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Feb 14:
Winnipeg,
MB Concert Review
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Believe it! To inaugurate the new and impressive building, home now to the Strait Pirates and the Port Hawkesbury Municipal staff, to ballet and the YCMA, to a quilt market and an art gallery, Marketing and Events Manager Paula Davis and Natalie MacMaster's brother, Dave, arranged a performance by the Troy fiddler and all her in-laws, the internationally acclaimed Leahy family. "You're going to have a good time whether you like it or not," Donnell Leahy told the sold-out audience in the Civic Centre arena and, joined by seven brothers and sisters, led the willing audience into a Celtic wonderland of music, song and dance. The Port Hawkesbury concert was only the second time these two Celtic forces, Leahy and MacMaster, had performed together, the first time being a couple of nights earlier in Halifax, but the Halifax performance, Donnell Leahy noted, "was only a dress rehearsal for tonight," which was in every way a homecoming. All of Cape Breton lays claim to Natalie MacMaster, the island's most exciting and endearing daughter, and since marrying Donnell Leahy a couple of years ago, he might also have been adopted except that Donnell and the whole Leahy clan can claim their own Cape Breton credentials, their mother, Julia (MacDonnell), being from Deepdale. With performances ranging from Cape Breton jigs to the standing ovation Leahy received for its spirited version of Orange Blossom Special, from dance numbers, to the tender lyrics of Borrowed Time, a Leahy song inspired by the death of friend's daughter, the audience was alive and clapping and tapping along. Fortunately, the audience was neither clapped nor tapped out by the time the evening's second show started. Natalie MacMaster and her band took the stage after a short intermission, opening with The Jig Party from her recording, Blueprint, and from there was a dazzling display of energy and talent. Dance routines by MacMaster may have comprised as much as twenty-five percent of her performance on Saturday, and we're not talking slow dancing to a waltz band. This woman rarely let up, Cape Breton fiddling with the passion that has earned her international fame, playing her instrument one-on-one against her band, Brad Davidge's guitar, John Chiasson's bass, Allan Dewar's keyboard, Matt MacIsaac's bagpipes, Miche Pouliot's drums. Moving from the fiddle to dance routines, featuring rapid taps while standing still, a hornpipe, and, of course, Natalie MacMaster's signature back-kick. When she wasn't fiddling or dancing, she was fiddling and dancing. For a breather, Natalie would approach the mike to talk to the audience in the fashion most cherished by Cape Bretoners, telling stories, at which she is as accomplished as she is with fiddle or feet. (Someday, get her to tell you about trying to qualify for funding for a music video, and how that led to a previously unrevealed MacMaster talent, songwriting!) And just when people thought it was over, it wasn't. After all, the lady from Troy is married now, so the audience wanted to watch them play together (which they did with proper decorum), the two fiddlers in a fascinating duet. And just when people thought it was over, it wasn't. Onto the stage came Natalie's band and the Leahy clan, forming a string of musicians nine fiddlers long on the Civic Centre stage. It took a long while for the applause to fade.
Photo:
Frank MacDonald - Natalie and Donnell: The Leahy-Natalie MacMaster .........................................................................................................................................
November
30, 2004
MacMaster played faster, kicked higher and smiled wider than a stage full of Rockettes, and what made the show even more enjoyable was the fact that the audience of about 1,700 smiled back with gusto. A look around the packed arena revealed a crowd that was with MacMaster on every note she played, every tap she stepped and every story she relayed in her ever-the-Cape-Bretoner accent. MacMaster told the audience she was thrilled to come home and perform alongside her husband, Donnell Leahy, and all the rest of the Leahy clan. Anyone who has seen Leahy perform knows that their show is electric, but they seemed to put even more passion into Saturday's performance, perhaps in homage to their newest family member. "It's really great to be here in Port Hawkesbury, a little place I've come to know a little bit better over the past few years," Donnell told the crowd. "We ran this show a couple of times earlier in the week in Halifax, as just a warm-up, just a dress rehearsal for tonight, really." Their performance brought the audience to its feet more than once as they struggled to keep an eye on Donnell's flying bow.
Photo:
STEPHENIE CAMPBELL .........................................................................................................................................
November
25, 2004 Will they play together?
And while the Grammy-nominated musician from Troy may have played it coy in interviews leading up to the historic show, when she gave a broad wink at the end of her "last blast of tunes" telling the audience it was the final number, they knew the moment they had waited for was about to occur. The duet, which came at the end of two hours of first-class fiddling, sizzling step-dancing and good-natured banter was every bit as magical as imagined. The capacity crowd was still on its feet as Donnell Leahy, who wed MacMaster two years ago in Cape Breton, returned to the stage to join his wife in a sweet, rich melody played with classical grandeur. After a quick kiss, the duo picked up the tempo and were joined by the other Leahy siblings in a rollicking nine-fiddle set. Donnell Leahy and MacMaster share passion and talent for the fiddle but their musical styles are vastly different. While she's a captivating, exhuberant player, whimsical, full of life and joy, the music lightly flowing from her fingertips, he's more driven, more precise, more intense, while dazzling with the lightning speed of his fingers and bow. And the audience loved both performances. The Lakefield, Ont., family, with Cape Breton roots on their mother's side, highlighted their opening set with the traditional Cape Breton Medley, spectacular stepping in Ottawa Valley style from Agnes, Erin and Maria - Siobheann, who had a baby just three weeks ago stuck to bass guitar - a plaintive ballad from pianist Erin about a women who lost her 21-year-old daughter to cancer, and the Orange Blosson Special. Call to the Dance which ended with step-dancing fiddlers, who twirled and kicked in unison as if taking part in a Broadway chorus line, brought the audience to their feet. MacMaster's band - guitarist Brad Davidge, Matt MacIsaac on pipes and whistles, drummer Miche Pouliot, bassist John Chiasson and Alan Dewar on keyboards - filled in the stage as Leahy exited in a seamless transition. MacMaster, clad in pink sparkly pants and bright fuschia tee, entered to MacIsaac's haunting tin whistle and soon had the audience in the palm of her hand with her humour and mile-wide smile. Her enthusiasm for playing at home was palpable, as was her joy at playing favourites like Blue Bonnets Over Scotland and demonstrating her skill at Highland dance and in a rare hornpipe. Later she got funky with a step-dancing moonwalk, followed by a sleek moonwalkthat would make Michael Jackson proud. It was a night to dazzle on all fronts.
Photo:
TED PRITCHARD / Staff .........................................................................................................................................
November
24, 2004
Leahy drew the first set, as the four brothers and four sisters from Lakefield, Ont,. kicked into a rousing set of tunes. Fiddles and keyboards, guitars and a thundering drum kit cranked the energy - and the volume - into high gear. Donnell is a world-class fiddler, with an impressive command of the instrument. And sister Erin is an excellent keyboardist and compelling singer. But with so much sound and fury, the eight-piece band rarely let the soul of the music shine, overdriving their performance with frenetic energy. Leahy finally found its voice on their signature Call To Dance, which showcases the solid ensemble playing and culminates with the whole clan madly step- dancing in a line. No pause As Donnell introduced each of his sibs, the Cohn stage crew was quietly changing over the stage for MacMaster. Without a pause, her band took over as the lights dropped and eased into a moody tune built round Matt MacIsaac's low whistle. You could feel the room exhale and refocus. MacMaster skipped onstage in sparkly pink pants and a hot pink top, and launched into a sweet set of Cape Breton tunes. Her tone is gorgeous, and her playing is effortless. She seems almost disconnected from her instrument as the music flows out of her like warm breath on a cool morning. She kicked the band into the lilting Harvest Home hornpipe, with Brad Davidge adding some greasy electric guitar fills, then spilled into a driving set of reels. Seems the big rock on her left hand hasn't slowed her playing any. Last night's concert showed little of the bluegrass flavour from her recent Blueprint CD. She kept the music closer to home for the crowd, which was stacked with Cape Bretoners. And MacMaster was feeling the love, beaming as she played. She exudes a palpable joy in her music, adrift in the exuberance of her Celtic muse. She closed her well-balanced set with the stunning Blue Bonnets Over the Border, a staple of her live set, animating the ancient tune with a fresh arrangement. MacMaster has one of the finest Celtic bands in the world - Davidge, MacIsaac, bassist John Chiasson, pianist Allan Dewar and drummer Miche Pouliot. To no one's surprise, as the standing ovation roared, Donnell appeared from behind the wings to join MacMaster for a lovely unaccompanied violin duet. The swooping harmony parts wove round each other, creating an intense musical connection onstage. Sawing away Not unlike family dinner at the Leahy farm, the intimate mood was soon interrupted, as a pair of fiddling siblings arrived, followed by a couple more. By the time the band blasted into Alabama Jubilee, all eight Leahys and Natalie were sawing away on fiddles and step-dancing like mad. Welcome to the family, Nat.
Photo:
Palpable Joy: Fiddler Natalie MacMaster performs last night at the Cohn .........................................................................................................................................
November
20, 2004 THE QUESTION "Who's on first?" may be the trigger for a classic comedy routine, but when you've got two powerhouse Canadian Celtic acts touring on the road together, it's no laughing matter. Keeping it all in the family, Cape Breton fiddler Natalie MacMaster is on her first tour with her husband Donnell Leahy's band of siblings delivering a one-two punch of high spirited, fiddle-fueled traditional sounds. The two Nova Scotia stops include a pair of shows at Halifax's Rebecca Cohn Auditorium on Tuesday and another at Port Hawkesbury's new Civic Centre on Saturday, Nov. 27. Usually it's a question of who's the headliner and who's the up-and-coming act who gets the support slot, but in terms of popularity, success and skill the MacMaster/Leahy pairing is a tough call (although it's a safe bet that the fiddling fireball from Troy has a slight edge on the East Coast). "I'll tell you this, we split it up evenly," says MacMaster from her home in Lakehill, Ont. "I go first half the shows, and Leahy's going first the rest of the time. It's hard, because I wouldn't want to have to close for Leahy, and Donnell doesn't want to have to close for me. I don't want to have to go on after Leahy, they put on a great show. And we both do similar things and have an energetic, highly spirited show, and it's really tough to keep that momentum. They just knock the audience out of their seats, and I think, 'What am I supposed to do now? Where's my ring of fire?' " "But we realized that sharing the bill makes a lot of sense, and the power of both bands together is something else. We're separate entities, but put us together and it's a whole new thing, and people who are interested in our kind of music will get a big dose of it. "And we're different enough that there's variety there. I'm more traditional and Leahy is a bit more rocking, so we just decided to stop worrying about it." Fans are also probably wondering if they can expect a Natalie/Donnell duet at some point in the show, since the two collaborated on My Love, Cape Breton and Me on her recent Blueprint CD, and the new Leahy CD In All Things includes their joint composition Wedding Day Jig. The pair actually did share the stage when MacMaster launched her doublelive CD at The Marquee Club, when they were still just engaged, and it's bound to be a highlight of this show. If it happens, that is. "I have to figure out how to answer that question, because it's come up before, and I don't want to give anything away," says MacMaster. "The best answer I could come up with is, 'What do you think?' " Hmmm . . . Will the sun rise tomorrow? Is the sky blue? Is the Pope Catholic? If I were a betting man, I'd lay odds on The Wedding Jig making an appearance in the show, a tune that means a lot to MacMaster for obvious reasons. "I was obviously a little more endeared to that one," she says. "You know how when you go to a wedding and you sit down to dinner and there's a little something there for the guests, like candles or a box of chocolates or something? We were wondering what to do, and we thought, 'Let's give 'em a tune.' "So we decided to write up a tune, put it on nice paper and roll it up and have it on the tables. Well two days before the wedding we realized we didn't have the tune! So we wrote the tune - I wrote the first half, Donnel wrote the second - ten minutes each in turn, and when we finished, we thought, 'Hey, that's good!' " But Wedding Day Jig nearly remained a secret between MacMaster's and Leahy's friends and family, until the Cape Breton native suggested to the Ontario-raised family band - whose mother was an islander - that they record a jig for In All Things. "Well, they thought that jigs tend to sound a little dorky - needless to say, I disagree," says MacMaster, before reconsidering her choice of adjectives. "OK, not dorky, that's a bad word for it, but he's very cautious with them. They have that 'dum-de-dum-dee-diddle-dee-dum' rhythm to them, and it's easier to make a great arrangement for a reel because of the rhythm, while it's a lot more thought provoking and time-consuming to come up with one for a jig. "But I thought we should try it anyway, and the arrangement came together so quickly, I loved what they did with it. There's nothing rinky dink about it at all, it's got a great groove." MacMaster doesn't have to sell Nova Scotians on the fine quality of jigs, their bouncy rhythmsare perfect for stepdancing and you can't hear one without smiling. Cape Breton music without jigs would be like classical music without minuets. "We grew up with jigs in Cape Breton, and it's such a major part of the music,"she says. "The jig was as popular in its way as the reel, and we love to play them. On my traditional record, I've got three sets of them, I just adore them. But you don't hear people play them as much up here (in Ontario). "They play breakdowns and clogs and reels and waltzes, they play lots of waltzes. They lovethe waltz like we love the jigs." Surprisingly, this is MacMaster's first Cohn show in four years - Leahy played there in 2001 - and while she figures she still plays about 100 shows per year with her band, most of that effort has taken place in the U.S. "Life continues to be exciting," says MacMaster, who notes the past year has included appearances on Good Morning America and Late Night with Conan O'Brien, onstage at Carnegie Hall and with the Boston Pops. Joined by her band - including guitarist Brad Davidge, Matt MacIssac on pipes and whistles, drummer Miche Pouliot, bassist John Chiasson and Alan Dewar on keyboards - MacMaster says her current shows are some of the best she's ever played, bolstered by the songs off Blueprint, which was recorded with some of the biggest names in traditional music in Nashville. Besides the concerts at home, MacMaster is also excited at the prospect of some time off once the current round of dates is over. "Yes, a whole month! Usually I play in December, but this is the perfect time to take off, with all the Christmas stuff." .........................................................................................................................................
