Hopefully everyone will bear with me on this one. I’m not writing in regards to a question but rather just to express how beautiful the Skara Brae album is (yes, I know it is old). I bought it two weeks ago and can’t stop listening to it! Help.
I thoroughly agree. Just try imagining the impact it made when it first came out. It was people like the O Domhnaills and Planxty that made trad music cool and thereby made it accessible to a whole generation who might otherwise have disregarded or despised it.
Help me out here, please. Is Skara Brae the band’s name or the album name. Is it still available? Scottish music?? I did a google search on the name and got neolithic village in Scotland and an assertion the the builders were ancient Egyptians.
Tony
Skara Brae was the name of both the group and the one and only album. The group comprised Mícheál Ó Domhnaill, his two sisters Tríona and Mairéad, and Daithí/Davy Sproule. I don’t know if the album has been reissued as a CD. The guitar playing in particular was quite new, bringing some crossover fingerpicking influences (blues, John Renbourne…?) into Irish trad.
Mícheál and Tríona went on, after one or two interim lineups, to become founder members of the Bothy Band. I lost sight of them after the Bothy era, but Mairéad had a solo album a couple of years ago. I think they got together recently for another album, but I don’t think anything subsequent would quite replicate the sound of the Skara Brae album, although the timbre of the girls’ voices - especially Tríona’s - is very distinctive. The music is Irish with modern influences. The family are originally from County Donegal, which has strong cultural links to Scotland, but I suspect that the idea for the group’s name is probably due to the fact that one or other of them studied archaeology in college.
BTW, the archaeological site is way up in the Orkney Islands and apparently doesn’t obviously relate to any other known style of construction, so it’s something of a mystery. Cue New Age music with lots of reverb.
Speaking of New Age, Mícheál and Tríona have done several cd’s with Nightnoise. I enjoy the music. It’s not trad Irish by any stretch, but shows influences in the melody lines and incorporates the occasional whistle and fiddle. Triona sings beautifully on some tracks and Mícheál’s guitar, as always, sounds great. If you’re curious, I’d recommend At the End of the Evening and A Different Shore.
Tony