Black Isler Hewat may be co-director of the musical levithian that is the all-star Unusual Suspects, but this is a much more intimate recording, just herself on harp and vocal with the one woman folk revival that is Northumbrian piper and fiddler Tickell. It's a rather splendid Anglo-Scottish combination, though more Scottish than Anglo with the lion's share of tunes and songs hailing from Corrina's side of the Tweed. Off-setting Hewat's breathy version of Burns' "My Love is like a Red Red Rose" and Jacobite balladry, Tickell brings a sweetly sinister lullaby and tops and tales the album with a dreamily nostalgic narration of life on a North-east farm in the 1950s, transcrbed from a surreptitious recording of her mum reminiscing, set against Hewat's tune "Favourite Place".
The two women make a fine musical pairing, Hewat's spritely harp weaving in and out of Tickell's luscious fiddling and nimble piping with gentle vocals completing a most attractive musical package.
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