"...This brings to her performance an uncontrived naturalness and at times a raw heartfeltness that is nothing short of captivating.

The trio of Maggie singing and playing clarsach, Brian MacAlpine on keyboards and accordion and Anna Massie on guitar (with or without the wandering capo) generate a subtle yet emphatic pallet of accompaniment, at times sparse, at others gently swinging with lilting syncopations, and then with rapid-fire reeling..." Peter Urpeth, Highland & Island Arts 2009

"...her singing was such that no translations were necessary…"

"…her voice was haunting and angelic; and her chilling unaccompanied vocal on a Scottish lament earned the show's longest ovation from the
sell-out crowd…" Boston Globe, USA

"…one of the brightest singers of traditional Gaelic music in Scotland." A.F.I.M. (Association of Independent Music ) June 1999

"…a display of singing confidence, background authority and unshowy musicality that bodes well indeed."
Rob Adams, Glasgow Herald, 25 Jan 2000

"….The finest live performer in Gaelic music today"
Folk Roots Magazine, July, 2001

"…it also takes a performer of unusual talent to unlock the soul and
to place there in this music and these poems and Maggie MacInnes
is certainly one such performer."
The Living Tradition Magazine, Summer 2001

Maggie MacInnes Trio
Merchiston Castle School, Edinburgh
Published Date: 15 April 2010

The Maggie MacInnes Trio opened the concert, with the Gaelic singer and harpist accompanied by Brian McAlpine on keyboards and accordion, and Anna Massie on guitar, alternating lively waulking songs with some poised and delicately accompanied material from Barra and Mingulay. Chan e Caoidh Mhic Shirid, a sister's lament for her drowned brother, was particularly poignant. Jim Gilchrist 2010

Maggie MacInnes Trio
Live at the Star
OBAN TIMES March, 2010

It may not be a venue frequently visited by enthusiasts of west coast music, but the weekly meetings of the Star Club, held in St. Andrew's in the Square, sometimes showcase Gaelic artistes.

Last week's concert was one of those when Maggie MacInnes and her band, Brian McAlpine on keyboard/accordion and Anna Massie on guitar, provided quality entertainment which deserved a far greater attendence.

Over the years I have featured Maggie MacInnes concerts in this column and, as in the past, she showed why she is one of Gaeldom's best performers.

From the outset, even when setting up, the trio struck up a rapport of fun with the audience and this was maintained throughout. Explanations of the songs were provided but not to the extent that they took longer than the actual singing which can sometimes be a characteristic nowadays.

And there was great variety included in the programme. Rabbie Burns, a particular favourite of Maggie's, featured and there was a sample from her CD with Colum Sands to be released soon.

It was a concert with many highlights but perhaps in time tradition the "best was kept for last" when the singing and sensitive accompaniment to Blair Douglas's Solus m' Aigh, written for Father Colin MacInnes, was simply superb.

Maggie MacInnes and the James Graham Trio
Celtic Connections Festival • 21st Jan, 2010.
St Andrews In The Square, Glasgow
Bluesbunny Music Reviews
Independent music reviews from Glasgatraz

Though the venue was just shy of the heart of Glasgow's city centre, you'd barely have known just where you were. An evening of fine celtic music saw the James Graham Trio and Maggie MacInnes entertain those amassed in St Andrews In The Square. Weren't you half expecting a hymn sheet upon entrance! Ba mhaith liom cupan caife!

The James Graham Trio are composed of two suitably dexterous musicians in James Ross (piano) and Neil Johnstone (cello), who created the perfect the symphonic backdrop for James Graham to sing over. Graham's chanting was entirely in Gaelic and I'm sure many in the audience were more than aware. Those less fluent in Gaelic were given perfect reason to learn. Owing almost as much to classical awareness as to celtic sounds, The James Graham Trio are an excellent example of how modern music in the Gaelic tongue can have widespread appeal.

Coming from a family deep-soaked in musical brilliance, you'd expect at least a minim of musical understanding in Maggie MacInnes. This was, of course, to be the case. Resplendent in a shining black dress, Ms MacInnes - flanked by the wonderful Anna Massie (guitar) and Brian McAlpine (keyboard/accordion) - flew through a set of wonderful music, all positively Scottish in nature, and their origins well explained beforehand. The clarsach is her instrument of choice, and Ms MacInnes drew a healthy, emotive sound from it. Drawing mostly from songs regarding the long-uninhabited island of Mingulay, Ms MacInnes sang with a gentle sincerity that needed no understanding of the Gaelic language to properly convey its beauty. Of course, it'd have helped.

