"Blair Douglas is looking forward to hearing his composition An Aifreann Ghaidhlig (A Gaelic Mass), which opens the Blas 2009 celebrations of Highland culture at Inverness Cathedral tomorrow, with more than the usual composer's interest in a new work..."

Read the Rob Adams piece in today's Herald:
http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/features/display.var.2528811.0.Ive_still_to_hear_the_finished_version_of_my_Mass.php

I'm going and looking forward to it immensly.

See you there :)

I thought I would revive this thread to let you know that An Aifreann Ghàidhlig, Blair's Gaelic Mass will be broadcast on BBC Radio nan Gàidheal on Easter Sunday (2nd April) at 3.00 pm.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rx9pw

This is from a recording made at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Portree, Skye, as part of Blas 2009. The Mass features soloists Paul MacCallum and Maggie Macdonald with the Inverness Gaelic Choir, Iain MacDonald and an ensemble of classical musicians conducted by Andy Thorburn, who arranged the piece.

Thanks for the forewarning, Arthur. Have been wanting to hear it for ages. I hope it'll be on Èist a-rithist, as I'll be tied up with family stuff on the day itself, and probably nowhere near a radio or computer.

Apologies to all, but I've been told that An Aifreann Ghàidhlig, Blair Douglas's Gaelic Mass will be broadcast on BBC Radio nan Gàidheal this Sunday, 2nd April, at 3.30 pm and not 3pm as advised in my earlier post.

This is your last chance to hear this again on i-player, as I'm doing now for the second time.
Unfortunately with lengthy pauses and odd squawking sounds due to frequent intermittent buffering, even on the second listen. Anyone else have this problem?
I like it and am enjoying both the music and the performance - instruments and singers and choir. But I have to say I find it very derivative - or, more kindly, the roots are showing, and quite a mixture of roots there is. Baroque and romantic opera, mediaeval English carols, Gaelic traditional song... I find it an enjoyable and liturgically perfectly acceptable pot-pourri of influences and styles, rather than a unified, transcendant whole. And I'd love to sing some of it!
Any chance of a CD becoming available? A score? BBC? 'eil fios aig duine sam bith? Oilrig? Nic?

I would love to hear this live - all the opportunities, even the Lochaber ones - didn't work out, unfortunately.

The mass is a personal fulfilment and I'm very glad Blair has been able to do this.

Not sure, Pict! I know it was submitted as a proposal for BBC ALBA but obviously that hasn't happened except through Radio nan Gaidheal. A live CD could be tricky if it wasn't in the original contracts - I'm figuring all this right now with something else!

I see what you mean Pict, good weather and audio only, and I'm getting pauses too (it's still available until 5:30). It's pretty much unlistenable

The problem is that BBC iPlayer only buffers a very short period ahead, so you can't just pause for half an hour and come back to it once the whole thing's done.