November
18, 2004 When Natalie MacMaster glided down the aisle in the big Stella Maris Catholic Church in Creignish to marry Donnell Leahy, it was about as close as Nova Scotia gets to a royal wedding. Reporters and photographers stood in the October chill outside, waiting for the happy couple to emerge from the church. Two years later, the pair is living happily in a home on the Leahy beef farm in Lakefield, Ont. whenever the busy musicians find a little downtime in their careers."It's so gorgeous here," says MacMaster, from her home 20 minutes from Peterborough. "It's just like a little storybook." Donnell and Natalie bought a house on the property, but plan to build their dream house there in the near future. He works most every day on the farm with his father and brothers, tending to 300 head of beef cattle. "I find the farmwork such great balance from the music," says Leahy. "We grew up working, and it's in the blood. I actually have to pull myself away from it. I get caught up in the farm." On Tuesday night at the Rebecca Cohn, the two are doing something they've never done before: MacMaster and her six-piece band will share a concert stage with the eight-sibling Leahy band. "We wanted to make the Halifax show a little special," explains MacMaster, 31. "So we talked about it, and then Donnell went to Leahy with the idea, and I went to, uh, myself with it and it was a go for everybody." With 14 musicians plus crew traveling, it's a big entourage. But MacMaster loves having the family around. Both bands will split the evening down the middle, though MacMaster won't reveal who will open. And will the married fiddlers play onstage together? "What do you think?" she laughs. The acclaimed fiddler has scaled back her once-hectic touring schedule to about 100 shows a year plus another 40 days of traveling around those dates. As her star continues to rise on the international scene, MacMaster now plays major soft-seaters, festivals and the "odd specialty gig, like the Good Morning America show." The Grammy-nominated fiddler opened shows this summer for Don Henley and Faith Hill, played a PBS televised concert with the Boston Pops Orchestra, performed on Late Night With Conan O'Brien and participated in a marvelous fundraiser at Carnegie Hall with classical-music superstars Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, Pinchas Zukerman and Joshua Bell. "I was hanging out backstage with Bobby McFerrin and Yo-Yo Ma and Itzhak Perlman. These guys are kings in their fields, but they made me feel really good." The classical players were awed by MacMaster's ability at "cutting the bow," the rapid triple bow movement that gives the Cape Breton fiddle style its distinct drive. "They thought it was pretty cool, and were standing around trying to figure how I was doing it. I was laughing to myself, thinking all you have to do is go to a square set in Glencoe and you'll hear it." MacMaster's fan base continues to grow in the important U.S. market, where much of her touring is now centred. She's been performing in the States since she was 12 years old, flying south to play dances and festivals even while attending teachers college in Truro. MacMaster figures her Blueprint album, recorded in Nashville with some of the best acoustic musicians in the world, has helped boost her profile and reputation in the U.S. bluegrass stars including Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush, Bela Fleck, Bryan Sutton and Viktor Krauss. The Cape Breton musician met many of the players over the years playing festivals across the U.S. "There are some musicians who have stood the test of time, who are the real deal," explains MacMaster. "There's a circle of those well-respected musicians, and part of that circle was on that album." Still, MacMaster continues to grow and evolve as a musician. She has opened the horizons of traditional Cape Breton music, incorporating elements of Latin and pop. "I'm learning all the time about how I like my music to sound." MacMaster has been recording some new tracks over the summer toward a new album. "I'm working a lot with (guitarist) Brad Davidge on the arrangements, and really finding a nice place. I write some music and get it to a place where I can't get any further, and then take it to Brad." Ironically, MacMaster has only begun writing in earnest in recent years. Like many fiddle players, she preferred to draw on the extensive canon of traditional fiddle music. "I remember thinking that I'd written some tunes but didn't like the experience and had no intention of becoming a writer. I didn't have the confidence before. But I've totally changed. "Now I'm really enjoying the creative process and trusting my instincts more." And when MacMaster isn't touring, she often hits the road with Leahy. "Why stay home alone? I might was well be out with him." But don't expect her on-stage "I enjoy the night off and play with the kids backstage." How is she enjoying married life? "I just love it, oh my gosh. I feel I am no longer restless in life. I give marriage a lot of credit. I didn't know marriage was such a beautiful thing until I entered into it." While she says her once-driven focus on her career may have softened since being married, "I am still so motivated. I am as excited about music now as any point in my life. But in terms of priorities in life, absolutely my marriage is number one." Leahy agrees that marriage has helped him find balance in life. "Natalie helps everything. She's really taken to married life . and we both understand the (demands of) the music career." You'd think with two of the best fiddlers in Canada sharing the same house, the rafters would ring with live music. But with their busy schedules, there's little time for playing music in their house. "I find we play a lot less at home than people would expect," says Leahy. "We get home and want some normalcy. Our tours are long, so when I come home, I don't really want to play the fiddle too much. When I come home, I want to be married and be normal, if there is such a thing." MacMaster is taking to the domestic chores that were never a large part of her single life. Living on a beef farm, she's becoming pretty handy in the kitchen. "Do I ever love it, boy oh boy. I have a new passion. If I wasn't a fiddler I'd be chef. One day I'll have a really good kitchen with cool ovens and fancy propane stove tops I can't wait." With a happy marriage, can children be far behind?
"We'd
love a family," says MacMaster. "But we'll just have to let
nature take her course."
'Natalie is deeply rooted in the Cape Breton music," explains Donnell Leahy. "All the music she writes is grounded in that Cape Breton music. I've come from Ontario, and grew up without a fiddle culture. So I developed on my own. When I approach a piece of music, it's completely different from Natalie." Leahy's father was a renowned fiddler player, and the main musical influence on young Donnell. "I started playing the fiddle when I was three, and when I was 10, I was given four records Jerry Holland, Irish fiddler Sean McQuire, T-Jean Carignan from Quebec and Graham Townsend. I learned every tune on those records. I think God sent them to me. It happened at a key point in my music development. I had learned my own style, then was introduced to these great players." Donnell's stunning technique on the fiddle has long been the centrepiece of the Leahy band, which toured country fairs and festivals when all were young kids. In 1985, a documentary about the family band won an Academy Award as best foreign student film. Leahy has built its reputation on its showy concerts, with the eight siblings trading instruments, singing and stepdancing. It's a far different environment that breeds the fiddle players from Inverness County. "In the Cape Breton style, it's all about timing and rhythm and tunes, tunes, tunes," says Leahy. "They group 10 tunes into a medley and play and play. But we'd play one tune and stop." That Cape Breton tradition grew from the dance hall demands, where the driving jigs and blistering reels would set the rhythms for the square sets. A fiddler needed several tunes to keep the music flowing until the completion of the dance. .........................................................................................................................................
October
21, 2004 Bluegrass and Celtic music are close cousins," reads a publicity sheet for Natalie MacMaster's latest CD, Blueprint, "with shared roots hundreds of years old." But Natalie says that's not why she picked bluegrass artists, Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush and Edgar Meyer, to back her on this album. They were simply the absolute best musicians anywhere and their recent influence on her music will be heard during her concert tonight at 8 p.m. at Saint John's Imperial Theatre. Now 30, Natalie has been taking her Celtic based, pop and, recently, bluegrass influenced fiddle music to a steadily growing world audience since her teens, and this past year has been a busy one! She married, moved from Halifax to Lakefield, Ontario; accompanied Ireland's most prestigious music act, The Chieftains, on a US tour, was featured in an Evening of Pops in April at Washington Centre for Performing Arts, and played over 85 solo concerts. Easily North America's most recognizable fiddling personality: she's been featured in official NS tour guides, TV commercials for General Motors and Tim Horton's. A step-dancer since five, Natalie began studying fiddle at nine and toured Canada when she was only 11. .........................................................................................................................................
October
19, 2004 Natalie MacMaster is what you might call a globe-trotting homebody. The Cape Breton fiddling sensation has been on the road for half her young life and perhaps it's for that reason that she craves the simple things: like doing her own laundry, for instance. "I don't find anything mundane about being at home. I love home. Donnell (Leahy, MacMaster's husband, fellow fiddler and member of the Celtic family band, Leahy) is the same way I suppose. We are never at home. I enjoy doing the laundry, I enjoy cooking, I enjoy ironing. You know why? Because I never do it. It's like a little taste of real life," MacMaster said. "When you're on the road, you're staying in hotels and you don't have to make your bed every day." Not that she's complaining (who would?) but the celebrated fiddler cherishes her quiet time, especially as her star continues its ascent state-side. In the past year alone, since she last appeared in New Brunswick at Saint John's Festival by the Sea, she has appeared on Conan O'Brien, Good Morning America, opened for Faith Hill and appeared with the Boston Pops, among countless other concert dates. It has all been in support of her 2003 album, Blueprint, a breathtaking 13-song collection of strathspeys, jigs and reels played by MacMaster and a supporting cast of some of the best American pickers in the business. The album kicks off with Blast, a medley of strathspeys and reels, the first of which, Bishop Faber MacDonald's Strathspey, is a tribute to the Saint John religious leader. MacDonald and MacMaster go way back. She appeared on his debut CD a few years back to which she donated a tune. A devout Catholic, MacMaster said she just wanted to pay tribute to a man who opened up a world to her. "I met the pope," MacMaster said, still sounding amazed, "and the reason why I met the pope is Bishop Faber MacDonald. I said to (the bishop), 'I don't know what I'll do for you but I will write you a tune.'" Anyone hoping to see the two on stage together will be disappointed. MacMaster said MacDonald is out of town during her Saint John performance on Thursday. "He phoned me to tell me he couldn't be there." But the musician will be bringing with her a five-piece band, including a bagpiper who doubles on whistles to New Brunswick for three shows. In concert, she is as energetic as ever, her blonde mane flying as she stepdances and furiously fiddles. Her shows, she admitted, are about the only exercise she gets. "I will have to start working out at some point," said the 32-year-old. "The only exercise I get is on stage. I wouldn't describe myself as being a couch potato because I keep the house nice and have every day activities." Among the countless awards MacMaster has won are: two Junos, seven East Coast Music Awards and two Canadian Country Music Awards, as well as a Grammy nomination. A fiddler since age nine, MacMaster released her first album at age 16 at a time when very few musicians of any stripe in the Maritimes were putting out music. "I had a great start. It was just the right time. There weren't that many people going out and releasing records. When I put mine out, there were hardly any. I was 16. Now the market is flooded. For the future of Cape Breton fiddle, that is great. I am thrilled. (If you're starting out), it's a little harder to get noticed these days," MacMaster said. Of course it was MacMaster, along with Ashley MacIsaac, who helped bring the Cape Breton fiddle to the world, thrilling a whole new generation of fans. With digital recording and inexpensive ways to reproduce CDs, anyone can now put out CD, and scores of youngsters now do so, looking to become the next Natalie. But the market is changing again, little more than two decades after the CD's introduction. MacMaster doesn't sound too worried about videos completely overtaking music in popularity, given that DVDs are starting to dominate music stores over traditional music formats, like CDs. "I don't think the music will ever be lost. We all have the same human desires. Everybody wants to be loved. Just hearing music does that," MacMaster said. "We'll be okay. It's all about the live performance. If you can make your sales from performing, that's where the real true test of musicians will surface." .........................................................................................................................................
