and music. We need more music like this; spontaneous, alive and affecting, The Haar will take you on a journey and have you appreciating the purest of life’s pleasures. Wonderful stuff.
https://soundcloud.com/thehaarband/siul-a-run-the-haar/s-rPLS2SPkzy7
The Haar is released on 5 June and can be Pre-Ordered here: