Purveyors of European jumping music, Sheelanagig, expand their repertoire with a flourish of finesse.

Release Date : 2nd July 2025

Label : Self-Released (Bandcamp link)

Format : CD / vinyl / digital

High octane snooze destroyers

Of course you know of Sheelanagig. If you have been to any nominally folk or roots festival, let alone rather more free for alls, like Glastonbury or Shambala, these last 20 years, you cannot fail to have been regaled by the quintet at some stage. Known for their high octane performances, canny promoters have been known to put them on at quieter times of the day, and deliberately so. Once they have blown, nay, burst into your afternoon, the difficult one after the night before, well, that’s another snooze gone for a burton, as your body defies itself, finding energies where there were none.

Once defined by the Balkan gypsy jazz fumes they exude, latterly they have expanded widely their palate, with dancing music from all over Europe, from Shetland and Scandinavia sweeping through and down to from where they first sought inspiration. And with fiddles, guitars and flute to the fore, the engine room of bass and drums has plenty of fuel to keep the party going wherever they choose.

With Aaron Catlow, predominantly fiddle, and John Blakely, drums, both a constant, there have been a few changes over their, now, six album trajectory. Flute now comes from Luke Phillips, on board since 2018, with bass from Jon Short, a year or two longer. Newest recruit, since 2021, is the powerhouse of Alex Garden. With hands insufficiently full with the more purist folk of Tarren and the neo-trad beats of The Drystones, this busy guitarist shows a desire to leave no genres unturned, and also produces the record.

Hot Club de Clifton

Poncho Pounce is one of those light and breezy extemporisations over an acoustic dum der dum der dum chug, propelled by bouncy drums. Fiddle and flute slur well together, before Catlow goes off piste with a meandering Hot Club de Clifton solo that is as engaging as it is diverting. As a mellower ambience seems to bed in, with a synth scooting off in a smooth jazz direction, suddenly Garden lets rip with some frantic samba rhythms on electric. With bass loping beneath, the flute of Phillips then begins to tootle a merry air, with Catlow then slotting in alongside, if ultimately left behind in the wake of the notes cascading forth from Phillips’ mouthpiece. It’s a grand start, each of the contributory tunes coming from Garden.

Shivering Betty is unmistakeably Balkan, with what sounds like pizzicato fiddle being plucked at speed. In an instant it becomes a unison fusion of bowing and blowing, the engine room keeping up a brisk horo, or whatever they call such frantic frenzies. Catlow is aflame, once more, likely his normal mode, before it all sidles down into a waltz, led by Garden’s guitar. The flute sashays a sultry dance, as the fiddle plays hard to get, each sending out seductive messages. The speed begins to accelerate again, retaining and returning to the features with which it all began. Author here is actually Garden’s fellow Drystone, Ford Collier.

A decidedly modern rousting gavotte

Who was St. Congar, and whether a walking stick was needed does not get an answer, but I needed to know. It seems a Welsh abbot and later a bishop in Somerset. clearly, at some stage, he didn’t need his stick, thrusting it into the ground, at his town, Congresbury, where it grew into a yew tree. (You’re welcome) Appropriately, this, the title track makes use of a bevy of medieval melodies, arranged and revamped by Catlow.

Thus it starts with a decidedly modern riff, not unlike some of the sonic charge of Jethro Tull, as they started to shed their blues origins. As it breaks into a second section, that semblance gets maintained, Philips and Garden jousting on flute and electric guitar respectively. It makes for a great few minutes, each playing their own way, before then again switching gear and direction. Blakely is superb on the drums during those earlier sections, and still is, as a rousting gavotte unfurls and twirls, the soundscape now more Gryphonesque. It’s a corker and outside the usual comfort zone of this clearly still evolving unit.

ANGLO BENT

Traveller represent the half way stage and is again a tune that carries an Anglo bent, at least to my ears, bobbing and weaving between time signatures and themes. Uncertain if written jointly or as two separate segments, the credit pairs Catlow with previous Sheelanagig guitarist, Kit Hawes, the two also having a track record as a duo. English pastoralism remains upfront for the lilting The Divint Gan Radge. Catlow ekes some gorgeous extended lines from his instrument, whilst Phillips swoops his flute in a brief call and response.

However, never a band for overstaying a tune’s welcome, Catlow’s melody is speedily usurped by the fluteman for his own composition, which carries the track to it’s conclusion, near four minutes later. Led by the cantering drums of Blakely, it becomes a thrusting duet of strings and woodwind, each breaking off for solo jiggles. (If Short is getting less overt mentions than his bandmates, this is because his bass, both electric and acoustic, has the gift of solid unobtrusiveness, that is until you hone in on it, a seamless scaffold of strength and beauty. Then you can’t shift it.)

A surprise up the band’s capacious sleeve

Duck is another Phillips composition, with further low rumbling riffage, before the flute soars. If it sounds double tracked, it isn’t, that is Catlow mimicing every move and every step of the way. I find myself stonished that Phillips isn’t better known, guilty also of not seeing the skill behind his fiddle playing compadre’s showmanship. These are two superb musicians, each shining in the light offered by the exemplary background arrangements and play of Garden, Short and Blakely.

And it doesn’t end there, with a further surprise up the band’s capacious sleeve, for Garden’s Petticoat Wag. This sees the guitarist swap for fiddle for a mournful air, on a bed of droned bowed bass. Catlow slips in beside him, the two fiddles conjuring a renaissance dance, anchored still by the slow deep saws of Short. The beat of a drum adds a tumbril like effect, as if for a funeral procession. Capitalising that mood to an apparent conclusion, a phoenix then arises, to perform a Scandi infused dance that, of all things, carries a frisson of the Paganini variations that informed Julian Lloyd-Webber’s South Bank Show theme. Given I love that piece, it is difficult not to also love this. Altogether it makes a great conclusion that shows that Sheelanagig are a band of many tricks and many ponies. Bring on some live!

Live you say? Look above, and also, if you are at Boom Town, Folk East, Green Man, Shambala or Between The Trees Festivals this August, you have a treat in store. Meanwhile, here is the album opener, from last years’s Green Man. Original jumping European folk music? I should cocoa!!

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