Launched last October at Cape Breton’s Celtic Colour Festival, Oirialla is an album from a group made up of Gerry O’Connor on fiddle, Nuala Kennedy on flute and singing, Martin Quinn on accordion, joined by Breton guitarist Gilles le Bigot. The name derives from a historical kingdom made up of parts of north Louth, south Armagh and east Monaghan.

O’Connor comes from a fiddle-playing family in Dundalk. Known as both a soloist, a collaborator, and a founding member of Lá Lugh and Skylark, his solo album, Journeyman, was released in 2004. Gerry is also a violin-maker, music teacher and producer, and currently directing a traditional music initiative with over one hundred students in a number of primary schools in the Drogheda area. 

Kennedy is a singer and flautist from Dundalk. Her albums include The New Shoes (2007), Tune In (2010) and Noble Stranger (2012). She has recorded or toured with artists including Will Oldham, Norman Blake, and the late Canadian musician Oliver Schroer, with whom she recorded an album of original compositions released in 2011. 

Quinn is a box player from a family of musicians from just outside the village of Mullaghbane in south Armagh. He has performed and recorded with, among others, Lá Lugh, Dorsa, Josephine Keegan, Paul Bradley and Cathal McConnell. He released a duet album with Angelina Carberry in 2003. Quinn is known for his bass-strong chords inspired by the regulators of the pipes.

Gilles Le Bigot is best known in Brittany as co-founder of the groups Skolvan and Barzaz, and well known for his open-tuning playing. He recorded and performed with Lá Lugh throughout the 1990s and has continued to work with O’Connor since that time, recording a duo album with him in 2006. As well as collaborating on several major recordings such as l’Héritage des Celtes by Dan Ar Braz , and Azéliziza by Le Bagad Kemper, he has performed and recorded with Kornog, Slovan, Barzaz, Fiddle Rendevous and his own trio line-up, Empreintes with Jean Michel Veillon and Marthe Vassalo.

The songs are the Scottish lullaby ‘Bidh Clann Ulaidh’, ‘Voice from the Sea’ based on a text from The Ulster Folk collection with an original setting by Kennedy, ‘The Boys of Mullaghbawn’, and ‘The Cavan Road’ (learned from Cathal McConnell).  

The tunes are arranged in the following sets:

Delvinside Set, highland and reels (‘Delvinside’, ‘Drowsy Maggie’, ‘Yankee Cabbage’, ‘Miss Hutchinson’, ‘McFadden’s Own’)

McCusker’s Jigs (‘I Lost My Love and Care Not’, ‘MacLeod of Mull’, ‘The Sweets of May’)

The Kitten Set, double jig, slip jig and reels (‘Cavers of Kirkculbright’, ‘The Kitten’, ‘Lady’s Pantaloons’, ‘Miss Butler’s’, ‘Tamarack’er Down’  – composed by Cape Breton fiddle player, Donald Angus Beaton, and which can be listened to below.)

Sung in Louth, strathspey, jig and set dance (‘Mrs Carroll’s Strathspey’, composed by Liz Carroll, ‘Cathal Mac Aodha’, ‘The Blackthorn Stick’)

Humours of Glen, air, long dance and reels (‘Humours of Glen’ (Pierce Power), ‘Betty Black’, ‘Callan Lasses’, ‘An Gabhrán’)

Through the Heather Highland, single jig, highland and reels (‘Switch Her Through the Heather’, ‘Peter McArdle’s’, ‘Down the Meadow’, ‘The Scutchers Reel’)

oiriallamusic.com