October
7, 2004 For the first time Leahy and Natalie MacMaster will perform together, with two full bands, at the Rebecca Cohn Auditorium in Halifax on Tuesday, Nov. 23 at 7:00 pm. Hailing from Lakefield, Ont., Leahy is the eight person musical collective, including Agnes, Angus, Donnell, Doug, Erin, Frank, Maria and Siobheann Leahy. The group released its third Virgin Records album entitled In All Things in February. It was recorded at their home studio, The Farm. Leahy's 1997 self-titled debut along with tour dates with Shania Twain grabbed the public's attention earning the group sales of double platinum in Canada. The group received two 1997 Juno Awards for Best Instrumental Group and Best New Group, and took home the Best Country Group or Duo trophy the following year. MacMaster, a 2000 Grammy nominee, returns to her home province to perform songs from her latest album Blueprint. The album fuses Cape Breton fiddling with the sounds of banjo, Dobro and mandolin. Recorded in Nashville with producer Darol Anger, Blueprint features some of the best of America's bluegrass community including Bela Fleck (banjo), Jerry Douglas (Dobro), Sam Bush (mandolin) and Edgar Meyer (bass). MacMaster has won numerous awards for her early traditional Cape Breton recordings and has taken Celtic music to new heights with albums like In My Hands, which featured elements of jazz, Latin music and guest vocals by Alison Krauss. Tickets are $35 and go on sale on Friday at noon. They are available at the Dalhousie Arts Centre box office, by phone 494-3820, 1-800-874-1669 or online at www.dal.ca/artscentre .........................................................................................................................................
September
3, 2004 If people are weary from an activity-filled summer, they can collect sparks from the high-energy fiddling and dancing of Natalie MacMaster, who will perform Friday in Atwood Concert Hall. "Even without hearing us, if you plug your ears, you can see the energy and spirit all over the stage," MacMaster told the (Newark, N.J.) Star-Ledger recently. The Grammy-nominated musician might jump away from her Celtic roots with a bluegrass spin, a familiar Bach tune or a splash of funk, pop or jazz. She spoke with us from her home in Lakefield, Ontario. Q. What's your creation process? Jamming in studio? Long walks with music in head? A. It comes in all sorts of different ways. For the most part, for me, it involves taking initiative, opening my mind, sitting down with the violin and being in focus in the zone. Rarely do I get inspired when grocery shopping. Things come or they don't; it might be a little snippet. Sometimes, a whole tune comes; then the next day, I realize it's not good. A couple weeks down the road, I realize it was great in the first place. I like the lucky breaks when it is great from top to bottom. Q. What's in the future for you? A. I'm always working on new projects. Even on the road, I'm working on stuff, with lots of plans to take over the world, starting in Anchorage (laughs) Q. You are being more selective in your touring schedule, though 100 concerts a year is still a lot. What brings you back to Alaska? A. The theater there was really nice. The audience was warm. It was a great market for us, and I want to nurture that. Also, what a neat place in the world. It is right on the back of our own country and similar to the north of Canada. I'm really into culture. Scottish culture has maintained through centuries where I grew up. (It) is very hopeful that the world is hanging onto its differences and individuality. We don't all look the same or sing the same or do things the same. Q. How do you distinguish Cape Breton fiddling? What does it mean to you? A. Cape Breton is Scottish in origin. It's more traditional and rooted in Scottish tradition. The dance style is different (from Irish Celtic dancing). We do speak Gaelic, but Scottish Gaelic dialect is different from Irish Gaelic, and that influences music; music sounds a lot like the language. Gaelic has a lot of throatal, rough sounds -- and the music reflects that too. We say it has lots of dirt in it. We have something called the cut, which is a triplet done more aggressively than an Irish triplet; it has a gritty sound. It's my most-requested technique. I doubt that what we play in Cape Breton is like what they played in Scotland 300 years ago, but it's the same style, only a little more refined. Q. For the record "Blueprint," you sought out a more refined sound. A. Nowadays, you can layer so much on music. It sounds really cool. (However,) this record was not about technology but about my fiddling with support instruments around ... more about musicianship. The record had more solos than any record I ever did. The record is very clean and pure and all about musicians. Q. How do your recordings and performances differ? A. I like having both because one helps you appreciate the other. If I didn't record, I might get sick of performing. In studio, you get to create, and anything you don't like you can redo. You get the best microphone in the world and add in luscious sounds. (Sometimes) I put headphones on and sound like a goddess. Onstage, you get one mike, so the sound of a violin is more raw, rougher than in the studio. But what you don't get in studio is that energy. Whatever goes off inside there you can't get by sitting in your house or anywhere but onstage. Then there's the thrill of the crowd, supporting you like a pat on the back, confirming everything you're doing. You can be having the rottenest day in the world, and as soon as that first chord is played, it's all good. In studio, you wonder, "Is this good? Maybe it sucks." Q. Are there songs you perform live that you don't record and vice versa? A. Certainly ... there's stuff on records that I don't do live, (thinking,) "Nah, that wouldn't translate." When playing live, I look for really intense pieces, where highs are really high, slows really tearful and fast pieces really energetic. In studio, I don't need the extremes. I find people like to listen, just sitting in their car. Onstage, there's nothing cute; it's all powerful. Q. What do you look forward to most when touring? A. I always hate leaving (home), especially now that I'm married (to fellow fiddler Donnell Leahy of the band Leahy), but as soon as -- and I mean instantaneously -- I'm on the bus, it's great. I'm excited and ready to perform. I enjoy creating on road, messing around with sound checks, putting together something new. Every now and then, we have an extra-special show. Those make you really feel like being alive. .........................................................................................................................................
August 26, 2004 Cape Breton fiddler extraordinaire Natalie MacMaster closes out the Grand Theatre's Hot August Nights concert series with an all but sold-out show tonight. In just the past six months, MacMaster has played Carnegie Hall on a bill of such classical music greats as Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman and Joshua Bell. She has opened for Faith Hill and Don Henley, played with Michael MacDonald of the Doobie Brothers and did a concert with the Boston Pops that was broadcast on PBS and has turned up on a span of American network shows from Good Morning America to Late Night with Conan O'Brien. And believe it or not, MacMaster insists things are slowing down for her a bit. Not that she's complaining. "As far as my career goes," MacMaster says, "I'm very content with the pace right now. I do about 100 shows a year. A few years ago we were doing 250 shows a year and that was bad for us. It was too much for me personally. That pace lasted for two whole years and I found out where my own threshold lies, what my quota is. I enjoy 100 shows a year and can really give myself to those shows and enjoy them instead of trying to get away from it all." MacMaster's career really started to take off around the same time that another Cape Breton fiddling sensation, Ashley MacIsaac, was going through a bit of a PR meltdown. At least in Canada, MacMaster was seen in some circles as the anti-MacIsaac. "I don't see it that way personally," MacMaster says, "but a lot of the papers played it that way. I was the angel and he was the devil. I like Ashley. We grew up a quarter of a mile apart. We trained with the same teacher. We're close in that regard, plus we're distantly related. So of course the papers were going to compare us and gossip about us." Far from feeling any competition or animosity, MacMaster is delighted that MacIsaac seems to have gotten his career back on track. One of MacMaster's biggest fans is the Canadian-born ABC News anchor Peter Jennings. "Peter's just a fan," she says with a laugh, obviously flattered by the attention. "He invited us on his program and he's phoned a few times. However he got my number I don't know. He and his wife were going to Cape Breton this summer and he called to find out where the hot spots were. I'm glad he feels like he can call me." MacMaster's less punishing concert schedule frees up the time and the mental focus to concentrate her energies in the best way. "I'm more creative now than I've ever been," she insists. "That's partly because of my marriage and my general contentment in life. I love the recording studio and am going to continue doing more of that. But as for plans and goals, I have to tell you that I don't really have any. I've always taken the attitude that I should go wherever paths open up and great things will happen. My only real plan is that I want to play music until I'm in the grave. If I can just do that -- and be reasonably happy doing that -- then that's all I want." Where earlier Cape Breton fiddlers such as Don Messer and MacMaster's Uncle Buddy were strict traditionalists, MacMaster and MacIsaac both came to the fore at a time of unprecedented mixing of genres. "We're surrounded by all different types of music now," MacMaster explains. "Plus people are travelling like never before. You put all that together and musicians are crossing boundaries and borders more and more. For me personally, I love all kinds of music. I don't just love Cape Breton fiddle music." Does she ever worry that different styles can be blended so much that the end result becomes some bland hybrid that speaks of nowhere? "No," she answers. "I happen to come from the rich tradition of Cape Breton music and that will always colour whatever I do no matter how much I mix things up. There's no fear of that dying out. I don't think I could lose it if I tried." MacMaster's show is always changing as new numbers get slotted in. That is particularly so now as she and her band head into the studio in October to cut their next album. In addition to her usual backup of guitar, piano, bass and drums, the newest member in MacMaster's band is a piper who also plays banjo and whistles. In addition to the new songs in development, MacMaster says London fans can expect four numbers from her last release, Blueprint, and a lot of older material from earlier albums such as My Roots Are Showing. "A couple of my band members sing as well so we've slotted in a couple of songs that highlight them. And there's a bit of dancing as well so this show will have pretty well the whole kit and kaboodle." .........................................................................................................................................
August
14, 2004 CREIGNISH - Cape Breton's queen of the fiddle, Natalie MacMaster, brought her king, Donnell Leahy, home to Creignish this week - and the two made beautiful music together during the first Pastoral Aires concert at Stella Maris Church on Thursday night. The setting was made all the more romantic by their memories of their wedding here almost two years ago. When Leahy's turn to perform came at last, he fondly recalled the day.
" Also performing in the stellar lineup were Kinnon, Betty Lou and Andrea Beaton, Sandy MacDonald, Delores Boudreau, Mac Morin, Allan Dewar and Cape Breton Gaelic singer Jeff MacDonald. MacMaster told the audience that while the idea for Pastoral Aires is not new to Cape Breton parishes, it is the first time one has been held in Stella Maris Church. The plan for the concert was born from a conversation last fall between MacMaster and fellow organizer Peggy Burke, who agreed it would be an ideal fundraiser for the historic parish. MacMaster joked that she just wasn't used to taking care of all of the details for concerts, from helping with the sound to making sure there was enough to drink backstage (or in the vestry) for the performers. "Just water!" she quickly assured everyone. MacMaster's experience with the acoustics of her home church convinced her that it would be a perfect setting for a concert. "Stella Maris is such a great place to play," she said. "We've always enjoyed the acoustics here. So tonight the mics will be on low, and the acoustics will be on high." Truer words were never spoken, as the music did seem at times to be coming from "on high." The crowd, a blend of locals and tourists, sat enthralled despite the less-than-cushy wooden pews and the heat created by the late evening sun slanting in through the windows. People just fanned themselves with copies of Glory and Praise they found in the pews and let themselves be carried away on a wave of pure sound. The most magical moments of the night came when MacMaster and Leahy stood together and played, their fiddles in almost heartbreaking harmony. When they played a slow air, a tear came to more than one eye in the crowd and even the old church seemed to hold its breath and listen. When the last note was played and the crowd spilled out into the night, it was with a great hope that Pastoral Aires at Stella Maris will become a tradition. Peggy Burke says the concert was a great success, with more than 300 people attending, and bodes well for future events at the church. Music set within the wood-slatted walls of the century-old church, spilling out to Creignish Mountain and to the sea below, is just plain inspiring. "The music is really coming from their souls," Burke said. "It is a spiritual connection." .........................................................................................................................................
