Albums

Strings that Nimble Leap is a collection of the highest quality, with beautiful instruments being played by some of the very best musicians in the game. 52 artists including Martin Simpson, Martin Carthy, Andy Irvine Nic Jones, Charlotte Carrivick, Lisa Hannigan and more.

As an album, Silent Spring may be built on and around the folk-infused music of fifty years ago but its message is very much for today. Henry Parker is clearly an excellent guitarist and writer, but he has also not lost sight of the message. He has found his path.

Fran Foote of Stick in the Wheel and her mother Belinda Kempster, make their own contribution to the folk tradition with this album of songs mostly collected from Essex and learned from Fran’s great uncle, Ernie Austin who was recorded by Topic for the 1974 album Flash Company.

Rob Harbron, one of our most prized English concertina players has finally found time to craft his solo debut album. Made in the simplest way, Meanders is exactly what you would wish for, which is beautiful pieces of music performed with the utmost skill by a master of his instrument.

The Outlander may seem like the slightest and the straightest of Jim Moray albums, but in truth, it is the most condensed and representative document of the artist that we have, and that alone – besides all the great songs, of course – makes it a treasure.

Malin Head is a tribute to the sense of longing many of Irish descent must have felt leaving everything behind. Accordingly, there is hope amidst the heartbreak in equal measure. Ardentjohn mine both seams, creating a statement of yearning that tugs at listeners long after the album has ended.

Their collaboration with the New Sinfonia orchestra has pushed North Wales trio Golden Fable into a far-reaching soundscape, their most ambitious and rewarding release to date.

With its title inspired by a line in a  Keats poem,  High Romance marks a quantum leap for Emily Mae Winters that sees her fully immersed in her Southern Americana influences, setting a new benchmark by which future Americana albums should be measured.

Justin Rutledge’s eighth album comes in the wake of his marriage last year and subsequent impending fatherhood. With albums like this, it’s unfathomable that he still remains largely undiscovered to the wider Americana/folk-roots audience outside of Canada.

Will Beeley’s first album in forty years is written with dry wit and performed with a relaxed vibe. Beautifully written and performed, if Highways and Heart Attacks is your first taste of Will Beeley, you will soon be seeking out the rest of the catalogue.

It’s the water of life that gives Chip Taylor’s new album its title and the opening recollection of a time back in 1958 when that’s what he briefly did for a living. As any whiskey connoisseur will tell you, this album is a mellow, aged in the cask of life 18-year old singular malt. Sip and savour.

The simplicity and apparent effortless ease of Damien O’Reilly’s playing is highly deceptive and inevitably there’s more to his artistry that’s revealed primarily by further attentive listening to Dúchas.