Review: I Kept These Old Blues by Muireann Bradley.

County Donegal in the north-west corner of Ireland is famed for its beautiful scenery, but also for its fine musical tradition. Famous acts from Donegal include Altan, Clannad, Enya, Moya Brennan, and one of the greatest blues guitarists of all time Rory Gallagher. Recently another blues guitar player and singer has joined that illustrious list which is Muireann Bradley who hails from the small town of Ballybofey. It was Muireann’s perfect performance of Candyman by Reverend Gary Davis on Jools Holland’s New Year’s Eve Hootenanny which made her an overnight sensation, and made me order her debut album which arrived here last Friday. I see that her performance on Jool’s show has already had 450,000 views on YouTube and the album is number 1 on the Irish charts. Muireann’s dad is a big blues fan, and a guitar player, so it is no wonder that she grew up steeped in the blues. Her dad gave Muireann her first guitar at age 9. Music wasn’t Muireann’s only interest growing up. She was also a very keen and promising boxer. It was only at the start of lockdown when boxing training was out of the question that she began seriously learning how to play her favourite songs. She was only 13 at the time and I think she is only 17 now, so her progress has been phenomenal in such a short time. She must be gifted with a huge natural aptitude for playing the acoustic guitar. 

The first song she learned was Police dog Blues by Blind Blake. I think if Muireann ever meets Ralph McTell they would get on like a house on fire because whenever I have seen Ralph perform, he always plays a song or two by Blind Blake and Gary Davis. Anyway, Muireann was filmed singing Police Dog Blues. The video was put on YouTube which was spotted by Josh Rosenthal of Tomkins Square records which led to her debut album being recorded. I have listened to the album several times since Friday, and I love it. I’ve already played it twice today while writing this! It is a very sparse recording, just Muireann singing while simultaneously playing her guitar. I think this adds to the album’s authenticity because it is exactly how these old Blues singers would have recorded their songs nearly 100 years ago.

 The album opens with Candyman which is followed by Richland Woman Blues by Mississippi John Hurt. Muireann also plays Stagolee and Frankie by Mississippi John Hurt on later tracks, so she is obviously a big fan of Mississippi John. He was born in 1893 and worked in obscurity as a sharecropper farmer until being discovered in 1963. He only had three years of relative fame before he died in 1966. After the aforementioned Police Dog Blues we are treated to Shake Sugaree made famous by the great Elizabeth Cotten who I have written about previously on this blog. As you know Elizabeth had her own unique upside down left-handed ‘Cottenpicking’ style. Muireann’s version has an arrangement by Stefan Grossman. (Listen below) Stefan also contributes the arrangements of the instrumental Vestapol and an emotional version of Delia to the album, and Muireann thanks him on the sleeve for all his help and encouragement. 

I love her treatment of Dave Van Ronk’s signature song Green Rocky Road. I have heard a lot of versions of this song in the last few years (and put most of them on this blog page) by people like Dave himself, Van Morrison and Karen Dalton. Other great songs on the album are Police Sergeant Blues by Robert Wilkins and Buck Dancer’s Choice by Sam McGee. I don’t know anything about either of these people I’m afraid, but I do know of the arrangement on the latter song by a great guitarist John Fahey. The album ends with Muireann’s own take of Elizabeth Cotten’s most famous song Freight Train. I thoroughly enjoy listening to this album. I slightly wish When The Levee Breaks by Memphis Minnie had been included because Muireann does a nice version of that song.

Last night on The Blues Show on BBC Radio 2 Muireann guested with Cerys Matthews and I enjoyed her version of Dylan’s Don’t Think Twice Its Alright. You can listen to that show on BBC iPlayer. It is a bit early to wonder what the future holds for Muireann. I see she has some sold out dates in Dublin lined up soon. I hope they book her for the Acoustic Stage at Glastonbury this summer. Muireann hasn’t written any of her own music to date as far as I know, but maybe her greatest contribution might be in helping to keep alive and bringing to public attention the great blues music of the past before it slips into obscurity. We can be very grateful to Muireann for that.