Long-running Scottish folk group Battlefield Band may have a current link with Ireland in singer-guitarist Sean O’Donnell but the connection goes much further back through band manager-producer Robin Morton whose influence and knowledge permeate this richly annotated celebration of Scotland and Ireland’s shared traditions. It involves talent from further afield than the twelve miles that separate the two countries and while tracks were recorded in Sydney and New Jersey, as well as the band’s spiritual home, Temple in Midlothian, it sounds like everyone’s in the same room, singing of disasters, sweethearts and frolics and playing vigorous reels, harp lullabies and measured dance sets. It’s all of an intimately pitched piece but with highlights including Christine Primrose’s moving Gaelic addendum to The Blantyre Explosion, South Carolina-reared harmonica master Don Meade and New York fiddler Tony Demarco seasoning The Whole Chicken in the Soup set, and the peerless Jim Kilpatrick reconfirming that pipe band drumming can be as emotionally uplifting as the pipes themselves on Gillespie’s Hornpipe.

Rob Adams