August
11, 2004 Celtic fiddler Natalie MacMaster (news | tickets) sets out on a late-summer/early fall North American tour that supports her latest album, "Blueprint." The run kicks off in late August, and dates are set through the end of October. The first few weeks focus primarily in the U.S., while most of the October shows are set in Canada. Details are shown below. MacMaster released "Blueprint" in September of last year. The set, which is her first studio recording since 1999's "In My Hands," features contributions from bluegrass pickers Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush and Edgar Mayer. Backing MacMaster during the tour is her band: Miche Pouliot (drums), Allan Dewar (piano), Brad Davidge (guitar, vocals), Matt MacIsaac (bagpipes, whistles, banjo) and John Chiasson (bass, vocals). A native of Cape Breton--an island off the east coast of Canada near Nova Scotia--MacMaster is the niece of Cape Breton fiddler Buddy MacMaster. "Irish music affects me the same way as Cape Breton music because those are the sounds and instruments that I've heard since I was a child," she said in a statement. "It's the same thing with bluegrass music, which has many of the same sounds and instruments. And, in a way, bluegrass musicians play reels, breakdowns and jigs too, so it's all very similar." .........................................................................................................................................
August
6, 2004 Faith Hill, with special guest Natalie MacMaster, is set to play Saturday, Aug. 7 at Base II on Blackcomb Mountain come rain or shine. Local personalities and musicians will also share the stage in one form or another. Whistler's very own Doug Craig, AKA Guitar Doug, and Kristen Robinson will MC the main concert along with the afternoon show. "I have had the pleasure being involved in many concerts in Whistler and look forward to announcing such incredible acts like Faith and MacMaster," said Robinson who was awed to learn she was invited to MC the event. Robinson, otherwise known as the infamous KR, is well known in the community as one of the producers of the Telus World Ski and Snowboard Festival for seven years and a familiar voice on Mountain FM and Whistler Resort TV. Having just returned from Toronto where she worked as a booking agent in the music industry, Robinson is happy to be home once again in Whistler. "I am super excited that these mountain concerts are back," she said. "As a music fan, we don't have to travel far." In addition to Hill and MacMaster, two Canadian artists from Vancouver will warm audiences up before the main concert for a late afternoon of picnicking, barbecuing and country/folk music. Gates open at 4:30 p.m. with the first music set beginning at 5:30. MacMaster begins fiddling at 7:30 p.m. with Hill striking up the night at 8:45 p.m. Vancouver's Rae Armour is one of the two late-afternoon acts who will share country-infused folk music with the crowds. A prairie girl from Calgary, country music has always come natural to Armour. The now real estate agent who took a break from her musical career of 17 years is back in full swing with the release of her most recent CD in February. The timing of the Faith Hill concert invite couldn't have been more perfect. "Having my music played to a larger venue, I would certainly hope will promote my music in the future. It may open doors that may have been previously closed," Armour said.
"I'd
like to credit Faith and her people for choosing Canadian talent for
being Armour also has Dennis MacDonald to thank. He is president and executive producer for Shout Resort Concerts - the production company responsible for bringing Faith to Whistler. It was important to him that local talent be incorporated into the superstar-line-up concert. "I wanted to give locals the opportunity to have a platform to show what they can do," MacDonald said. In addition to Armour, Melanie Dekker , also of the Vancouver music community, will be performing for the all-woman concert. Dekker has shared stages with famed Canadians such as April Wine, Biff Naked,Tara Maclean and the Powder Blues. She's won numerous songwriting contests nationally and internationally and received national radio play for her hit singles "When I Think of You" and "I Said I". There are still Gold tickets available for the concert with seating provided. For Silver and Bronze tickets, there is no structured seating, and therefore, audiences are asked to bring blankets or low-seated beach chairs to sit on. All tickets are general admission, so seating is first come, first served. Tickets will be sold at the gate. There will be no debit machines available, so visit an ATM prior to coming to the concert. Wrist bands with corresponding colours to the gold, silver and bronze sections will be issued. Parking in the Whistler Day Parking lower lots one, two, three, four and five are free of charge. Concert-goers can then proceed to either the Whistler or Blackcomb base to take a free lift to the concert venue. Parking in upper lots six, seven and eight by Base II will cost $10.00 per car. Bus service will be available. Concert goers are reminded to bring sunscreen, a hat and jacket along with something to sit on. No alcohol, coolers, cameras, smoking or umbrellas will be allowed. Rain ponchos will be available for purchase. .........................................................................................................................................
July
29, 2004 Vivacious fiddle virtuoso Natalie MacMaster has played Carnegie Hall alongside Pinchas Zukerman, Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma and more. She's shared other stages with Pavarotti, Carlos Santana, Paul Simon, The Boston Pops and a host of symphony orchestras. When she felt drawn to the sounds of bluegrass she didn't quench her thirst with a Dolly cover or two. Not Natalie. She rounded up some of the most esteemed pickers in the genre including Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush and Edgar Meyer who were more than happy to collaborate on the acclaimed album that came to be 2003's 'Blueprint.' She harbours a secret ambition of playing fiddle in a funk band a la the P-Funk Allstars under deep cover of an alter ego - think Garth Brooks' rock 'n' roll fantasy character Chris Gaines only MacMaster claims she wouldn't tell a soul. And she dreams of collaborations with R&B icons like Prince and Stevie Wonder - the melody from Isn't She Lovely would sound especially sensational played by her fiddle, she enthuses. Amidst all the funk band alter ego scheming, R&B legend dreaming and bluegrass, country, pop, jazz, rock and classical collaborations rest assured - Natalie MacMaster knows exactly who she is. "Here's the deal: I'm a Cape Breton fiddler," she declares from her home in Ontario's lake country, punctuating the statement subconsciously with a tenacious regional accent that's held fast after years on the touring circuit and the move to central Canada. "Even if I play a tune that's not traditional Cape Breton, it doesn't matter. It might as well be - I'm a Cape Breton fiddler. "I just play my style. If I play a bluegrass tune it's still going to sound like my style. Let that be known." MacMaster's unshakeable foundation in traditional East Coast Celtic music has grounded her through her experimentation with a myriad of musical styles. "If you love something set it free" goes the familiar saying. MacMaster has applied the concept to her sound. Her current band consists of a jazz bass player, pop guitar player, and country drummer. "You put us all together and we just play music," MacMaster says. "We go where the music leads us, not where we think it should be, not where we think people expect it should be. We let it breathe on its own. What that ends up being is a combination of my Cape Breton fiddling and a band of players that sometimes can take on a bit of a funk overtone, or go a little bit poppy, or a little bit jazzy, or a little bit Irish, or a little bit whatever. "When it comes to me and recording and what I want to play it's not like I want to be something. I just let the music be what it needs to be; somebody can put a label on it after it's recorded." MacMaster attributes much of the creative freedom she enjoys both onstage and off to the fact that despite her success she has yet to record a "hit." "There's advantages and disadvantages to having hits. I'm sure people can't imagine the disadvantages, but one of them is that we can play anything, anytime, however we want it," she says. "Musically, it's very fulfilling. You don't have to play the same thing over and over in the same way." She differs in this way from All-American country-popstar Faith Hill, for whom MacMaster will play the opening set on Saturday, August 7 at Base II on Blackcomb. Hill will no doubt have the entire mountainside at the open-air concert singing along with radio favourites like This Kiss and Breathe. Even so, MacMaster couldn't be happier about the lineup, including the profile discrepancies between the two performers. "I'm going to complement her," the forthright fiddler declares. "I think it's a real smart pairing. I like opposite things. I would never have a Cape Breton fiddler open for me." With the upcoming gig squarely in her sights MacMaster's effervescent voice gains momentum. "I am going to take her crowd and I've got 45 minutes to stir them up and I'm not stirring them up with vocals, so when she comes on stage it's going to be the first time you hear vocals and it's just going to be beautiful because it's fresh." She pauses. "And, mind you, because she's awesome." More gold for that thar' Hill show. They weigh in at $118. Even so, the tier one "gold" seats for the Faith Hill/Natalie MacMaster show at Base II on Blackcomb are hot tickets. The original block of 750 sold out shortly after going on sale on Monday, July 12. Concert organizers added 250 more, which were declared sold out by Tuesday, July 13. As of Wednesday, July 27, 500 more gold tickets were put aside. The gold tickets provide general admission seating and the closest proximity to the stage. The remaining 13,500 tickets require concertgoers to bring their own seating -blankets or beach chairs are suggested. .........................................................................................................................................
July
22, 2004 Country-pop superstar vocalist Faith Hill's Aug. 7 outdoor concert in Whistler has been moved to the Base II area on Blackcomb Mountain from its original location at Creekside. Organizers Shout Resort Concerts cited several reasons for the move, including easier accessfrom Whistler Village by foot, transit or gondola, a higher automobile parking capacity, and a gentler slope. The concert set up will remain the same, with a stage at the base of the slope at Base II and the hill functioning as a natural amphitheatre. The new location also provides the opportunity to expand the capacity by 5,000 should the original 15,000 tickets sell out said Shout spokesperson Barb Fraser. Any extra tickets issued would be either the mid-range $86 "silver" tickets, or the $65 nosebleed section "bronze" tickets, neither of which provide seating. All 1,000 of the $118 "gold" tickets, which include seating and the closest proximity to the stage, are sold out. The concert is Hill's first major vocal performance in four years. MacMaster added to Hill bill. Cape Breton-born Celtic/bluegrass fiddler Natalie MacMaster was announced earlier this week as Hill's opening act. The vivacious virtuoso has toured all over the world and collaborated with celebrated musicians such as Bela Fleck, Sam Bush and vocalist Alison Krauss. MacMaster has won several Canadian Country Music Awards for Fiddler of the Year and heralbum My Roots Are Showing was nominated for a Grammy Award in the Best Traditional Folk Album Category in 2000. Her latest album is the bluegrass- themed Blueprint. MacMaster takes the stage at 7:30 p.m. .........................................................................................................................................
July 19, 2004 Natalie MacMaster to open for Faith Hill Saturday August 7, 2004 Creekside, Whistler, BC. Celtic fiddling virtuoso Natalie MacMaster has been confirmed as the opening act for Faith Hill, Saturday, August 7, 2004 in Whistler, B C. Thirty year old MacMaster is already a veteran of her instrument. She first picked up a fiddle at the age of nine and hasn't looked back. The niece of famed Cape Breton fiddler Buddy MacMaster, Natalie quickly became a major talent in her own right. After winning numerous East Coast Music Awards for her early traditional Cape Breton recordings, she began taking Celtic music to new heights featuring elements of jazz, Latin music and guest vocals by Alison Krauss. To her accomplishments, she has added a Juno Award for Best Instrumental Album and several Canadian Country Music Awards for Fiddler of the Year. With her latest release "Blueprint", MacMaster is once again pushing the boundaries for traditional music, fusing her brilliant Cape Breton fiddling with the sounds of banjo, Dobro and mandolin. This summer Natalie has been performing at outdoor festivals and events. Her addition to the Faith Hill date is a perfect fit. Gold seating, general admission tickets have sold out. Silver and Bronze general admission tickets (no seating, bring lawn chair) are still available. .........................................................................................................................................
