The evening opened at The National Piping Centre, Glasgow with The Hannah Fisher Trio made up of herself (a finalist in this year”s Young Trad awards) on fiddle, her partner Sorren McLean (who himself had a show on the Sunday as part of the New Voices ) on guitar and Craig Ainslie on double bass.

It was a great mixture of both tradtional tunes and modern pieces with Sorren also singing a Bob Dylan song then some of his own compostions, whilst Hannah had some of her own works which included one she had written for her great granny”s birthday – as she said herself “what else could I give her!”

They were a great start to an even better night to come.

 

So in the second half we were treated to the Rachel Hair Trio with the lady herself on harp, Euan Burton on double bass and Jenn Butterworth on guitar.  The three of them “bounce” off each other on stage, each getting a chance to speak about the songs.

Again they played tunes interspersed with songs which Jenn sang. These included Grey Funnel Line, Cancro Cru, Swedish (which Rachel explained were tunes she had come across but they wern”t named only numbered so it was a bit like pick “n” mix!) and one, which appealed to me, called the Eccentric”s Emporium.

Rachel spends quite a bit of time on the Isle of Man, where I lived for 10 years and there is a huge warehouse in the north of the island called Jurby Junk!  Stella, who is the owner of this warehouse, is the subject of the song and it is a lovely quirky tune.  As for the warehouse, I could not begin to describe it, however if you ever visit the island, you must make a trip to see it!

I

thoroughly enjoyed both of the trios and it was just unfortunate for the audience that Rachel, Euan and Jenn had to rush off as they were off to the Concert Hall for a BBC Radio 3 live broadcast.

Ruth Roy