Batt O'Connor - Where Voices Still Sing On The Wind - By John Cutliffe

It was just a few weeks back when I had to travel from Atlanta to Nashville to take pictures of banjo virtuoso, twelve year old Ryan Holladay for the cover of his new album. It is usually a four hour drive and a very pleasant one through some lovely scenery and the day was sunny and bright as I got past Chattanooga heading North. One thing I had forgotton that Thursday afternoon was that the Bonnaroo Festival was starting in Manchester Tennessee and the early arrivals of the hundreds of thousands of music lovers who converge annually at the site were lined up for about 18 miles. The local country radio station foretold of great delays as I grew closer to the turnoff for the event and sure enough traffic slowed to a trickle as I sat people watching in the afternoon sun.

Not being in any kind of a hurry I turned the radio off and used the time to catch up on some albums I had been sent and hadn't had time to listen to yet. One such album was by Irish singer Batt O'Connor. Batt and his work had come to my attention through former Altan soundman and all round party monster Adrian Cunningham who had worked on the album. Ado 's musical tastes are varied to say the least so I didn't know what to expect.

What I got though was the perfect relaxing soundtrack to the laid back scenes of camper vans, trucks, backbackers, hippies, Goths and various other youngsters making their way to the festival.

Batt is basically a ballad singer. These days there are few can capture the feel of true old style Irish ballad singer the way you would hear it in the back room of a quite pub after hours. Batt has pulled it off and has made a little gem of a CD.

The lovely thing about this album is that although Batt has written all the songs himself you still feel at home among the ten tracks as each has an old time ballad feel and a warm familiartity. From the opening song A Chance of a Melody through to the Ballad of The Finglas River he gently pulls us back to a quiter time far away from the noise of today's volatile world.

He enlists the help of some very fine musicians to create these gentle sounds. Niamh Dunne, Michael O'Connor and Gerry MacNamarra all feature as do Mickey Dunne, Mick O'Dwyer, Avril Bowler, Fred OBrien, Mick O'Brien, Declan O'Connor and Tomas O'Conner.

This is not an album for a raucous party or session but would certainly be perfect at 4am when most of the guests have gone or collapsed and you are left with one or two real friends, shooting the breeze and letting Batt O'Connor tell you a tale or two.

For more on Batt and this lovely album check out his website HERE