If ever there was to be a time to forge an understanding of the Gaelic tongue, it is now. Music such as this can be appreciated without understanding of the words, but in understanding them, another realm of beauty expands to the listener.
Peter McGee, 2010

Maggie MacInnes Trio
An Lanntair, Stornoway on 21st May, 2009, for Hi-Arts.
www.hi-arts.co.uk
Review reproduced with kind permission of Highland & Islands Arts.

PETER URPETH feels the crucial influence of home and
family in the artistry of Gaelic singer Maggie MacInnes

Performances by Maggie MacInnes have for this writer always had something of a qualitative difference from those of other singers performing songs from the Scottish Gaelic tradition. The difference stems entirely from Maggie's direct family relationship to a tradition of song which evolved in the Islands of Barra, Vatersay, Mingulay, Eriskay and South Uist and which stretches back for more than three centuries.

Maggie's repertoire comes largely from the songs she learned from her mother, the great Gaelic singer from the Isle of Barra, Flora MacNeil, who, of course, in turn had heard and learned the songs from her own mother, her extended family and from the island community in which she grew up.

Although largely drawn from the song traditions of that small archipelago at the southern tip of the Outer Hebrides, Maggie constantly turns-up surprises in her performances in the form of unfamiliar if not totally unique songs; unfamiliar variations of now familiar songs in the contemporary Gaelic repertoire; and familiar songs that only became familiar to us as a consequence of her mother's resilient preservation of them.

But the uniqueness of the repertoire, although of great interest for those who love this tradition of song, is not the only element of the Gaelic tradition that Maggie has acquired, and in which she herself is now firmly placed.

Maggie performs these great and rare songs with an emotion and an intimacy that surely can only come from her in-the-blood proximity to these songs in their original domestic rather than concert hall setting. Many of the songs she sings, just like her mother before her, have been a part of her real lived life for as long as she has had a life. The songs, of course, continue to evolve and live in their contemporary setting, but the idea of what a performance is, is surely different between those who have the songs as a part of their lives and then sing them on stage and those who learn them as one might learn lieder, however much the singer might love the learned material.

This brings to her performance an uncontrived naturalness and at times a raw heartfeltness that is nothing short of captivating.

The trio of Maggie singing and playing clarsach, Brian MacAlpine on keyboards and accordion and Anna Massie on guitar (with or without the wandering capo) generate a subtle yet emphatic pallet of accompaniment, at times sparse, at others gently swinging with lilting syncopations, and then with rapid-fire reeling.

Maggie at times utilises the clarsach in this mix for cross-rhythmic phrases and punctuations that add a different colour dimension to the arrangements, so much so that this trio perform with impact of at least a quintet. But then, in Brian and Anna, Maggie has chosen wisely from amongst the crop of the very finest musicians in contemporary Scottish music.

The set, which apart from its foundations in the environs of Barra, testified to the extent to which this is a diverse tradition of songs largely by and about the experiences of women, focused on Maggie's recent project exploring and recording the songs of Mingulay, which is now available as a new CD – A Fagail Mhiughalaigh (Leaving Mingulay).

Two songs in particular from this sequence (which also have Vatersay connections), the fishing song Leis an Lurgainn and Oran Na Raiders Bhatersaigh (Song of the Vatersay Raiders), testify to the sheer struggle for existence that the community endured before the final clearance of the island in 1912, and both also document the fact that Mingulay had its own local versions and variations of many songs.

Another song with Mingulay connections, the Luadh Cha Teid Mise, was given a particularly forceful and spirited performance.

The set also included Sraid Na h-Eala, A Fhleasgaich Oig is Ceanalta, Thig an Smeorach as t-Earrach (which Maggie's mother learned from the singing of the great Lewis Gaelic singer, Joan MacKenzie), Dh'eirich mi gu moch Diluain, and Gradh Geal Mo Chridh (aka The Eriskay Love Lilt, here sung in a traditional form), along with two Burn's songs (in English) that included an arresting version of My Heart Is In The Highlands, and closed with a contemporary Gaelic song of great beauty, Blair Douglas's Solus M'aigh.

The theatre space at Stornoway's An Lanntair arts centre is particularly well suited to this scale and type of performance, ideal for what was a real celebration of traditional and contemporary Gaelic culture in its heartland. © Peter Urpeth, 2009