Natalie MacMaster album review "YOURS...

Some years back when I lived near Daytona Beach, Florida I attended several concerts of the Florida International Festival, and one of those
was a lovely young fiddler from the Cape Breton area of Canada, Natalie MacMaster.
She had the skill, the fire, the looks and the heart to be a superstar.

She has since done quite well.

TV, Radio and print advertising campaigns have featured her music and image, including: in her region such as, "Farmers Dairy- Milk", and in the US nationally, General Motors - Pontiac" with more being added to the list as her fame spreads.

She has had CD's charted on Billboard's Top 20 Selling World Music charts.
Four of her CD releases have been certified "gold" in Canada, selling in excess of fifty thousand units each.

Recently I was fortunate enough to acquire an advance copy of MacMaster's newest album, "YOURS TRULY". fileId:3096224743945687;size:full;

She is not just a fiddle player. She's a world-class dancer, internationally renowned concert performer and beautiful person. Her music remains rooted in her native Cape Breton, but she's no classical 'folk purist' either.

Previous albums have included contemporary percussion, organ electric guitar, as well as the more traditional pipes, flutes and fiddle she plays so beautifully.

Her collaborators on other albums have been such wide ranging artists as: fiddling giant Mark O'Connor , Country diva Alison Krauss , Guitarist Jesse Cook (playing Flamenco!), and Sharon Shannon on accordion

About YOURS TRULY she has commented that: " "How can I describe it?" she says. "There's one really rocky kind of tune on there. . . . It's got electric guitar -- lots of electric guitar actually, big drums, a big rock sound. There's another piece with cello. It's traditional at first and then halfway through it explodes and the band kicks in and the cello. It sounds very worldly."
"I wrote about 70 percent of the record. I tell people this record is more me than anything I've ever done. So that's why it's called 'Yours Truly.' "

Not too many years ago the Late Peter Jennings requested that she play on ABC Television's New Year's Eve, reflected on YOURS TRULY as "Farewell To Peter".

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Hardly a somber piece of work, her up tempo instrumentals comprise the majority of the album, the opening "Volcanic Jig" as an example, with "David's Jig" showcasing her step dancing as the major percussion on the cut.
The last cut on the CD is a thank you to her fans, her family, God, and her fellow musicians, I know that sounds syrupy and perhaps even a bit maudlin but she brings it off with the style and grace that she has in all her work.

Recommended!