Published in the Guardian
Three stars
Last month in the Edinburgh international festival, the Bang on a Can
All-Stars used field recordings as a jumping-off point for a series of modernist compositions.
In most cases, the new scores were less interesting than the source
material which, even worse, was exoticised in the process. No such
complaint here in the Outer Hebrides, where singer Fiona J Mackenzie is
evoking a living tradition of Gaelic song in a production by the
National Theatre of Scotland and the Blas festival.
The little bird blown off course was Margaret Fay Shaw,
an American woman who took an unexpected migratory path from
Pennsylvania to South Uist in 1929. While at school in Helensburgh, she
developed a passion for Gaelic song. Having travelled to South Uist to
do some research, she dedicated her life to the preservation of an oral
tradition that would otherwise have been lost. Here and on neighbouring
Canna, where she lived with her folklorist husband John Lorne Campbell,
she built up an invaluable archive of photographs, cine films,
recordings and scores, until her death in 2004.
The stage world
inhabited by Mackenzie is consequently one of scratchy 78s, crackly
phonograph cylinders and black-and-white images of sheep shearers,
fishermen, crofters and guisers. Accompanied by a superb four-piece
band, playing Donald Shaw's bright and inventive arrangements, Mackenzie
runs through a repertoire of work songs, laments and lullabies, her
voice soulful, melodious and pure. As a musical experience, one with
deep and considered roots in the culture, it is exquisite.
Theatrically,
however, the show is under-developed; it tells us little about Shaw and
nothing that isn't already in the printed programme. It is honest in
its excavation and celebration of the island's culture, but makes no
pretence to be dramatic: splendid as an enhanced gig; too cautious as
theatre.
© Mark Fisher 2013
More coverage at theatreSCOTLAND.com
Sign up for theatreSCOTLAND updates
Sign up for theatreSCOTLAND discussion
No comments:
Post a Comment