July
14, 2004 Cape Breton fiddle virtuoso Natalie MacMaster loves performing live, and she especially enjoys doing New England shows. She’s particulary fond of New Hampshire and Vermont audiences. Talking by phone from her home in Ontario, MacMaster said “there’s some places where, I don’t know if they’re fiddle fans, or Natalie fans of if they just love Celtic music ... there’s just awesome crowds, like Lebanon and Burlington.” Asked if she recognizes individual fans after doing so many area shows (11 in 2003, 15 in 2004) she replies “I see the same faces coming through, yes.” MacMaster brings her high energy fiddling and step dancing to the Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe tonight and the Lebanon Opera House Monday, as she continues touring in support of last year’s bluegrass-infused “Blueprint” CD. Inspired by musicians like Alison Krause, she recruited producer Darol Anger and top Nashville players, including Jerry Douglas and Bela Fleck, for a two-week session. The result was a very organic and spontaneous record. “The freedom happened when the players got together, and once we started things were allowed to bend and grow, ” she says, crediting producer Anger. “He’s very prepared but very flexible. If it moves, if it changes, he allows it to happen, he creates an environment where you don’t have to play by the book.” Though it was invigorating to work with improvisational masters like banjo player Fleck and mandolinist Sam Bush, MacMaster herself stuck to the book. “I hardly improvised at all, only on one track,” the rollicking “Gravel Shore’”. Of that song, she says, “there was no ending made for it, so we just kind of kept playing and it turned into this whole new thing. I just thought of this tune and everybody started playing, there were no chord charts, it was just amazing. What a thrill - I was pushed and pulled into places I’d never been before.” Expanding on this, she explained that “Gravel Shore” was not just a rare experience, but a sort of forbidden fruit. In the Cape Breton tradition she comes from, she says, “you practice and put something together beforehand, play it tune for tune. I didn’t grow up in an improvising environment. In fact, if you improvise in Cape Breton stuff, it’s considered very disrespectful to the tradition.” Discipline shapes her live shows. “I am very planned. I really place a lot of importance on the pacing of the show ... when I find what works, I just cling on to it, to create those moods and pull the people in certain directions. Once I find that magical combination, I’m, like, great - done.” The formula appears to be working, with healthy record sales almost entirely driven by audience sales. “I’m not an Enya,” she says, “the only reason one of my records will sell is if people see me live.” Industry veterans are often amazed by this. One, with 25 years in the business, told her he’d “never seen an artist sell product” like MacMaster does at her shows. Her vigor is perhaps spurred by a general dissatisfaction with the record business. “I’m not a big fan of the industry, I try to stay removed because I don’t really fit, you can’t just plug me into the system.” She’s dimly aware of new digital distribution methods - “I’m not computer savvy AT ALL” - but it’s clear that her instincts are way ahead of the trends. She’s been reaching her audience directly for as long as she’s been playing. So it’s not surprising to hear her say “touring is it for me, don’t get me wrong, I love recording, I’ll do it until they put me in the grave. But live performing makes my records sell.” She tours relentlessly - towards the end of the 90s she was doing 250 shows a year, though she’s down to 100-150 in the recent past. For MacMaster, music is a family tradition. Her uncle Buddy MacMaster and cousin Ashley MacIsaac are also highly respected Cape Breton fiddlers. Natalie is married to Donnell Leahy of the band Leahy. She mentioned that both she and her husband’s bands were starting out on tour at the same time. So her inspirations obviously begin with Celtic music and the sounds of her native Cape Breton, but it’s surprising to hear what else moves her. “I love to listen to music in the vehicle,” she says, “I have thousands of CDs, and I just keep a bunch in the car.” Right now “I love the Dixie Chicks,” especially “White Trash Wedding”. “Maroon 5 too,” she says, singing a line from their recent hit “This Love”. She praises a “hardcore bluegrass” CD she got from her mother, featuring a singer “that’s a cross between Allison Krause and the Cox Family, just amazing”, as well as a compilation of English choirs made for her by a bandmate. When asked how it is that an artist who’s performed one lead vocal in her career (1999’s “In My Hands”) is such a fan of vocalists, she says, “I am really and truly not a great singer. I can’t stay in tune.” She’d rather work with them than be one herself. “In My Hands came about by wanting to do something vocal,” but the majority of the track was spoken - Celtic rapping, if you will, so “I didn’t have to be a great singer. I feel like I got that bug out of me,” she says. On the other hand, “I’m so motivated by fiddle stuff, there’s no end to what I want to do.” Natalie MacMaster’s tour is set to end in October, when she’ll return to the studio with her current band and, she says, “a guest star who I’m so excited about, awesome, but I’m not gonna tell you who.” When pressed, she holds her ground. “It’s a man, that’s all I’ll say. He’s famous across the board.” Still, the interview has produced one scoop. Natalie MacMaster, steeped in traditional music and avowed non-vocalist, listens to the fizzy-pop tunes of Maroon 5 in the car. She knows the words, and she sings along. There’s something for the CNN ticker! .........................................................................................................................................
June
25, 2004
Canadian fiddle phenomenon
Natalie MacMaster grew up on Cape Breton Island, off the east coast of
Nova Scotia, so it was no surprise that she first picked up the
instrument at age 9.
"It was just
something I grew up around at square dances and other events,"
explained MacMaster, 30, last week by telephone from a tour stop in New
Mexico. "From the time I was a little girl, I knew I would always
play the fiddle, but I never imagined I would make a living doing
it."
MacMaster - who headlines
a Celtic Festival featuring the Cape Breton folk quartet The Cotters at
the Cape Cod Melody Tent on Friday - is the niece of famed fiddler Buddy
MacMaster. She quickly became a name in her own right, however, thanks
to contemporary albums like "In My Hands," with vocals by
Allison Krauss, as well as the more traditional "My Roots Are
Showing," which earned a 2000 Grammy nomination for Best
Traditional Folk Album. An exhaustive schedule of live performances has
led some to call MacMaster the busiest woman in the Canadian music
business.
"Earlier in my
career, I went out and played just about every venue possible. In those
days, I was doing something like 260 shows a year. Then there came a
point where it was just too much of a good thing. These days, I do about
100 shows. I have definitely become selective about where and when I
work, and I enjoy it more."
When she is not on the
road, MacMaster is often in the recording studio. Her latest album,
"Blueprint," was released last September on Rounder Records.
With five songs written by MacMaster, it offers a combination of classic
Cape Breton fiddle music with the sounds of American string greats
including banjo players Bela Fleck and Alison Brown, mandolinist Sam
Bush, dobro player Jerry Douglas, bassist Edgar Meyer and singer John
Cowan.
"Much of the fiddling
on this CD was not planned, but came about because of a moment created
by the music. I was pulled like a tide by these brilliant musicians. I'd
be fiddling around and all of a sudden play something I never thought of
before, because they had carried me to a new place that was just
absolutely natural," says MacMaster. "The album is a
collection of Cape Breton-style music with hints of bluegrass provided
by Bela Fleck and some of the others. It is a whole CD of great music,
by great players."
With appearances on
"Late Night With Conan O'Brien" and "Good Morning
America" to her credit, MacMaster has branched beyond the music
that brought her fame, but has no plans to put her fiddle away.
"I absolutely love
recording and touring. The spinoffs from that, like commercials and
acting, just help to keep my life interesting. People always say 'never
say never.'" MacMaster comments with a confident laugh. "Well,
I'm saying never. I will never stop playing the fiddle." .........................................................................................................................................
June 15, 2004 Blueprint, the latest CD by Natalie MacMaster contains the most comprehensive arrangements yet! The instrumentals, stunning and masterful, are the strong points on this recording as evidence by the powerful opening tune, "A Blast", with Natalie's vigorous fiddling working well with piano in this Cape Breton instrumental medley. The energy continues to fly also in tunes like the exhilarating "Jig Party." Aside from the dazzling stream of energy, this CD demonstrates Natalie's broad range of artistic expansion from instrumentals such as "Appropriate Dipstick", with its cool and unique arrangement including electric pipes and bass lending a jazzy edge to Bela's Time", a great instrumental featuring Natalie and banjo master Bela Fleck to the heart moving "Joshifin's Waltz," which Natalie renders with such sensitivity and emotional expression her fiddling that it's sure to draw tears for it's great beauty. There are also two songs on this CD, both very different from each other with "Touch of the Master's Hand" being more bluegrass influenced and "My Home, Cape Breton and Me," a sweet, beautiful song rendered with great emotional expression. Whether its down home traditional or cutting edge, Natalie demonstrates she can do it all, superbly on this CD. .........................................................................................................................................
June 8, 2004 Natalie MacMaster has effectively moved from the kitchen to the concert hall without missing a beat on her latest CD, Blueprint. This collection of tunes is big in a lot of ways. It is big in sound, with a depth of tone that captures the essence of all of the instruments used (and believe me, she uses the entire range available to her). It is also a big step for the girl from Canada's east coast to the world stage. She certainly has prepared herself well and is obviously ready to take her place at centre stage. She has some big names in the music business on this disc as well. Bela Fleck, Edgar Meyer, Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas and Bryan Sutton are all over this recording. Needless to say, the playing is fantastic throughout, and Natalie holds her own with them all. This is a band made in heaven, by anyone's standards. The mark of these superb players is evident in the arrangements. Never have such simple tunes sounded so sophisticated. Stops, starts, tempo changes are all integrated perfectly to elevate this music to another level. The tracks on this CD are not really songs, but sets of songs, many of them traditional. They are blended seamlessly with MacMaster's own and other new tunes. The only thing I don't really like about this album is its pace; yet when I say that, I feel like the character in the film Amadeus, who said, when searching desperately for some criticism of Mozarts work, "too many notes." Almost every song takes off at breakneck speed. From the opening notes of the first cut, "A Blast," the album never really allows the listener to catch his or her breath. The opening track is a set of three strathspeys (or dances) and a reel. The tempo grows progressively faster until the end of the set. That's the time I would retire from the dance floor and let my legs recover, but it is not to be. The next tune, "Appropriate Dipstick," starts and is a nice slow number -- for about the first thirty seconds. Then it takes off like a bullet! The third song, "Jig Party," doesn't let up at all, either. The fourth song actually features the human voice of John Cowan struggling to keep up with the musicians. "Touch of the Master's Hand" is the least traditional song on this album. It reminds me of "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" by Charlie Daniels. In the end, all my searching did not really find anything to complain about on this album. At least my legs will be in better shape from tapping my feet! For fans of traditional east coast fiddle music, I highly recommend it. .........................................................................................................................................
May
29, 2004
The Boston Pops plays a wider variety of music than any other orchestra explained Keith Lockhart at the onset of last nights concert. What followed certainly proved his point: From Broadway to bluegrass, swing to Motown, and Bach to 1970s pop, this concert was certainly eclectic. No doubt much of this came with the choice of the two soloists - Celtic fiddler Natalie MacMaster and pop superstar Michael McDonald - two different, but equally remarkable talents who showed their diversity in their varied sets. At one moment, MacMaster put a bluegrass spin on a familiar Bach tune, the next McDonald gave a lush rendering of a little-remembered Carole King ballad. Variety, it turns out, was the spice to this concert, which will be repeated this evening. The tall and very blonde MacMaster has gained a considerable reputation for showing the connections between Celtic music and bluegrass. Here she also showed the connection with classical music when joined by Pops concert master Tamara Smirnova for a spirited sparring of dueling fiddles playing Bach and a traditional Celtic tune. Her high point, though, was her spectacular playing of a traditional Irish tune as she step-danced in the best "Riverdance'' tradition. Sporting a shock of white hair, McDonald, was relaxed and personable with his closing set of familiar pops songs, which he accompanied on the piano. Some were pop hits he help make famous as lead singer with the Doobie Brothers, such as "What a Fool Believes,'' and some were made famous by others, such as two Motown songs "I Heard It Through the Grapevine'' and "All In Love is Fair,'' both of which appear on his newest CD, ``Michael McDonald's Motown.'' His distinctive tenor may lack the power it had 20 years ago, but he remains a persuasive singer, and was at his best with a pair of bluesy ballads, the lush "I Can Let Go Now'' and "Hey Girl,'' which he delivered with exquisite emotional power. (Boston Pops, with Keith Lockhart conducting and guests Michael McDonald and Natalie MacMaster, at Symphony Hall, Boston, last night. ) .........................................................................................................................................
May 4, 2004
During “The Kitchen Session,” MacMaster fiddled fast while two dancers entertained the crowd—think Riverdance, but with better music. “It’s starting to warm up,” MacMaster says after she eases into her set. If she considers her first few songs “warm,” then what followed was scorching. For the finale, she laid her fiddle down, and kicked her way across the stage, throwing in Michael Jackson’s moonwalk just for fun. Then she began tapping her feet, building the beat into a sound that eventually became part of her show-stopping closer. With Celtic flutes, Irish fiddling and multiple high leg kicks, MacMaster wowed the crowd to a standing ovation. All we could mutter was a simple “damn.” The Nashville Bluegrass Band took the stage in a steady drizzle, but everyone in the audience stayed glued to their seats. For the next hour, unadulterated bluegrass seeped through the pristine Wilkesboro hills. “Let’s play something that has to do with the mountains,” says banjo aficionado and North Carolina native Alan O’Bryant, after a few foot-tapping numbers from the group’s latest album. And, with that, the five-man ensemble broke into “Crossing the Cumberlands.” Even Vince Gill had to have his dose of NBB. The country superstar sat to the left side of the stage for part of the set, while the band shuffled through “Honky Tonk Swing”—a song featuring a solo by bassist Mark Hembree. (Natalie MacMaster photos by Cory Albertson, Nashville Bluegrass Band photos by Katie Vesser) .........................................................................................................................................
