Kate Chadbourne is a woman of many talents. She is a scholar of Celtic language and literature, sings traditional Irish songs, is a published poet, and provides improvisatory musical accompaniment for storytellers and dancers. She also writes and performs her own original songs--16 of them on this self-produced debut recording.

Kate sings and plays the piano accompaniment on every song. Other instruments, which include cello, Irish flute and bodhran, play backup and add color, but the piano consistently carries the song, generally with an insistent, rhythmic running series of harmonies. Over this rippling foundation soars Kate's voice, a versatile and mature instrument which can be soothing, matter-of-fact, hauntingly pure or passionately entreating.

It's a storyteller's voice, and suitably is often employed in contemporary ballads of working-class lives -- a waitress, a nurse, a fisherman. Other songs are more mystical in nature, invoking mythological images from Medusa to mermaids. Many evoke the sea, part of Kate's background as the daughter of a New England lobsterman and obviously one of the major inspirations for her flowing, organic style. Within this, variety of musical influences are represented: "A Shade Too Soon!" has a cool jazz beat, while a setting of Yeats' "The Song of Wandering Aengus" simply and melodiously carries us to that mysterious land beyond the sun and the moon.

The poetry of the lyrics only comes out fully when sung, as they tend not to have a strong rhythm when read. Lines like "Seashells are the vessels of my devotion/And I make a motion/I say let the winged things fly" only make sense when sung with the uneven ebb and flow of the sea in "Green Wave of Ocean." Or take these: "He was shaking his finger at me/I thought he'd blow me away, he'd blow me away/As soon as the light turned green" -- puzzling to scan on their own, they perfectly evoke the "Madcap Taxi Driver" of the title when sung with bouncy nonchalance.

With all of this it's not easy to place Kate Chadbourne; she's been compared variously to Sarah MacLachlan, Tori Amos, and Bruce Hornsby. Rather, call her a modern troubadour, travelling between the world we see with our eyes and that which we perceive with the imagination. The Celtic bards of old would surely approve.

Information on Kate Chadbourne's recordings and upcoming performances is available here.