Saturday, 27 June 2015

Steve Tilston - Swans at Coole, album review



Impressive

If you were at all unsure about my comment in the previous music posting about Steve Tilston being one of the great guitarists, listen to the 23 minutes of the gorgeous Rhapsody on his 1990 instrumental album Swans at Coole, where he also plays mandolin. It is an exquisite folk symphony with guitar at its beautiful root and then broadened by the fine accompaniments of  Flute, Whistle & Percussion: Maggie Boyle; Cello: Tony Hinnigan; 1st Violin: Stuart Gordon; 2nd Violin: Paul Boyle; Uilleann Pipes & Whistle: Tommy Keane, and Bodhran: Mike Taylor.

And the prowess doesn’t stop there. Second, traditional The Wind That Shakes the Barley/The Ladies' Pantellets, is a rousing folk ditty, with third Planxty Concoran a virtuoso classical piece. On both, and others, violinist Stuart Gordon plays wonderfully, and he is the friend for whom Tilston’s song The Way it Was from his latest album Truth was written. The rest of the album is a further showcase of Tilston’s remarkable talent, and the whole is simply impressive and perfect.

No comments:

Post a Comment