Special Music.

Somebody once asked me what the point is in listening to a song sung in Gaelic, since I don’t understand the language and so can’t understand what the song is about. There’s every point. When a native song is sung in a native language that is unfamiliar, the sound of that language becomes part of the music, adding to and enriching it. That’s the point.

So it is with the Julie Fowlis snippet below. I have this track on one of her albums, so I could read the notes and find out what the words mean if I wanted to. I don’t want to. That would detract from the experience. And there’s more.

When I first fell in love with this song a few years ago, I didn’t know that she’d performed it on one of the splendid Transatlantic Sessions programmes produced by the BBC. But there she is, a sweet little girl from the remote community of North Uist in the Outer Hebrides, all grown up and sitting with some of the greats of Gaelic music. She displays no rampant ego. Her eyes smile unassumingly, she sings like an angel, and is simply glad to be doing so.

You may keep your commercial prima donnas, and even your Beethovens for that matter. This is the heart of music beating deep in the soul of man. This is real. This is music from the hearth. This is roots. This is special.