Session A9

(Raj)

With two of the nine tracks already familiar from their previous album (the live One For The Road) and a title that wouldn't have caused much of a punch-up at a production meeting, this latest release from one of Scotland's premier fiddle bands has, on first impressions, the feeling of a holding operation. But from the graceful opening strains of Charlie McKerron's masterly Wedding Polkas onwards, these three sincerely sung songs and six instrumental selections provide ample evidence of a band at the top of its game. Apart from anything else, the lift the four fiddlers involved can give a tune, supported by the grooving forward motion of their rhythm section, just makes you feel that all's well with the world. And their reach is global, pitching the bluegrass interlude that is Gordon Gunn's The Birds Have Gone, the Breton celebration of Ridee and the Moroccan roll of the late Gordon Duncan's magnificent The Bellydancer alongside the deep-in-the-north-east-tradition finesse of The Miller Of Dron.