El McMeen
Dancing the
Strings
Piney
Ridge Music PRM 110; 2003
El
McMeen's solo guitar CD, Dancing the Strings, is, as the subtitle Celtic
to Contemporary suggests, an unusual mix of traditional tunes and popular
modern music. All the tracks seem to be played on solo guitar, with no obvious
overdubs, which is a refreshing change in this era of multi-layered string accompaniments.
The tuning system he uses (CGDGAD) is a departure from the more usual DAGDAD
and other standard guitar tunings, and when used without a capo (as on Midnight
on the Water, a Texan waltz memorably covered by Máirtín O'Connor on Perpetual
Motion) produces a rich, deep tone. The genres on the CD are equally
distributed, with five tracks of both 'Celtic' and popular music, and four more
traditional American tracks (three waltzes and America the Beautiful);
I'm going to concentrate here on the traditional tracks, which will probably be
of more immediate interest. 
The
slower tunes are, to me, the most attractive: there is great control and
clarity in the playing, while at the same time conveying a real depth of
emotion - this is particularly apparent in the treatment of the Tennessee
Waltz, where the sensitivity and lyricism of the playing, especially in the
harmonics of the introduction, raise the tune well above its somewhat hackneyed
reputation. The playing is similarly thoughtful on Midnight on the Water
and on the Skye Boat Song, which is paired with a fresh interpretation
of Give me your Hand; indeed McMeen's eagerness to avoid the obvious in
the arrangements and chording of these pieces is impressive and attractive.
Where
the recording dips a little (for me) is in the playing of the quicker tunes,
and particularly the Irish jigs. Although again there is great skill displayed
here, the versions of the tunes are, to me, over-simplified in their adaptation
for McMeen's style of finger picking. This is particularly the case with a tune
I would associate with the uilleann pipes, The Humours of Ballyloughlin
(or The Hurler's March), where so much of the substance of the tune is
incorporated in the usual ornamentation, which is missing from McMeen's
setting. The more classically-styled Carolan tune Hugh O'Donnell works
better in this regard, as much ornamentation would not be usually expected.
Overall
then, a mixed bag in both style and content, the slow tracks working well, but
the faster tracks suffering in the translation to this technique, which perhaps
doesn't seem entirely cut out for Irish 'dancing on the strings'!
This
is an original review by Adrian Scahill completed in January 2004.
More
information about El McMeen can be found a t www.elmcmeen.com.