Troy and Sabra MacGillivray and
Jake Charron at the Skye Theatre

Event Summary

Date: 2010 November 3 (Wednesday)
Time: 19h
Venue: The Skye Theatre Performing Arts Center, 2 Highland Drive, South Carthage, Maine
Description: Troy and Sabra MacGillivray and Jake Charron
Admission: $10.00. Reserve via e-mail to Phill McIntyre at
phill@necelticarts.com
or via phone at +1 (207) 562-4445
Alternate Dates: 2010 November 1 (Monday) at 430 Bayside in Ellsworth (Maine); tickets $15.00
2010 November 2 (Tuesday) at the Franco-American Heritage Centre in Lewiston (Maine); tickets $12
2010 November 4 (Thursday) at the Unity Center in Unity (Maine); tickets $10
2010 November 5 (Friday) at a private house concert in Baudoin (Maine); tickets by advance reservation only
Contact Phill MacIntyre for details of these alternate events.

Review for the Cape Breton Music List
(Posted 2010 November 7)

Euterpe and Terpsichore must surely have both been beaming with attentive delight from on high Wednesday night when Troy MacGillivray, Jake Charron, and Sabra MacGillivray took the stage at the Skye Theatre in western Maine. Certainly, the knowledgeable audience present at this performance was!

Their initial set, of jigs and reels, began with Troy MacGillivray on fiddle and Jake Charron on keyboards; Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn joined them later and concluded the set with a fine step-dance. The set began with Peter Schryer’s jig, Cape Breton Dream, a favourite of Troy’s which appears on both Eleven and Live at the Music Room; included Willie Coleman’s Jig and Willie Hunter’s Cape Breton Fiddlers’ Welcome to the Shetland Islands; and ended with Phil Cunningham’s Wing Commander Donald MacKenzie’s reel. What a rousing start to an evening of wonderful music!

“A coupl’a polkas” from the Antigonish tradition followed, with Troy on fiddle, Jake on keyboards, and Sabra on bodhràn. I didn’t get the names of the tunes in the third set, which had Troy on fiddle, Jake on guitar, and Sabra on bodhràn. Next, Troy, on solo keyboards, played a beautiful slow air with gorgeous sonorities; its end was followed by applause, after which Troy, single-handed on the treble keys, launched into a tremendous display of speed, skill, and musical beauty, soon joined by Jake on guitar, Sabra on bodhràn, and then Troy’s second hand on the bass keys, concluding with The Devil and the Dirk from his Musical Ties CD: what an incredible display of mastery of the piano this entire set demonstrated! Sabra then took the stage to step-dance to Troy’s fiddle and Jake’s guitar: I’m no step-dancing expert, but what I saw looked very fine to me. Next, Jake and Troy did a set on dual keyboards that Sabra later joined on bodhràn: another technical tour de force from both players. With Troy on fiddle, Jake initially on guitar and later on keyboards, and Sabra on bodhràn, the first half of the show concluded with The Road to Errogie set from Troy’s CD Eleven, which includes the popular tunes The Mortgage Burn, by Gordon MacLean, and the tune for which the set is named. What a fine hour of music and dance!

After the break, Troy and Jake played a fine set on dual fiddles; I was struck by the clean, crisp sound — often, dual fiddles sound muddy “around the edges”, but in this set, the fiddles melded beautifully together while each still preserved its individual identity, a tribute both to the fiddlers’ talents and to those of the sound technician (Andy LeBlanc). The second set showcased Jake’s superb guitar pickin’ talents, with Troy providing a piano accompaniment. The third set featured Sabra step-dancing to the strathspeys Mr. Thom and Tulloch Gorm, played by Troy on fiddle with Jake on guitar; what an astounding dance that was, with Sabra seemingly inexhaustible! Her feet were moving so fast that my camera, even at 1/60th second shutter speed, could not get an unblurred shot. Then Troy played a set on keyboards he had put together for the Piano Summit show at Celtic Colours, beginning with the Irish reel Natural Progression; it was a vituoso performance that left me breathless at the end. Next, Jake and Sabra provided rhythmic feet à l’acadienne while Troy, on solo fiddle, began a set of three “French” tunes; Jake then added in piano and Sabra bodhràn while continuing the foot rhythm — the set was superb. The final set began with Jerry Holland’s Old Faithful march, continued with several Jerry Holland reels, and ended with a John Morris Rankin reel; during this set, Troy was on fiddle and Jake on guitar; Sabra step-danced during part of the set and then played keyboards as Troy step-danced while continuing to fiddle at its end. The performance was greeted by a standing ovation; when the performers left the stage, a rhythmic clapping began that soon brought them back. For an encore, Troy on fiddle, Jake on keyboards, and Sabra on bodhràn played the Poor Girl Waltz and finished the evening off with a long blast of strathspeys and reels. A happy audience gave the musicians a final burst of heartfelt applause for their fine performances throughout.

