Jackie Oates
Album: Lullabies
Label: ECC
Tracks: 15
Website: http://www.jackieoates.co.uk

Having participated in numerous folk-oriented musical ventures over the past few years (including The Imagined Village and the Cecil Sharp Project), Jackie now returns to the more intimate scale of operation with a new solo album (her fifth), which forms part of a special project where she focuses on lullabies, a sub-species of song that has fascinated her long-term. But I'd stress right from the start that this record is neither soporific nor sleep-inducing: instead it's a thoroughly charming sequence of (mostly) sleep-songs sourced from various traditions; many of these have been tucked away in arcane collections, and their unearthing has been a real revelation to Jackie, as has the discovery that while exploring the folklore of the cradle with its superstitions and customs, lullabies can also be outlets for the many aspects of parenthood as well as sounding-boards for the joys, grievances and anxieties of the adult world.

Even by the standards of Jackie's known enterprising and adventurous approach to repertoire-building, the variety of material on this disc is stunning; it encompasses the well-known Dream Angus (from Scottish tradition), a pair of dandling songs from the nursery, two songs from Ruth L. Tongue's magical but little-known collection The Chime Child and the melodious, lilting Philomel from Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. I'm not won over by Jackie's spoken-word exhortations at the close of A.A. Milne's "moral tale" of Alexander Beetle, but that's a minor reservation among so many inspired and unerringly convincing interpretive decisions Jackie makes over the course of the album.

Jackie's solo discs invariably also exhibit ingenuity in choice of material, with at least one slightly maverick inclusion - in this case it's Paul McCartney's 1970 opus Junk, as well-turned as it is unexpected even in this context. One particularly captivating strand of the disc is provided by its Icelandic contingent: firstly in the form of an atmospheric string-ensemble accompaniment to several of the songs, and secondly in the inclusion of three dark Icelandic lullabies, on which Jackie is joined by Chris Foster and Bara Grimsdottir (on langspil and kantele). Chris and Bara also add their vocal talents to Jackie's dulcet tones on a standout a cappella rendition of Wexford Lullaby (John Renbourn's lyrical expansion of the 12th century carol). Another key contributor to the feel of the project is pianist Belinda O'Hooley, whose limpid and ever-imaginative playing graces four of the disc's early tracks including a truly gorgeous version of Bill Caddick's Waiting For The Lark (which employs the closing masterstroke of a string-quartet lark ascending into the instrumental texture). Some other songs also selectively employ other musicians including Chris Serjeant and Barney Morse-Brown, but although textures are kept spare the effect is always telling and warm and the desired intimacy is never compromised.

The dreamlike and slightly otherworldly demeanour of the music also conveys a soothing and often wistful ambience that also ideally suits Jackie's vocal characteristics: the gentle delicacy, the tender and slightly sweet timbre that conceals an understated strength. All of these elements add up to a beautiful invocation of the mysterious and yet strangely delectable realm between the states of wakefulness and sleep. This is nowhere better depicted, however (IMHO) than in the disc's closing item, a transformation of Mike Heron's comforting morning hymn Sleepers, Awake on which, in making the song her own, Jackie invokes the essence and adventuresome spirit of the ISB themselves in her bold treatment, which tweaks the contours of the group's own setting in bringing fragments of the original melody and harmony lines through the texture almost like slivers of a half-remembered dream recalled on waking, and yet building all into a cohesive new creation of startling originality.

Finally, to set the seal on a marvellous achievement, the presentation of the album is extremely attractive too, with complementary illustration and artwork (Lizzy Stewart and Brad Waters) and succinct booklet notes which relate the rationale for choice of songs as well as detailing Jackie's sources. Sheer magic - Lullabies proves a significant addition to Jackie's already very special canon of highly cherishable solo records.

David Kidman