March
4, 2004 "Cherish your visions and your dreams, as they are the children of your soul, the blueprints of your ultimate achievements." -- Napoleon Hill Celt In A Twist: You’ve opened for Carlos Santana, and the Chieftains. You’ve turned down a shot on stage with Michael Flatley in Lord of the Dance, but you’ve played with the Edinburgh Symphony. You’ve appeared on albums with such diverse musicians as Eileen Ivers and Raffi. and on a Pontiac commercial. Are you taking Celtic in new directions, do you think? Natalie MacMaster: Well, after an introduction like that, yes. It’s funny when you mention all those things, you think, “Gosh, I forgot about that, I forgot about that. ‘ You know, it’s amazing all those things you do in the course of years and just when you collectively look at them you think,yeah, maybe I am. If I am, it’s certainly not intentional. CIAT: You’re just going with the flow. Natalie MacMaster: I’m just doing my thing. It’s all about the music. CIAT: Very organic. You’ve been through some changes in the past year or so. Natalie MacMaster: That’s right! CIAT: I notice that Leahy is currently touring, and they’ll be in Vancouver on Sunday March 21st. Do you have an agreement with your husband that you’ll both tour at the same time so you can both be home at the same time? Natalie MacMaster: We haven’t gone to the point where we have to make agreements yet. I think what we’re doing is following our career paths and once it starts becoming a problem then we’ll have to start changing it. It’s not too bad I have to say. The most we will have been apart is three weeks so that’s tough but if we don’t have to do it too often it’s OK. CIAT: That might keep some of the magic going. Natalie MacMaster: That’s right, there are good things about it, too, you see. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. CIAT: Any joint projects in the works? Natalie MacMaster: There will be. Just because it will be a shame for us to leave this earth and not have ever recorded together or toured together or something. CIAT: We’re going to look forward to that. I checked out your website, Natalie Macmaster dot com. I’ve never come across a musicians website with recipes on it before. I particularly liked the Celtic Cousins Cocktail with maple syrup in it. I think you’re really a homebody at heart. Natalie MacMaster: I am, I do enjoy the simple life, I enjoy country, I enjoy being alone with my husband in our house. We have a house on a dirt road so we’re very much out of the way and we like it like that. CIAT: You gathered some very talented musicians to play with on Blueprint. Jerry Douglas, Victor Wooten , Bela Fleck and you produced it yourself. Tell us a bit on how it all came together. Natalie MacMaster: Well, I can’t take all the credit. Certainly I did have a co-producer and that is Darol Anger and he was a huge help and a part of the project. The whole thing came together after I phoned Darol and I asked him if he would produce the record for me. He’s been in the business for years, he has played all styles of music. He’s a fiddler himself, he loves Cape Breton fiddling. He knows everybody and everybody loves him. And I certainly enjoy working with him. So I figured that’s the guy, that’s the guy I want. And from there we talked about what we wanted the project to be. I was absolutely wanting something that was very musically strong where the musicians on the record were heard and noticed and not just in the background. I wanted production that was very simple, very clean sound and very acoustic. We went to Nashville and got some great musicians in the bluegrass field and in the jazz field and recorded “Blueprint”. CIAT: Award winning piper, Matt MacIsaac, is touring with you, fresh off his own tour with pop idol Aaron Carter. Is this another cousin? Natalie MacMaster: No, not a cousin actually. I am related to MacIsaacs but not this one. CIAT: Who else is travelling with you? Natalie MacMaster: We have Brad Davidge who I think everybody knows. He’s been in my band for five years now. But the rest of them I think may be new. They’re Miche Pouliot on drums, Alan Dewar on piano, John Chaisson on bass, and of course Matt and Brad. CIAT: I caught you on’telly with Conan O’brian. Is the sophisticated Big Apple audience ready for a down-home Cape-Breton girl? Natalie MacMaster: Yes! It’s amazing! Like well first of all considering that you can get everything in New York and there are people that will encompass all types of living and all ethnic background and religions and cultures and everything. So there are people in the big city that do love fiddling and they do love more of a down home I guess, I don’t know what you’d call our show, but whatever it is, people in New York like it. And we’ve played there four times in the past four months. We did the performance on Conan, and then we did Good Morning America, we did our own show at Joe’s Pub and then another show at a theatre called Merkin Hall. And low and behold, Peter Jennings was in the crowd. So we’ve got a fan down there. Actually Peter, everyone knows he’s Canadian of course, so I think he particularly takes to Canadian music. CIAT: We’re going out with Eternal Friendship from the album. When I heard Jerry Douglas play that poignant dobro on that song, I thought he was playing on our heartstrings. Natalie MacMaster: Well, it’s a tune I always wanted to have dobro on, and I’d never recorded with dobro before but it is a beautiful instrument. And of course, who better than Jerry Douglas, he’s the best. And he actually couldn’t be there to record it. He did all the other pieces on the record live, but that was an overdub. The record, amazingly, only had four or five overdubs on it which is really, really minimal. So everything was taped live off the floor and Eternal Friendship was taped with the piano, the violin, and the bass. And we left a little opening for Jerry to record. And Jerry went out of his way. I was like “Jerry, you have to be on this particular track”. And he was touring with Alison Crouse, and he went out of his way to find a studio, to find an engineer, and do the track for me on his day off in the middle of a tour. CIAT: Well, that sounds wonderful. Now it’s even more about friendship. Natalie MacMaster: There you go, well put. (Natalie was interviewed by Patricia Fraser, host of Celt In A Twist ) .........................................................................................................................................
February 14, 2004
“YOU’RE really going to enjoy this,” cooed one of the attendees of last night’s Natalie MacMaster concert to a young friend. “It’s like a cultural event.” Sure enough, the iconic MacMaster’s native Cape Breton has a cultural wealth worth the title of “distinct society,” even if it doesn’t have the political muscle to make it official. Besides being a voice of an oft-neglected portion of Canada’s East Coast heritage, MacMaster’s nimble fiddle is a vibrant tribute to a living history. And what better poster girl for the last decade of the popular rebirth of Canadian Celtic music? Musically speaking, MacMaster is the good twin to Ashley MacIsaac’s prodigal son: both brilliant and adept fiddlers, both young and hip and able to bring their culture to a fresh audience far beyond its geographic borders. But, MacMaster took the high road even while infusing her sound with cross-cultural references. As a result, she is on top of the world music niche while MacIsaac has fallen through the cracks. She has a brand-new Juno nomination for the November release of her eighth album Blueprint, a 2000 Grammy nomination, four gold-selling albums, and a mantel full of other awards and milestones. Taking the stage shortly after 7:30 in a slick and shapely black outfit (later to change into funky plaid tartan pants), MacMaster wasted no time. Kicking up her heels and launching into a spirited set of jigs and reels, strathspeys and airs, the fiddler highlighted the lively tradition of her Nova Scotian and Highland heritage. She spoke little, and when she did her voice was shy, with its delicate East Coast accent. Otherwise, she let her exuberant fiddling and spry stepdancing do the talking for her (although she did happily mention her recent marriage to fellow fiddler Donnell Leahy). Backed by a phenomenally adept five-piece band, MacMaster easily delighted the diverse audience — which ranged in age from eight to 80 — with her sweeping renditions of both time-worn Cape Breton melodies as well as her own compositions. .........................................................................................................................................
February 14, 2004
Natalie MacMaster showed her roots last night. Although her new album, Blueprint, is inspired by bluegrass and she has moved to Ontario, MacMaster showed a crowd of 920 at the Burton Cummings Theatre she is still a true Cape Bretoner at heart. MacMaster and her band played two sets of traditional and contemporary Cape Breton music adding touches of jazz, blues, folk and rock to the mix with a variety of instrumentation. John Chiasson switched between a regular four-string bass to a stand-up electric bass, which he played with a bow, while Matt MacIsaac took turns on the highland bagpipes, small pipes, whistles and banjo, adding an extra dimension of sound to every song. MacMaster was a bundle of frantic energy, playing her fiddle centre stage while dancing, spinning and kicking her legs in the air while her mane of blond hair flew behind. She is a truly remarkable fiddler and the fingers on her left hand were a blur all night. Between songs she explained some of the origins of the music she was playing and spoke about her recent marriage to Leahy's Donnell Leahy and relocation to Lakefield, Ont., which earned some boos from the audience. "Why does everyone do that when I tell them that?" MacMaster said, adding she's the same small-town girl she's always been. "There's still a noticeable difference in population when I'm gone." MacMaster switched between upbeat jigs and reels to slower airs while the crowd clapped along to everything. If there weren't seats in the theatre, they surely would have been dancing. Near the end of the first set MacMaster played some traditional Scottish highland music from the 17th century with only her pianist Allan Dewar. She then took a seat alongside Chiasson and guitarist Brad Davidge, while two young step dancers from a local Irish dance troupe tapped up a storm in front of them. MacMaster is the star of show, and she was usually front and centre, but she stepped aside at various times throughout the night to give each of her band members a chance to show of their skills with solos.
Chiasson
and Davidge provided the only vocal portions of the evening performing
songs off their solo albums, with Chiasson delving into the jazz arena
with Here in the Moonlight and Davidge showing he has a pop .........................................................................................................................................
February 10, 2004 A blueprint can be anything from a highly detailed plan to a rough drawing on a stained cocktail napkin. For Canadian fiddler Natalie MacMaster, it was a sound. "It started with a sound that I wanted to achieve," MacMaster says, noting it was one she was inspired to seek after listening to Alison Krauss' Forget About It. "I wanted to get a sound that was really clean with very strong musicianship -- instruments that sounded like they were the best instruments in the world. "I wanted it to be a musicians' record ... That was my motivation." The result is Blueprint, a warm, sunny hybrid of Cape Breton fiddle music, bluegrass, jazz and pop, which MacMaster will showcase this evening at the Jack Singer Concert Hall. The disc which was recorded over a two-week period in Nashville, and features some incredible musicians, including Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Edgar Meyer and Sam Bush. For MacMaster, playing with some of the best players in the business was a blast of unparalleled proportions. "Oh my gosh, like you wouldn't believe," MacMaster says. "But it was so scary, too, because even though I had met all of these musicians before, I hadn't played with any of them ever. "I hadn't even played with some of these instruments before ... "Until we went in the studio and pressed 'record,' I could only imagine what it was going to sound like." Already the sound has drawn favourable reviews and even earned MacMaster spots on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and Good Morning America, which boosted her profile considerably south of the border. "Those are moments that you wait your whole life hoping to get," she says. As to other aspects of her life, MacMaster is now trying to juggle extensive touring to support Blueprint with her recent marriage to fellow fiddler Donnell Leahy, of the band Leahy. Asked whether or not we can expect any little Leahy's fiddling around anytime soon, MacMaster laughs. "I have always taken my life as it comes to me, and I've never tried to control anything," she says of any immediate family plans. "I have the same attitude with my marriage and whatever comes. I just get out of the way and let the Big Guy do his work." .........................................................................................................................................
