Kevin Burke, a noted Celtic musician that you might have heard of, once said, 'This is dance music, and it's got to have a fair old bit of jizz in it.' The CDs we'll be looking at in this outing are all English dance music of a sort. So let's have the publican in the Green Man Pub pour us each a Ryhope Wood Hard Cider and we'll sit by the fireplace so we can be comfortable while we discuss these recordings. Comfy? Good.

English and Border Music for Pipes is a wonderfully straightforward recording that reminded of the work which Julian Goodacre and his brothers had done. Cat Eldridge noted in that review what he though of this sort of music: 'So how is this music? Sublime. Perfect. Truly great. This English Bagpipe music has a definite medieval feel to it as contrasted to thoroughly modern feel of the Blowzabella material. This is simple, straightforward traditional music that one well may have encountered centuries ago at a barn dance or other community event in some rural area of England.'

I once heard Moebius play live and they sounded a lot like what David Faulkner and Steve Turner sound like here -- a delicate, more gentle version of what most of us think of when we conceptualize piping music. This is not FHL (Faster Harder Louder) 'tall. Now the title of the CD is not quite correct as it should've been Traditional English And Border Music, Arranged For Pipes And Accordion. Yes, Turner plays the accordion, adding a nice counter-point to Faulkner's piping.

Everything here ('Mitford Galloway', 'Lasses Make Your Tails Toddle', 'The Bonny Miller/Rusty Gully', 'When I was a Lady/The Lilly', 'Jack Warrell's Hornpipe', 'Boxing Hares/A Hornpipe', 'Cuddy Claw'd Her', 'The Silver Pin/An Ye Had Been Where I Had Been You Would Have Not Been So Canty', 'Hey My Nanny/Hit Her Between The Legs', 'Alloa House', 'Welsh Hornpipe') is traditional, excepting 'Boxing Hares' which was composed by Faulkner. These two musicians have a great deal of power, grace and style for a duo! Moebius and the Goodacre Brothers are an obvious comparison as I noted previously, as would be Blowzabella in their Bobbityshooty period. Now despite the statement of one reviewer that 'recorded music on the Border pipes is still rather rare', there's more than a fair bit of recorded Border piping music out there, including albums by (of course) Billy Pigg, Kathryn Tickell, and the High-level Ranters, all of which do Northumbrian/Border piping. It's very easy for me sitting here talking to you over a pint or two to envision David Faulkner and Steve Turner sitting here in the Pub playing this music late at night. Why I can even clearly see a red-haired lass with her long skirts swirling as she dances to the music! If you like tastefully-played pipe music, you'll want to hear English and Border Music for Pipes!

Hekety has finally put out their first length album, Furze Cat. Hekety, who may be named after a witch in MacBeth, are, as they note in the liner notes, 'a dance band, first, last, and in the middle too.' Their first recording, a mere EP, was reviewed thusly by me: 'The EP that came from Hekety contains but six cuts but my, what a bloody fine bunch of tunes they are! Founded in Sheffield, England, a mere four years ago, which makes them true youngsters, Hekety are an English Ceilidh band who play a mixture of traditional English, Celtic and European dance music with an fair amount of self-penned material. The band consists of Jess Arrowsmith (Fiddle), Richard Arrowsmith (Melodeons), Gav Davenport (Cittern and Guitar), Nigel Holmes (4 and 5 String Bass Guitars), Jo Veal (Clarinet) and Paul Baker (Guitar). And like the Bursledon Village Band, Hekety has a great female fiddler in the form of Jess Armstrong who according to her bio 'has been playing and dancing in the folk scene since childhood; started seriously playing for ceilidh dancing in mid-teens; has also danced with and played for various morris teams (although none currently).' (It appears the members of the Bursledon Village Band are also involved in morris dancing!) She 'met Richard at Sidmouth in 1994, formed Hekety with him in 1997, married him in 2000.' Ain't love grand? Ah, but you ask how the music is? All six cuts from the opening selection of 'The Bulls Jig/The Millwheel' to the closing tune of 'Port & Stiffon' are played with skill, energy and a respect for the tradition of English dance music. If you love English dance music, you must hear this band play!'

Furze Cat comes our way a long three years after that recording, but what a lovely recording it is, well worth the wait. Unlike English and Border Music for Pipes, the tracks here ('Downhill Dream, Rice', 'The Man Tiger', 'Rambling Sailor', 'Thank You Letter', 'Elvaston Castle', 'Jakes Jig/Battleswing', 'The Watergoat March/Scampering Nell', 'Holtwood Reel', 'Panache De Main/Mure Sauvage', 'Isabelle/Trip to the Observatory', 'Furze Cat', and 'Young Collins/Jamaica' are not primarily traditional, but are largely composed by the members of the group. A 'furze cat', by the way, is a folk name for a hare. Anna Franklin in her excellent essay on the hare (which you can find here) says 'In Europe the hare is also associated with the corn spirit. In Anglo-Saxon poetry the hare is addressed as "the stag of the stubble, long-eared", "the stag with leathery horns", "the cat of the wood", "the cat that lurks in the broom", "the furze cat". Hares hide in cornfields till the last reaping and the last sheaf is often called "the hare" and its cutting called "killing the hare", "cutting the hare" or "cutting the hare's tail off".' Hekety would like you to know, again according to the superb liner notes, that the hare is also associated with Hecate, a goddess known, as I will note, for her kind nature!

