Phil Callery Band

Tunesmiths may face few problems with having new material accepted as "traditional", but not so songwriters

Tunesmiths may face few problems with having new material accepted as "traditional", but not so songwriters. And Phil Callery's band here grasped the nettle with daughters Rosa and Sarah leading Sinead O'Connor's ballad In This Heart. But, despite this, and a finale on the light Fair Rosa, the group presented a solid phalanx of well-thought-out "old" song and music from these islands.

Burns's Westland Winds set the vaguely 18th-century tone; Young Willy conveyed the era's morality; Bonny Blue- eyed Nancy developed the band to its fullest, almost to solemnity. But it was the great industrious workouts between the singers' and Colm Caughey's fiddles, their inter meshing with droning, riffing and choo-chooing cello, top ped off with Belinda Morris's bleating soprano sax, which created their sound. in's bouzouki, this was supreme in Sarah Jane and Lady Le Roi.

O'Callanain picked almost sitar-like at times, electronics minimal, but perhaps rock-rhythmics were too ever-present, and one unmediated a cappella piece would have been a charming contrast.

Callery's flawless voice is woven well into his sweetly-constructed backcloth, and while Price of the Pig may have lost its clever lyric tension by being galloped (a la Taunton Two), it was redeemed by a wonderful multi-instrument, 6/8 conclusion.