February 04, 2004 I recently spoke with an American professor about the "authenticity" of an ancient form of music still being played. My question was, is it tainted by modern influences? He pointed out that traditional music is actually more authentic -- that is, more true to itself -- if it has an active relationship to what's happening now. Music must grow and evolve, as it always has. Thus the "authentic" bluesman who replicates Robert Johnson exactly is not so much the real thing as a static museum piece.Enter fiddler Natalie MacMaster, who on Monday night dispatched two exuberant sets at the McPherson Playhouse. She plays everything from traditional Cape Breton strathspeys, jigs and reels to Celtic-flavoured pop. Typically, though, MacMaster's musical vision lies somewhere in between the two. It all works -- her music is unquestionably alive. This is a musician in her absolute prime.Why does her music succeed so well? After all, others who attempt hybrids -- opera arias set to a disco beat, for instance, or rappers who decorate their music with classic funk samples -- merely achieve superficiality. And Ashley MacIsaac (a distant cousin of MacMaster's) stumbled when he attempted to blend Celtic fiddling with hard rock.Not so MacMaster, who bounced on stage in sparkling, splotchy black-and-white jeans and never seemed to stop dancing. Her music is quite deliberately an amalgam of the old and new. The keening drone of the Scottish bagpipe is set against funk riffs played on a blood-red electric guitar, for example, and her drummer shifts easily between a two-step and a relentless rock beat. She understands that the dance-happy syncopations of Cape Breton fiddling are not so different from funk's stuttering groove. She realizes the drive of rock drumming -- and indeed, the hell-bent-for-leather rock sensibility itself -- has something in common with the braveness and the sheer joie de vivre of traditional music born in Scotland hundreds of years ago.MacMaster has just released a disc, Blueprint, that flirts with the sound of bluegrass. Some of these numbers surfaced at her concert, with master bagpiper Matt MacIsaac switching to banjo to capture this flavour. Yet it is Cape Breton music that flows most powerfully through her veins; this is the life-blood of what she does.MacMaster's sheer talent is the great unifier. Her ability as a musician provides cohesion for everything she attempts. Her technical facility is so ingrained, she's perfectly at ease dispensing fiddle fireworks while doing an athletic step dance complete with high kicks. The very sound of her fiddle is one reason she's able to engage so successfully with pop and rock styles. MacMaster's timbre is throaty, almost rough-hewn (but never coarse), in contrast to the icey purity of other violinists. This element of rawness comes across as soulfulness and, combined with her virtuosity, packs a powerful wallop.She covers the waterfront. Nothing was more affecting than her rendering, accompanied only by piano, of the traditional tune Bovaglie's Plaid. MacMaster's rich, warm tone brought the beautiful melody vividly to life. On the other end of the spectrum, MacMaster's bassist John Chiasson made a rare centre stage appearance to sing the standard, Autumn Leaves, with MacMaster contributing a convincing jazz solo. Not everything she touched turned to musical gold. Touch of the Master's Hand -- a song about an auctioned violin -- sounds like a retread of the Charlie Daniels Band's The Devil Went Down to Georgia (it featured MacMaster making a rare vocal appearance with a portentous spoken word intro).Overall, it was a wonderful concert. Above all, MacMaster knows the importance of entertaining. She danced like a fiend, tossing her blond tresses defiantly.Some songs were enlivened by young dancers from a Vancouver Irish dancing school. Fiddle music can become a buzzing drone, however, MacMaster sidesteps monotony by often structuring her tunes as slow builds that become increasingly raucous. At the end of the night, MacMaster responded to a cheering crowd by performing a dance (sans violin) that combined step-dancing with disco hand-rolls and a funkified Charleston. The message, it seemed, is that it's all life-embracing fun, whether the tradition is old or new. Happily, MacMaster possesses both the talent and spirit to absolutely convince us of this. .........................................................................................................................................
February
1, 2004 Fiddle firebrand Natalie MacMaster pushes the boundaries of Cape Breton tradition to riveting effect on this "greengrass" fusion of reels, jigs, strathspeys, and airs, arranged and coproduced by Darol Anger. Joined by a constellation of bluegrass stars-including Anger (violin), Jerry Douglas (Dobro), Bryan Sutton (guitar), Sam Bush (mandolin), Béla Fleck and Alison Brown (banjo), and Edgar Meyer (bass)-MacMaster brings contemporary zing to the Scottish- and Irish-influenced music of Nova Scotia, as in "Gravel Shore" and "The Ewe with the Crooked Horn," where guitarist Bryan Sutton lets loose with some ferocious flatpicking. The musicians incite each other to giddy heights of virtuosity without sacrificing ensemble unity and inspire MacMaster to take her fiddling in new and atypically complex directions. (Rounder, www.rounder.com) .........................................................................................................................................
January 30, 2004 Once referred to as the "busiest woman in the Canadian music business," that all changed when Natalie MacMaster's attention shifted to another love. While still at the top of her game - writing or co-writing nearly half of the 13 songs on her latest recording Blueprint, and recording those with some of the world's top bluegrass pickers - MacMaster now divides her time between two loves, her music and her husband. "I don't deserve that quote anymore," says the Cape Breton fiddler about the chaotic lifestyle, which at one time included up to 250 shows a year. "Two-hundred and fifty shows was too much. You go and go and go until you fall. You don't know you've done too much until you've done too much. There was a point when I was getting tired and not looking forward to it. "You have to live life outside of that. Especially now that I'm married. My life has another huge focus. It inspires everything. I have an inner peace, contentment with life. Everything is better because of it," she says from Madison, Wisconsin, touring the U.S. and appearing on such shows as Good Morning America and Conan O'Brian. Obviously business hasn't stopped, especially with the release of Blueprint only a few months ago. The northern leg of the tour swings to Canada in February with a Victoria date Feb. 2. The live show will differ from the CD, as the recording features some notable bluegrass players. The Celtic-rooted fiddler has experimented with a variety of different styles of music throughout her career, but in this latest case felt she was wandering into new and exciting territory. "Because I do instrumental music I can do whatever I want. I don't think I am pigeon-holed into any type of music. I am a Cape Breton fiddler, but I have so many different types of recordings. Change is good," says the two-time Juno Award winner for Best Instrumental Album. "I love that (recording with different musicians) part. It's an opportunity to record, spend time with different musicians, play with them, write with them. You have the opportunity to experiment. "The title (Blueprint) was chosen because I was trying to think of a word that described recording the Cape Breton music with these Americans is a new thing. It's a new sound, it's a blueprint." However, she doesn't dare to say she has invented something, and admits the Celtic bluegrass sound that resulted wasn't planned. It happened that her wish list of who she'd like to work with in Nashville included banjo master Bela Fleck, mandolin great Sam Bush, dobro expert Jerry Douglas and vocalist John Cowan. The collaboration is a fantastic musical interplay of Cape Breton style Celtic and American bluegrass. No less discerning in choosing the musicians she travels with, while on tour MacMaster and her band will feature five or six pieces from the new CD, a few pieces not yet recorded and a mix of favourites from past albums. .........................................................................................................................................
January
29, 2004 There's a dramatic difference between Natalie MacMaster's exuberant live performances and the Cape Breton fiddle music heard on any of her seven recordings. The tunes on every album she has released--whether one of her roots albums featuring the fiddle music she's played since age 9, or one of the albums combining her fine playing with more diverse or contemporary influences--are not intended to be revisited in the same way live. "Never in the history of my CDs has it been a representation of what I do live," MacMaster said. Currently, the Canadian musician and composer is traveling the United States, in support of her latest album, "Blueprint" (Rounder). The album pairs MacMaster's alternately vivacious or melancholy fiddle music with instrumentals, and occasionally vocals, from American bluegrass guests such as Bela Fleck (banjo), Sam Bush (mandolin) or Jerry Douglas (dobro). And yet when she performs Saturday at the Harris Theater, she and her band will play only five tracks off the new album, and even those have been adapted for a concert performance. "Two of the tracks are so unique … I'm going to rerecord them on my next record," MacMaster said. The album's intent is to capture a perfect clarity of sound. After intently listening one night to Alison Krauss' "Forget About It" CD, MacMaster was motivated to "make a record that is acoustically brilliant and very clean in production. … It's a simple project and yet the musicianship speaks volumes," she said. "I find a lot of times we can produce things with all the gadgets [but] we don't know when to stop." This pure simplicity is not something MacMaster, 31, is looking to recapture in her live shows, however. The sound is bigger live, plus, she said, "you have the energy and you have the visual, so more of your senses are being attacked. "I like to create the best show I can and it's a passion of mine finding the right blend of different pieces of music. … I want to take [audiences] on an emotional ride. I want to make them feel extremely happy. I want to make them feel wild. I want them to feel contemplative, and very deep, and I want them to feel pride and joy and excitement and wonderment and all sorts of feelings." MacMaster has been working to build the perfect stage show for decades. Growing up on an island off the east coast of Nova Scotia, one of Canada's maritime provinces, it was entirely natural for her to pick up a fiddle at a young age and join in the down-home revelries of Celtic-inspired music, jigs and reels. MacMaster began performing live shows at age 10. Her first gig in the United States came when she was just 12. She played a Canadian-American Club in Massachusetts. She's been slowing building her presence on this side of the border ever since. She has seen awareness of Cape Breton and its music grow over the years. "I'm finding now that the American audiences are very aware of Cape Breton Island. So aware that they're coming to visit. So aware that they're buying land and building homes." But does she feel she's accomplished what is often a holy grail for Canadian musicians: the elusive success of making it in the American market? It depends on how you define breaking the market, MacMaster said, conceding that Canadian musicians often focus on making it big in the United States as a true testament of their success. "I'm a Cape Breton fiddler playing traditional music and I don't get radio play unless it's an extremely rare occasion when I have vocals in my tunes," she said, adding this does not lend itself to selling millions of units and making a big impression on American audiences. And yet, she says, "America has been very good to me." She estimates she plays 75 percent of her shows in the United States now. In the past five years she has even mostly given up touring in Europe so that she can concentrate more on meeting the American demand. "I don't know if I'll know when breaking the market is because I've never broken the market anywhere," said the musician/composer, who has nevertheless earned a series of accolades in her native Canada. "I've never gone from poor to rich or not known to famous. Everything that I've accomplished has been done in tiny little increments." .........................................................................................................................................
January
29, 2004 Word has it Canadian fiddler Natalie MacMaster delves deep into a sweet field of bluegrass with her latest disc, Blueprint. Well, the 31-year-old hasn't quite loaded up the truck and moved to the Appalachian mountains. Blueprint is considerably more Cape Breton Celtic than Kentucky. However, MacMaster -- who plays the McPherson Playhouse on Monday -- did enlist some formidable bluegrass players to play on the Nashville-recorded album, including mandolin great Sam Bush, banjo king Bela Fleck and dobro whiz Jerry Douglas. Such legendary musicians were enlisted by her producer, Darol Anger, although she'd met them all previously. "I thought, really, you think they'd play on this? (My producer) just went for the top right away.... At the end of it we had everyone we wanted. It was amazing," said MacMaster from her home in Lakefield, Ont. With Blueprint, bluegrass is more a flavour than a primary ingredient. Fleck's banjo picking is the strongest down-home country influence, although everything is subordinate to MacMaster's Celtic kitchen-party playing. (One could argue that Blueprint is tinctured with pop as much as bluegrass, with recurring funk bass lines jibing well with McMaster's passionate violin syncopations.) The niece of famed Cape Breton fiddler Buddy MacMaster and distant cousin to Ashley MacIsaac, Natalie MacMaster has achieved startling success for a niche musician. Her fiddle tunes, most with no singing, are universes removed from the slick commercialism of pop superstars Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera. Even so, MacMaster has enjoyed her share of mainstream popularity. The Juno-winning musician's album, My Roots are Showing (2000), was nominated for a Grammy. She's toured with the Chieftains, and once performed for a live audience of 80,000 as opening act for Carlos Santana. Only a few weeks ago she managed a double-pronged media coup, with appearances on Late Night with Conan O'Brien and Good Morning America -- TV shows that attract millions of North American viewers. For an early January appearance on Good Morning America, MacMaster was interviewed for four minutes by Diane Sawyer, and had three "bumpers" in which she and her band played before commercial breaks. Immediately afterwards Blueprint sales zoomed, making it the No. 14 top selling disc on Amazon.com. It was the first time MacMaster had been a guest on either show. "Conan was particularly nice. He is a nice guy. I expected him to be on all the time, his stage personality all the time. Always cracking jokes, whatever. He isn't like that at all," she said. "You know, it's amazing -- you relearn this all the time -- we're all the same. We're all just people." At the 2001 Canadian Country Music Awards, MacMaster had the opportunity to jam backstage with one of the giants of contemporary bluegrass: Ricky Skaggs. One would think such a collaboration might have planted the seed for Blueprint, but MacMaster says that wasn't it. The idea of melding bluegrass and Celtic fiddling came to her later while listening to bluegrass violinist Alison Krauss's album, Forget About It. "For some reason listening to Forget About It) enlightened me in a new way. I thought, you know what, I want to do a record that is clean as this. Her records are so clean, so pure." As far as MacMaster knows, this is the first time bluegrass and traditional Cape Breton music -- the lively jigs and reels, the slower strathspeys -- have been blended. The recording, completed in two short weeks, went well. Fleck in particular became a pal of MacMaster's and her husband, Donnell Leahy (of the Celtic band, Leahy). Nonetheless, before entering the studio she had jitters about exploring new musical territory. "It was a little scary beforehand. I didn't have anything to base this music off of. Like, it's not like I could say so-and-so did that (before). I had to imagine what it was going to be like." Leahy had time off from playing with his band, and so was able to stay with MacMaster during the recording. The pair married in October, 2002. One of the songs sung at their wedding, My Love, Cape Breton and Me, (composed by an uncle) is included on Blueprint. At one time MacMaster played a gruelling 250 shows per year. Now she aims for a more civilized 100. "I do love being home more than ever, because I have someone to come home to." The fiddler believes her marriage with Leahy, also a violinist, is the ideal alliance. Both are familiar with the unusual demands showbiz makes on one another. If Leahy is heading out the door and MacMaster's not leaving with him, it's because she's going on the road herself. The pair have yet to tour together, however, MacMaster believes that will happen one day. Having babies will be part of the future, too, she says. Leahy's sisters in his band have successfully managed to combine having children and being professional musicians. MacMaster, a staunch Catholic, plans to let things unfold as they will. "We do love kids. But I've always had the attitude, just get out of the way and let the Big Guy do His work." MacMaster says she finds considerable comfort in her Catholic faith, which sustains her when showbiz life becomes challenging. Drugs, sex and rock 'n' roll may be the stereotype for the touring musician, but for MacMaster and many others, the reality is quite different. She's aware of many musicians who find solace and stability in religious beliefs, be it the members of Leahy or Bono of U2. "I was raised in a very strong Catholic family. And it continues to be a strong point in my life." MacMaster may go into the studio to begin work on a new album as early as March. She'd like to record it with her current band, which she's particularly pleased with. She may do a double disc, with one side being completely traditional Cape Breton music. Then again, she may not. MacMaster seems to take a fatalistic view of her future. "I just let my life take its course," she said. "I swear, my whole life, I have not planned my life. I have taken one day at a time, I kid you not. I have never set goals for myself." .........................................................................................................................................
