Colleen Raney
Album: Here This Is Home
Label: Little Sea
Tracks: 11
Website: http://www.colleenraney.com

Though hailing originally from Seatlle, Oregon,now located in Portland, Colleen was brought up as a member of Seattle's celebrated Raney Family; she's now considered a key member of the thriving Irish music community in the Pacific Northwest, and a gifted singer in the tradition, having just now released her fourth album, Here This Is Home. Recorded in Dublin, produced by Aidan Brennan and engineered by Trevor Hutchinson (of Lúnasa), it's an accomplished and accommodating set that brings out Colleen's open-hearted warmth and genuine feel for her chosen material. Helped of course, by her select backing crew of musicians: Aidan himself on guitar and bouzouki, Johnny B. Connolly (button accordion), Steve Larkin (fiddle), Colm O' Caoimh (piano, harmonium), Trevor Hutchinson (bass) and Dave Hingerty (percussion), whose contributions are "just right" at all times, with not a hint of overkill and furnishing the ideal amount of forward momentum where needed.

Around two-thirds of the songs here are drawn from tradition; bravely, Colleen opts to begin with Canadee-I-O, which, though Colleen unashamedly namechecks the Nic Jones version as a permanent favourite, emerges bold and freshly animated with a noticeably driven bass line. The tale of The Granemore Hare both sparkles and gallops along, as does the complexity of The Cruel Brother (for all that the latter's scoring seems a touch mundanely employed). Emigration song Craigie Hill is also affectingly managed. Arguably the finest of Colleen's interpretations, however, is The Nightingale (learnt from the singing of Frank Harte), wherein Colleen's deft phrasing succeeds in capturing its special conjoining of the emotions of melancholy farewell and hope for the future.

The four non-traditional songs don't all make an equal mark on me. Two of them are settings of poems by contemporary Irish poet Vincent Woods; Stand Up For Love, with music by Aiden Brennan, is beautifully done, as is Sanctuary (from the lyric of which the album derives its title), although the latter's unadorned piano backdrop seems somehow too plain and uninteresting a counterpart for the richness of the imagery. Colleen also introduces us to Colliery Boy, a deeply felt tribute by Joseph Kavanagh to his parents and all the other folk whose fates were tied to the Deerpark Mine in Kilkenny.

This may not be one of the most immediate or overtly demonstrative albums of Irish song that you'll hear, but its appeal is not to be underestimated.

David Kidman