Staran - Staran (2021)

Staran is both an album and the name adopted by a new collective formed by five of the most exciting young talents on the Glasgow folk scene, and, in Scots Gaelic, it means path, trail or stepping stones.

The credit for bringing the collective together belongs to pianist and drummer, John Lowrie. He’d worked individually with the other four and recognised the potential inherent in such a diverse collection of styles and backgrounds. John’s own experience is wider than most, as he writes on his web pages, he’s “equally at home playing intricate contemporary jazz on the drums as accompanying Gaelic song on the piano”. It was the second of those that brought him into contact with Kim Carnie and she, in turn, brings her vocal talents, in both Gaelic and English, to Staran. The remaining members are Innes White, whose range of experience rivals John’s. Innes brings in acoustic guitar, electric guitar and mandolin. Breabach’s James Lindsay is on double bass and Rura’s Jack Smedley on fiddle. Also from Breabach, Megan Henderson adds harmonies to a couple of Kim’s songs. With that range of prior experience, you’d expect strong traditional roots to Staran’s music and you might anticipate some jazz influences from both John and James. But in reality, we get rather more, Staran truly is more than the sum of its parts.

The album’s opening places the focus firmly on tradition, Kim sings Dà Làimh sa Phìob, canntaireachd from one of the big Gaelic songs, Uamh An Oir. Kim’s pure vocal is just as you would expect, behind it is a drone, but not sounding like one produced from a set of Highland pipes. There’s also a variety of sounds, single notes from piano, occasionally a mandolin, maybe, and a resonating tone from, I guess, a fiddle. The fiddle certainly takes a turn around the melody between vocal verses. I offer no apology for hesitancy in identifying the sources, to enter the spirit of Staran is to leave aside such thoughts and enjoy music that varies from sparse accompaniments to richly layered soundscapes.

The next track provides an immediate contrast, a set of tunes, Back to Glasgow (and back to back again), from James Duncan Mackenzie, Canadian fiddler Shane Cook’s Squirmy’s finishing with a Jack Smedley piece, Deichead. It starts slow with a melody from the piano, Jack’s fiddle gradually adding more as the pace picks up, eventually taking over and leading a spritely charge to the end with the piano and Innes’ guitar keeping up the rhythm.

As if playing with our expectations, the music then switches back to another of Kim’s Gaelic songs, Horò Gun Togainn Air Hùgan Fhathast Thu. The words are traditional but Staran have put them to a melody composed by Kim. It starts simply enough with the steady rhythm typical of a work song, the vocal backed by John’s piano and with Megan adding harmony lines. The build-up that follows, though, isn’t of pace this time but one of depth of sound as the fiddle, guitar and bass combine with the piano in an arrangement that wraps around the song like a warm cloak.

The next three tracks, all instrumental, give opportunities for John, Jack, Innes and James to explore interplays between their various instruments and the different textures that can create. The first and third, Einbeck and Little Waves are John Lowrie compositions, in between, Casino, comes from Finnish composer Hannu Kella. Piano generally provides the backbone of the arrangements but it is the intricate way other instruments weave around it to create depth and variety of texture that takes this album to a different level. On both the John Lowrie compositions, John adds percussion into the mix, largely in the background on Einbeck but with greater prominence on Little Waves. This track also allows Innes to bring his mandolin to the fore.

Kim returns for a final Gaelic song Gaol A’ Chruidh, a traditional song to which she has added additional music and lyrics. Her voice is accompanied for much of the track by just piano and fiddle. However, the final section perfectly illustrates the full, rich sounds of which Staran are capable. Electric guitar takes a share of the melody, Kim’s vocal is enriched once more by Megan Henderson and the piano, fiddle and bass combine to become positively orchestral. That warm cloak is back.

Balcarres, the longest track on the album at almost seven minutes, could also be considered the most adventurous. Added to the previous instruments, Rhodes piano makes for a more varied keyboard sound and the other instruments, generally, are given a little more electronic “freedom”. The overall effect is relatively subtle, we’re not suddenly entering the world of prog rock, but it’s enough to show the directions in which Staran may be heading.