Jamaican Burns Night @ Celtic Connections

[Tim Little]

This year's Celtic Connections festivities featured an interesting take on the traditional Burns Night celebration: A musical exploration of the historic ties between Scotland and Jamaica at Glasgow's Old Fruitmarket. It certainly sounds like it was an unusual concert -- both in concept and in execution -- featuring the legendary reggae rhythm duo Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare as well as Scottish singer Karine Polwart among others. It sounds like it would have been fun to be there, especially for the finale, when Polwart, Dunbar, Shakespeare, and friends joined up for Burns' "Slave's Lament," "Green Grow the Rashes," and "Auld Lang Syne" done reggae style. (The band Edward II also did a fine reggae version of "Wild Mountain Thyme" earlier in the evening. You can give a listen here.)

(Full gig review.)

Perhaps more interesting for the folks here on X Marks -- particularly Burns aficionados and social historians -- is this extended Pat Kane piece from the Sunday Times on what exactly was the relationship between Burns and the Caribbean island. As Kane writes in the introduction to the article, "the Celtic contradiction of Robert Burns being both the writer of The Slave's Lament, yet also willing to take up a position as a book-keeper on a slave plantation in Port Antonio, was something I had to probe."

Back to the music for a moment: I've always been intrigued by creative musical fusion -- the Afro-Celts, Shooglenifty, Talitha MacKenzie, Salsa Celtica, MacUmba, etc. -- and I've thought that Jamaican dub/reggae and Scottish trad music would make for a very interesting, if somewhat surprising blend. From the few clips I've found online it sounds like the event went off quite well. If any of the rabble were in attendance, I'd love to get personal impressions.