Sabra MacGillivray, Troy’s sister, is married to Iain MacDonald and lives in Creignish where she is a massage therapist and a dance instructor. She is much better known as one of Cape Breton’s finest performers of highland dance, step-dance, and choreographed dancing, having performed widely in the past, achieved numerous impressive results at highland dance competitions, and appeared with groups as diverse as the percussion ensemble SQUID and the baroque trio, Ferintosh. This was Troy’s first road tour in which circumstances made it possible for her to join him this far afield, though she often appears together with Troy closer to home. I hope it will not be her last!

It was a pleasure to see Jake Charron again; although he did not play whistles this evening, as he had then, he certainly showed his formidable prowess on piano, guitar, and fiddle throughout the evening. His accompaniments are impeccable and I would very much like to see him in the future.

Troy and Jake will perform with Liz Carroll in Dayton (Ohio) on 13 November and Troy will play at the Piper’s Pub in Antigonish on 27 December; after that, he will be teaching in Scotland and will not be performing back here until late next spring. Three of Troy’s recordings, Musical Ties, Eleven, and Live at the Music Room, are out of stock; the remaining recordings are available via on-line orders through his web site. Moreover, all of his music is now available through the iTunes music store — just search for “Troy MacGillivray”. So, until this superb master of Scottish traditional music is back on this side of the Atlantic and you can once more hear him live, you have a ready way of enjoying his award-winning recorded music.

Photos

In order to avoid interfering with other filming and photography going on during the concert, all the photos I took then were shot without benefit of flash. Given the Skye Theatre’s excellent lighting, this was generally not a problem as regards exposure, but my camera did not allow me to set the shutter speed high enough to preclude blurring — if you look closely at bow hands and dancing feet, you will note a distinct lack of crispness in many of the photos.

Mountains to the west of the Skye Theatre in the setting sun

The Skye Theatre stage seen from the sound box at the rear of the theatre

The step-dance stage and the pipers’ platform above it

Detail of the wood work

Detail of the sleigh and wood work

Pre-concert jam session

Phill McIntyre opens the concert

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Sabra MacGillivray step-dancing

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle

Jake Charron on keyboards

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Troy MacGillivray on solo keyboards

Troy MacGillivray on keyboards accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar

Troy MacGillivray on keyboards accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Sabra MacGillivray step-dancing

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar

Troy MacGillivray and Jake Charron on dual keyboards

Troy MacGillivray and Jake Charron on dual keyboards
accompanied by Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Troy MacGillivray on keyboards

Jake Charron on keyboards

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Troy MacGillivray and Jake Charron on dual fiddles

Troy MacGillivray on keyboards accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar

Sabra MacGillivray step-dances to Troy MacGillivray’s fiddle

Sabra MacGillivray step-dances

Troy MacGillivray on keyboards accompanied by Jake Charron on guitar

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Sabra MacGillivray step-dances to the music of
Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards

Sabra MacGillivray step-dances

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle
accompanied by Jake Charron and Sabra MacGillivray on dual keyboards

Sabra MacGillivray on keyboards

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle
accompanied by Sabra MacGillivray on keyboards and Jake Charron on guitar

Troy MacGillivray fiddles and step-dances

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards

Troy MacGillivray on fiddle accompanied by Jake Charron on keyboards
and Sabra MacGillivray on bodhràn

Troy and Sabra MacGillivray and Jake Charron at the Skye Theatre

Event Summary

Review for the Cape Breton Music List(Posted 2010 November 7)

Photos

Troy and Sabra MacGillivray and
Jake Charron at the Skye Theatre

Review for the Cape Breton Music List
(Posted 2010 November 7)