The group this outing has a looser, more jazzy feel to their music. If you caught the Neverending Session last week when some Nordic fiddlers were taking part, it has much that same feel. Yes, 'tis still English dance music, but more modern sounding. Now the band would like you to heed the following comments if you're grumbling, as I can hear you doing, that modern music ain't worth pissing on: 'they also believe that if the music isn't good enough and interesting enough to sit & listen to, why should anybody want to dance to it? And it works a treat. A great, big, thumping, wailing, dark chocolate lump of noise that shoves you onto the dance floor, and then keeps you dancing until long after heart, lungs and common sense have told you to stop. It's not exactly safe music, not foam rubber Stetson & Roy Rogers cap gun stuff. Of the tradition, but unconfined by it; English country dance music for the 21st century and beyond!' It's dance, through and through, with 'nough jizz to give you really sore feet!

Let's take a break and have a wee bit of that food over there on the cupboard. Yes, the heather-smoked salmon is quite tasty as is the just-baked Celtic bread. Don't forget to sample the Pumpkin Ale! And do I see a pot of Jamaican Pepper Pot Soup simmering in the fireplace? Yummmm! I do so enjoy the late summer 'round here as our cooks get very creative.

Now where were we? Ahhh, the Old Swan Band. . . .

Now I'd not seen the Old Swan Band live, but I had heard good things 'bout them, so their first new recording in twenty years, Swan-Upmanship, was a real treat. Old Swan started out almost precisely thirty years ago as, I kid you not, The Cotswold Liberation Front, and members included Bernie Cherry, Robin Lister, Rod and Danny Stradling, Martin Brinsford, and the very young fiddlin' Fraser sisters, Fi and Jo, the latter who was but fourteen. This would make them only slightly older than the youngest folk dance group I know of -- Popcorn Behavior which had, when it started, three members thirteen years or younger! Rod and Danny Stradling soon left the band which meant that fiddles were the dominat sound of the dance band, a still-rare occurance in English dance circles. Oh, there'd be saxes and percussion too, but fiddles dominate the sound of the Old Swan Band.

Now it appears that the group made an EP of an incarnation of the band in 1983, but I'm not sure it was ever commercially released. I do know that this release (the tracks are thusly: 'The Green-Clad Hills/Jimmy Garson's March', 'Jack Robinson/William Irwin's No. 3/The Tipputs', 'Steamboat Hornpipe/Gloucester Hornpipe', 'False Start', 'General Ward/The Day Room', 'Winster Gallop/Four-Hand Reel/Dark Girl Dressed In Blue', 'Church Street/Redwing St. Mary's', 'Flowers Of Edinburgh/Soldier's Joy/Morpeth Rant', 'Wenlock Edge/Summer Waltz' 'Flowers Of Edinburgh', 'Schottis fran Havero/Another Fine Mess', 'George Green's College Hornpipe'. 'Basquet of Oysters and Sally Sloanes', 'Freedom of Ireland/Kitchen Girl', 'Beatrice Hill's Three-Hand Reel', and 'Ger The Rigger/Mickey Chewing Bubble Gum') is one of the finest sounding albums I've had the pleasure to hear in a long, long time.

Wild Goose on its Web site says that Swan-Upmanship 'brings a tap to your foot and an inclination to dance'. I couldn't agree more. The primary difference between this album and Furze Cat is that this is a much fuller sound than the intimate feel of the Hekety release. I said previously that the Hekety release felt sort of Nordic jazzy to me, but this release sounds really country English dance-y. Just give a listen to the 'Winster Gallop/Four-Hand Reel/Dark Girl Dressed in Blue' to see what I mean, particularly the 'Four-Hand Reel' tune. It has that same high-energy but respectful to the tradition that Kick Shins on the 'Wiltshire Six Hand Reel/The Maid Of Glenconnel' set has -- see their Dkyk Shynski album for it, or what Oysterband does with the 'Cornish Six Hand Reel' tune on their Little Rock to Leipzig album. Lively music that one definitely would do well to dance to. What I like most 'bout traditional dance music bands like the Old Swan Band is that they still sound fresh after thirty years of making merry together. Most folk rock bands that old have barely the enthusiasm to lift a pint of ale or 'member the lyrics. Now, I know there are notable exceptions to that statement, such as Jethro Tull and Fairport Convention, but I generally find the traditionally oriented bands to be better over the long-haul.

There you have it -- three superb CDs by bands that are as good as one could hope for. And all worthy of hearing over and over 'gain. All three will find honoured places in me collection of music. Now shall we see how the mulled cider's coming along?