Julie Fowlis Releases Gaelic Folk Album Uam, 3/9

Gaelic folk singer Julie Fowlis releases her new album Uam on March 9th (Cadiz Music/ Shoeshine Records). Now Scotland's official Gaelic Ambassador, Fowlis explores new roles, allowing her to bring a new worldly sense to her traditional music. Now, Uam uncovers the resonances that echo from the Hebrides to Nova Scotia, from Brittany to the Scottish Highlands, the interlinking yet oft forgotten traditions that connect Gaelic and Celtic communities around the northern Atlantic.

Today, Fowlis brings a new and worldly sense to Uist's songs. This evolution is thanks in part to her new roles, as musician-scholar and 21st-century traditionalist. With years of folklore already under her belt, she is now enrolled at the world's only Scottish Gaelic-medium college, where she is studying for an MA in Material Culture and the Environment.

Part of this work-her extensive touring with her band-has taken Fowlis to new, unexpected islands of culture that bore eerie resemblance to her own beloved Uist. One of these was Brittany, across the English Channel. There, in an island of Celtic culture, Julie learned "Me zo ganet é kreiz er mor" ("I was born in the midst of the sea"), a Breton fisherman's blues. The song, sung in Breton, came into being in Brittany 120 years ago.

While keeping to their roots, Fowlis and Dublin-born husband Éamon Doorley have encouraged cohesion within their band, taking old songs in new instrumental directions, or writing original takes on old ways, as Doorley does on several tracks.

For more information, visit http://www.juliefowlis.com.