January 13, 2004 Media outlets are flocking to Natalie MacMaster. The Cape Breton fiddler recently appeared on "Late Night With Conan O'Brien" and "Good Morning America." She is the folk darling of the moment, yet it was with utter modesty that she surveyed the crowd at Symphony Hall on Sunday. "This is wicked. We have a full house here," she exclaimed, seemingly surprised. She shouldn't have been, because Boston has long been in the palm of her fiddling hand. Her first fiddle came from here (when she was 9 years old), and her first American performance was at the Canadian-American Club in Watertown when she was 12. She turned in a grand performance, and with the radiant joy that ran throughout her show, one can only surmise that even bigger things are in store. Let's not get ahead of ourselves, though. Let's enjoy this magnificent, two-set marathon in which she played jigs, reels, and strathspeys for all they were worth, while adding Cape Breton step dancing skills that were updated to include a Michael Jackson moonwalk. It was maximum entertainment, especially considering that MacMaster rarely sings. She did a brief rap/vocal intro to "Touch of the Master's Hand," but the song was mainly sung by guitarist Brad Davidge. If MacMaster could ever gain the confidence to sing (and she's not bad from what we heard), she could easily be the next Alison Krauss, who likewise started as a fiddler. Everything else is in place for her to achieve stardom, for MacMaster takes folk music and makes it seem larger than life. She bounced around during the first set in an iridescent, reddish-pink suit, scoring with "Appropriate Dipstick," which started as a slow air and built majestically, as well as with the poignant "Autumn Leaves," a jazz standard sung by bassist John Chiasson. There was also a fast-paced Cape Breton medley that saw the local Four on the Floor step dancing troupe come out gallantly, and the simmering "David's Jig," which she wrote for her brother. The second set, in which MacMaster dressed in tartan plaid with a sexy hint of bare shoulder, was even more energetic. It opened with a polyrhythmic bagpipe solo from Matt MacIsaac (who also played electric bagpipes) and hit peaks on "Jig Party," "Blue Bonnets Over the Border," and "The Olympic Reel" (by Mark O'Connor). MacMaster's fiddle bow was a blur, and she allowed her five-piece band to stretch out, especially keyboardist Allan Dewar, drummer Miche Pouliot (who has previously played with k.d. lang and Bruce Cockburn) and the versatile Davidge, who switched from acoustic to electric guitar and even added some wah-wah pedal riffs. MacMaster also played some extra Cape Breton classics for the occasion ("Bovaglie's Plaid" stood out), and the crowd, which included some locally based cousins, wouldn't let her exit before a prolonged standing ovation was heard. .........................................................................................................................................
January
13, 2004 To call Natalie MacMaster the most dynamic performer in Celtic music today is high praise, but it still doesn't get at just how remarkable a concert artist this Cape Breton Island fiddler has become. At her Symphony Hall show Sunday afternoon, MacMaster's torrid, hyperactive performance caused the capacity audience to literally jump to its feet for a standing ovation. All around the august hall, people were turning to each other and exchanging wide-eyed looks that asked, "Did you see THAT?" The show's climax included MacMaster in a dance display so quick and wildly energetic that at points it seemed akin to flying. There was tap-dancing and moon-walking. There were bravura solos from every member of the fiddler's sensational band. There was a touch of funk and a brief, propulsive fiddle solo that included simultaneous dancing. Though still very much the friendly, small-town, Cape Breton girl, MacMaster has broken through to a new level of showmanship. Word of how much pure fun a MacMaster show is has obviously spread to a larger audience than just Nova Scotia folk fans. (MacMaster's appearance last week on "Good Morning America" surely helped.) MacMaster exhibited ferocious energy right off the bat, jumping and twirling while fiddling a sleekly arranged batch of jigs, reels and strathspeys. The band, with bagpipes, full drum set, electric guitar, bass and keyboards, deftly punched up the Cape Breton attack without losing the tradition's form. Drummer Miche Pouliot, keyboardist Allan Dewar and bassist John Chiasson form a rhythm section of pliancy, imagination and sheer power. The tall, thin, bearded and pigtailed Chiasson delivered the show's biggest surprise, crooning a subtle, cocktail-ready version of "Autumn Leaves" before leading the band in a warm jazz jaunt. MacMaster dove in briefly, the sole time she left her Cape Breton style. The tall, slender MacMaster was dressed in pants outfits of shiny red for the first half and bright plaid in the second. Musically and physically, she was constantly in motion. As she aptly described her energy: "Wind her up and let her go." MacMaster lacks the emotionally riveting slow airs of other Celtic greats. "Blue Bonnets," a mid-tempo tune of staunch sentiment, was the slowest she got. But what other fiddler of any ethnic tradition can hit the starting gates already in high gear and then lift off to such molten overdrive? Local Cape Breton step dancers Four On The Floor added to the merriment. But no one could match MacMaster's flying feet. .........................................................................................................................................
January
12, 2004
NORTHAMPTON
- With temperatures hovering near zero outside Saturday night, Natalie
MacMaster brought her own brand of fiddle fire to warm the crowd inside
the Calvin Theatre. The fiddler is a native of Cape Breton, and as she explained early in Saturday's performance, "There are more fiddlers per capita on Cape Breton than anywhere else in the world." It is a place where it seems every family has at least a fiddler or two, but ever since she started playing at the age of 9, MacMaster has progressed, to the point where today, at age 31, she's undoubtedly the island's best-known musical export.
And
while her instrumental work was dazzling, she proved to be a charismatic
character on stage as well. Feisty might be the best word to describe
her. Dressed in a colorful ensemble that included bright red plaid
pants, she danced with the fiddle, kicked up a storm, shouted "yee-haw"
at the crowd and let her curly, shoulder-length blonde hair bounce all
the while. The band included Miche Pouliot on drums, Alan Dewar on piano, the multitalented Matt MacIsaac on bagpipes, whistles and banjo, muscular guitarist Bred Davidge and bassist John Chiasson. Among the night's many musical highlights was the traditional "The Silver Spear" and "Appropriate Dipstick." The latter featured MacIsaac on a brand of electrified bagpipes, with drummer Pouliot setting aside sticks and playing the beat with his hands. MacMaster and Dewar teamed for a series of traditional Cape Breton tunes and MacMaster also brought a couple of dancers on stage to accompany the band with some Cape Breton-style step-dancing.
The
band was exceptionally tight on one of the night's high-points,
"David's Jig," which featured MacMaster slipping into
triple-time fiddle work with her musicians matching her note for note,
bringing the house down in the process. While most of the night's music
had its roots in Cape Breton, there were a couple of departures along
the way. Most notable was a jazz-flavored version of "Autumn
Leaves," which featured Chiasson on stand-up bass and vocals. It
showed another side to the group and the musical break was refreshing. She also let her fans know that she got married in the past year. Not surprisingly, she wed a fellow fiddler, Donnell Leahy, from the Canadian family band Leahy. .........................................................................................................................................
January
10, 2004 Her relentless touring and a series of standout recordings have turned the Cape Breton Island's Natalie MacMaster into one of the world's best known fiddlers, and with very good reason. The fluid playing, the energetic spark of her strings and her ability to mix and match various musical styles while staying true to her roots, all help make her concerts and albums a complete delight. The same can be said once again for "Blueprint," which finds MacMaster teaming with an A-list cast of American string players. It's a kick to hear MacMaster's fiddle flying against Bela Fleck's banjo in "Bela's Tune," just as it's a treat to hear her beautiful work set again Jerry Douglas' Dobro in the tender ballad "Eternal Friendship." Sam Bush, Alison Brown and Victor Wooten are among the other guests on board for this musically diverse adventure. Dominated as usual by instrumentals, the disc does include a couple of vocals, most notably here, "Touch of the Master's Hand," a tale John Cowan sings about a battered old violin being auctioned .........................................................................................................................................
January
2, 2004 People are forever coming up to Natalie MacMaster and telling her, "I don't typically like fiddle music, but I like your show." It might sound like an odd, backhanded compliment, but MacMaster has grown to appreciate it. She knows that she's taking the fiddle to places it hasn't been before. MacMaster, a native of Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia, has mastered that land's traditional, Celtic-derived fiddle style. But she's also an adventurous spirit who has incorporated a progressive fusion of bluegrass and jazz, which she plays onstage with a rock edge, making her a favorite of open-minded fans everywhere. "I make traditional CDs and also nontraditional CDs," says MacMaster, 30, whose recent releases have alternated between these formats. "I get motivated and excited when I hear good musicians, no matter what they're playing," adds MacMaster, who performs at Symphony Hall on Jan. 11. Her experimental side comes out more than ever on her latest nontraditional CD, "Blueprint," issued by the Cambridge-based Rounder Records. It was recorded in Nashville and employs such bluegrass and "new grass" stars as Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas (from Alison Krauss's Union Station), and Sam Bush, who was in New Grass Revival and played with Emmylou Harris for years. Many of the contributors were recommended by Krauss. "I was blown away by the caliber of these musicians," says MacMaster. "We only had two weeks to record [in Nashville], and the schedule was packed. Everything had to be very organized. And chord charts were planned, but a lot of spontaneity was also built into it, so it was flexible. I hadn't played with any of them before . . . and I had never played with a dobro or five-string banjo before, but I just trusted the musicians, and I was right to do that." The results are evident in the aptly titled "A Blast," in which Fleck uncorks some supersonic riffing on banjo, while his bandmate in the Flecktones, Victor Wooten, keeps up with him on bass. The star, of course, is MacMaster, who plays fiddle with an explosive energy that is further displayed on the ultra-hot
|
Port
Hawkesbury's new Civic Centre received its official Celtic christening on
Saturday night when Natalie MacMaster and Leahy gave performances so hot
they may have melted the ice under the insulated floor.
[Excerpt]
Taking the Civic Centre stage on Saturday night was Leahy, along with the
girl from-up-the-road, Natalie MacMaster. The pleasure in playing to the
hometown crowd was written all over her face as she literally lit up
the stage in a white satin suit, her trademark blond curls flying.
That
was the question on the minds of fiddling fans when Natalie MacMaster and
her husband's band, Leahy, played their first joint concert at the Rebecca
Cohn Auditorium in Halifax on Tuesday.
Natalie
MacMaster came home to play the Rebecca Cohn last night and brought her
new family with her - her husband Donnell Leahy and his seven musical
siblings. The double-header concert marked the first time his family band
Leahy split the bill with MacMaster and her band.
It's
almost two years since Father and Natalie kept me waiting in the vestry,
and since that moment my life has changed in so many ways," he told
the crowd. "So here I am again, waiting in the vestry. I hope my
life won't change quite so dramatically this time!"
After
dragging our over-driven bodies to Merlefest early Saturday afternoon,
we needed a pick me up and found it in the form of blonde Canadian
bombshell Natalie MacMaster. A native of Cape Breton, MacMaster—looking
chic in all black—stormed the Watson main stage with a whirlwind of
Scottish and Irish inspired tunes.