FOLK
BY JIM WIRTH
Brìghde Chaimbeul
★★★★
Sunwise
TAK:TIL/GLITTERBEAT. CD/DL/LP
Skye piper bursts through the gates of dawn.
“There seems to be a very strong pairing with the pipes and tartan and kilts,” sighed Brìghde Chaimbeul in a 2023 interview, but the 27-year-old smallpipes fiend continues to imagine more varied sartorial possibilities for her instrument. Her mystic, wintry follow-up to Colin Stetson collaboration Carry Them With Us kicks off with a six-minute drone on Dùsgadh/Waking, with the intense Ashra/Popol Vuh mood suggesting someone has been sticking something into their smallpipes and smoking it. However, Sunwise is anything but one note: Chaimbeul’s purposeful minimalist re-pointing of traditional tunes and forging of new ones is in turns mesmeric (Bog An Lochan) and – on Duan and the three-pipe frenzy Sguabag/The Sweeper – positively ecstatic. Circular closer The Rain Is Wine And The Stones Are Cheese, meanwhile, sounds like a rave in a prehistoric burial mound. Piping: hot. Ideas: hotter still.