Could folks recommend solo recordings of traditional flute players?
Regards.
There’s discography info at Brad Hurley’s site:
http://www.firescribble.net/flute/players.html
and Michael Anthony’s flute & whistle discography on Gordon Turnbull’s “The Flow”:
http://www.oblique-design.demon.co.uk/flow/disc/disc.html
Or did you want us to get very specific? If so, you should indicate any preferences for Solo flute (with or Without accompaniment), traditional vs. some non-traditional, etc.
Kevin Krell
Everyone has their favourites, of course, but here are a few names to look for: Josee McDermot, Seamus Tansey, Matt Molloy. If you want someone newer/younger, look for Harry Bradley.
djm
Paddy Carty is by far my favorite old traditional flute player. He has some really beautiful tunes on his recording (can’t remember the name right now). Somewhere between “old standards” and wacky new stuff.
J.
Mr. Krell . . .
While I’m open to anything for the experience, I prefer listening to solo, unaccompanied, traditional music. Some backup is okay, I s’pose, however. I shall be sure to check out those links that you provided.
Jonathan
I’m suprised that no ones mentioned flute geezers yet:
http://www.lafferty.ca/music/irish/flute-geezers/
Pure drop trad solo flute playing for the most part.
There are a whole bunch of flute player CDs listed by the people at IRTRAD-L for their Favourite Albums Poll:
http://www.irishmusicreview.com/Poll%20-%20Flute.htm
you can check out the rest of the IRTRAD-L Favourite Album Polls at:
http://www.irishmusicreview.com/poll1.htm
makes an interesting read..
Some of the discography is more modern, and there’s a lot of good flute music that is contained on CDs that also include other instruments (duets, groups, etc.). You might check out the compilations my non-profit organization issues for a glance into what’s out there.
Here are some of my suggestions for pretty much all flute CDs (might be some whistle). I know I’ve missed a lot. That’s because , well, I got lazy. And I don’t have some of them. And also many are good flute players but tend to have few solo recordings, but instead mostly appear in duets, or a group or session environment.
Turlach Boylan THE TIDY COTTAGE
Turlach Boylan SHAME THE DEVIL
Harry Bradley BAD TURNS AND HORSESHOE BENDS
Paddy Carty TRADITIONAL MUSIC OF IRELAND
Eamonn Cotter TRADITIONAL IRISH MUSIC FROM COUNTY CLARE
Kevin Crawford D FLUTE
John Doonan AT THE FEIS
Packie Duignan TRADITIONAL MUSICFROM COUNTY LEITRIM
Frankie Gavin UP AND AWAY
Hammy Hamilton THE MONEYMUSK
Catherine McEvoy TRAD. FLUTE MUSIC IN THE SLIGO-ROSCOMMON STYLE
Matt Molloy MATT MOLLOY
Matt Molloy HEATHERY BREEZE
Conal O’Grada TOP OF COOM
Marcas Ó Murchú Ó BHÉAL GO BÉAL
Emer Mayock MERRY BITS OF TIMBER
Emer Mayock PLAYGROUND
Note: She also plays U. pipes, fiddle, whistle. Many of her own compositions and perhaps sometimes outside the walls of tradition, but I think still well worth listening to. BTW, not at all like AfroCelts.
Josie McDermott DARBY’S FAREWELL
Justin Murphy MANA (also a bit more acocmpanied, but lots of flute).
Garry Shannon LOOZIN AIR
Seamus Tansey JIGS REELS & AIRS
Paddy Taylor BOY IN THE GAP (Cassette)
Desi Wilkinson THREE PIECE FLUTE
Desi Wilkinson SHADY WOODS
Kevin Krell
John Creaven’s CD, “The Story So Far,” released a couple of years ago, is excellent and mostly unaccompanied save for a few tracks with some tastefully understated bouzouki by Dennis Cahill.
Creaven’s playing is beautiful and deep, nothing flashy. It’s available from Celtic Grooves and probably Ossian USA.
Also, Frank Claudy’s CD, “The Thrush in the Straw” is accompanied only by bodhran and is very nice.
Marcas O’Murchu’s CD, “O Bheal go Beal” is also sparsely accompanied and has 71 minutes of music including lots and lots of great flute playing.
I’d second Brad’s recommendation for Marcas O Murchu’s album. Lovely playing and some very nice tunes.
Just recently got Paul McGrattan’s new album, “Keelwest.” The accompaniment isn’t so understated on this one, but it’s fine all the same (although I don’t know how I feel about some of the “natural” sounds he added on a couple of tracks). Good stuff.
Paddy Carty is good. Josie McDermott’s “Darby’s Farewell” or whatever is a classic. It was recorded in a hotel room in one day I believe. It’s about as trad as it gets. Solo flute and whistle, no accompaniement except a few tracks with Bodhran. McDermott has such great lilt and rhythm that you don’t even miss the accompaniement. Also good is Cathal McConnell’s “On Lough Erne’s Shore”. Great playing and wonderful singing too. The only drawback to that album is the Shetland guitar player accompanying on some tracks. The Shetlanders love the Boom-chukka type accompaniement.
Corin
I’ll echo Brad’s sentiments on the John Creaven CD, and along those lines there’s John Skelton’s stuff as well: A solo CD titled…“One at a time”, I think, as well as flute 'Duet" CD with flute player Kieran O’Hare. John also has a couple of CD/Tune book collections out that he put together for students, but the playing is quite nice and there is zero backing instrumentation.
Loren
(Edited to fix my mistake on the John Skelton solo CD title)
The flute duet cd (as per Loren’s post) with John Skelton and Kieran O’Hare is entitled “Double Barrelled”, aptly enough.
Yeah, one more thing I forgot in that post was the title of that CD, doh!
I guess I should also say that John’s solo CD “One at a time” is not strictly trad - there are other types of tunes on the CD, but his playing is so trad all the way through that it seems mostly trad.
Loren