Hailing from County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, Jarlath Henderson is one of the Celtic world's rising superstars. His new album, "Heart Broken Heads Turned," is by far one of the coolest Celtic albums to come out in a good while. Combining the use of a broad spectrum of musical sound, from uillean pipes (Irish bagpipes) and whistle to synthesizer, Henderson captures the living and breathing aspects of folk music.
Listen here:
The track linked above is "Courting is a Pleasure," which features Jarlath on vocals. Jarlath brings a lovely touch to this melody, which is actually a really old traditional Irish folk song. With the infusion of electronic sounds, he brings this tune careening into a modern ear. Not only does this song, and the whole album, feature acoustic and electronic instruments, but it features some more of the unheard sounds from the instruments themselves. Utilizing everything from the percussive sounds of a guitar to the breathing noises from the uillean bellows gives a real live quality to the music.
Jarlath is a tremendously gifted musician trained in the more traditional aspects of folk music. At the age of 19, Jarlath had already become the All-Ireland Uillean Piping champion three times. His talent oozes from the pipes themselves, listen here:
If you were to ask pretty much anyone around me, this album has very quickly become one of the more worn out CDs on the shelf. If it were just a piping album, this would be quite a bit harder to wear out, but with the all-star cast and the fresh take on what should be a breathing and evolving genre, it's easy to see how the album that was released in January of this year (2016) has taken the Celtic folk world by storm.
If you want to see more about how this album was put together, there is an excellent half hour folkumentary about it on YouTube, which can be found here:
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