Celebrate Traditional Irish Balladry With The High Kings

A couple years ago, my dad and I discovered Celtic Thunder. I’d heard of them before; he hadn’t. These lads from Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scotland soon became a major part of our musical landscape. Their hearty mix of pop and folk, of solos and group numbers, made it easy to get a good sense of each performer’s strengths, and with their frequent updates on Facebook and Twitter, they soon came to feel almost like friends. I long ago relinquished my reluctance to whole-heartedly embrace another Celtic group out of loyalty to the Irish Rovers, and when I stumbled upon the High Kings, another group introduced to America primarily through PBS, I snatched up their DVD for my dad’s birthday.

The High Kings: Live in Dublin features Finbarr Clancy, Martin Furey, Brian Dunphy and Darren Holden, all established Irish musicians in their own right with musical legacies to uphold. Produced by David Downes, who is also responsible for Celtic Woman, the band has a much more old-fashioned, folksy feel to it than Celtic Thunder. The vocalists consistently play a variety of instruments while singing, and for the most part, they sing together. They stand or sit on the stage, four in a row, and they sing with very little theatricality. You don’t have the borderline corny choreography you get with Celtic Thunder; you do have a fair bit of talking, which is one thing I miss with Celtic Thunder. The songs here are almost always a group effort, so getting a sense of the individual members isn’t as easy. The High Kings isn’t so much about individual personalities; it’s simply about the music.

That music includes a number of traditional songs that were familiar to me. The Irish Rovers introduced me years ago to The Black Velvet Band, a tragic but ever-so-sing-along-able tale of a man who falls for a wily seductress who frames him for theft; The Wild Rover, about a meanderer who has decided to settle down; Marie’s Wedding, about a rather raucous wedding; and perhaps my favorite of the four, Will Ye Go Lassie, Go?, a mellow, summery song about friendship, togetherness and the way romance seems to bloom more robustly among wild mountain thyme. The harmonies and instrumental accompaniment are especially nice on this one when the High Kings perform it.

Another thing you hear a lot more of from the High Kings than from Celtic Thunder are nonsense lyrics. Irish music is full of these babbling series of syllables that don’t mean a thing but sure are fun to listen to. We get the biggest dose of it in Jimmy Murphy, and they essentially dare the audience to sing along with the chorus, which gets longer and longer and ever more tongue-twistery. “Skinnymalink killymajoe whisky frisky tooraloo, rank a diddle dido ding dural i doe!” I think I’ll stick to listening, thanks. Same goes for the “routin’ toutin’” rambles of The Little Beggarman. Phil the Fluther’s Ball isn’t as nonsensical as it sounds; they just sing it really quickly, and the words trip all over each other in this jolly number. Unless you’ve got a very agile tongue, you’re likely to have a hard time wrapping your way around speedy lines like “With the toot of the flute and the twiddle of the fiddle, o; hopping in the middle, like a herrin' on the griddle, o…”

Because the four singers, who dress alike in a series of rustic outfits, also are adept at playing musical instruments, jigs and reels are integral to this concert. Bearded, burly Martin Furey, whose father was a member of The Fureys, picks up the bodhran, an Irish hand-held drum, to perform a sort of percussive version of Dueling Banjos with an Irish step-dancer in the very entertaining Dance at the Crossroads. This fascinating drum also gets the spotlight in Bodhran Solo. The Beggarman Jig, which follows The Little Beggarman, is a joyful showcase for the fiddle and accordion.

The lovely Ar Eirinn Ni Neosainn Ce Hi includes the music of Gaelic lyrics, as well as English lyrics to clue listeners in on the devastating tale being told. Finbarr Clancy, whose father was in the Clancy Brothers, adds to the poignant nature of the song with his beautifully performed Irish whistle. He’s front and center for The Holy Ground, one of the rowdiest tracks, which gives him and his bandmates the chance to sing while wearing the iconic white “jumpers,” or sweaters, that became so associated with Irish music. Though this is a song in the grand tradition of ballads about Irishmen leaving home and loved ones to try their luck across the ocean, it’s far too raucous to feel morose, particularly during the booming exclamations of “Fine girl ye are!”

A much more melancholy take on the same idea is the achingly harmonic Paddy’s Green Shamrock Shore: “A place in my mind you will surely find although I am so far away…” Even more downhearted is The Auld Triangle, an a cappella lament about a doomed prisoner daydreaming about being imprisoned with women. The Rocky Road to Dublin, which starts off the concert, is a breathless account of a treacherous trip that starts off essentially a cappella before the instrumentalists kick in and turn it into a lively reel. The moment in the concert that reminds me most of Celtic Thunder is Fields of Glory, in which the men sing a rousing anthem about Gaelic football and its power to make “boys become men”.

The strangest song in the collection would have to be Galway to Graceland, a pretty but oddball ballad about a woman who makes a pilgrimage to Graceland and has a little too much trouble tearing herself away from the gravestone of her idol. Meanwhile, the one that sticks in the mind most afterward is The Parting Glass, which concludes the concert. It’s basically a traditional Irish benediction bidding farewell, and there’s a sense a permanency about it. A simple song that builds in intensity as it repeats, eventually incorporating bagpipes, it leaves listeners feeling both charmed and wistful. “Fill to me the parting glass and drink a health whate’er befall, and gently rise and softly call, ‘Goodnight, and joy be to you all.’”

Nobody tells a rousing good tale quite like the Irish, and although I didn’t write this review in time for St. Patrick’s Day as I’d originally intended, it feels just as fitting for National Poetry Month. Whatever month it happens to be, these talented musicians breathing fresh life into classic ballads are well worth an hour of your time.