EJ Jones is best known for his highland piping in the Houston Celtic band, Clandestine. More recently, he plays also with Gerry O'Beirne and fiddler Rosie Shipley in The Willow Band.Though his career began long ago as a piper in his high school band (who says Houston isn't colourful)? The Willow is his first solo album. Jones is joined by Jennifer Hamel and Gregory McQueen from those two bands, along with Austin percussionist Wolf Loescher. O'Beirne gets among the credits as the CD’s producer.

I have great memories of Clandestine. When I lived in College Station, they'd come up and play in bars. Frat boys would dance on the tables in a murky pseudo-coagulated sea of smoke and tunes. Better yet, Clandestine would play live at our radio station and bring Guinness. "How do you mike bagpipes?" quizzed the engineer, (more used to singer-songwriters), but after a while, he figured it out. Jones' pipes packed quite a wallop, and they do on this album as well, as do their evil quintuplets, flute, whistle, bombarde, and small pipes.

Many of the tunes on this all-instrumental CD were composed by Jones himself, but others are traditional or composed in the trade. As on many albums, slow and fast tunes alternate for variety, and here the more active tunes are the best. Jones composed "Bayou Reels" around stories of New Orleans; it's upbeat and though with definite Celtic themes, Loescher and drummer Walter Cross throw in a crab boat haul of dance percussion. Another original, "The Willow Reels," features not only piercing highland pipes but the even more piercing bombarde, in a percussive Breton flavoured but Scottish based track. A traditional set of competition tunes "Susan McLeod's/Sandy Cameron/The Gravel Walk" is by contrast solidly Scottish (aside from the third tune which is Irish) and very loud, and in places very fast, a little Alban orgy in itself.

The slower tunes are interesting, but won't jolt the frat boys from their hangovers. "The Castle Of Dromore" features Jones on flute, and O'Beirne on country slide guitar. "The Oak Table," on which Jones plays whistle, is a duel showcase with Shipley's fast fiddle. Hamel's wordless vocals in "Breton Dance" are nice, but perhaps more wispy than necessary.

All the tracks are skilfully arranged in the contemporary style, but I wish that The God Of Complexity had backed off a bit and suggested one track of uncluttered solo highland piping, to demonstrate their power and majesty. Still, Jones' musicianship sounds great and The Willow is at the least a national-class recording.

 EJ Jones pipes on the web here

Read more EJ Jones/Clandestine reviews and find out why they are no run-of-the-mill jig band:
 The Ale is Dear (1996)
The Haunting (1998)
To Anybody At All (1999)
Music From Home (2001)