INGRID (ENGLISH VERSION)

MUSIC IN IRELAND

I believe that after Uaithnia, it seemed like I gained momentum. I had really believed that the feeling was like  water, spreading away from its pump towards every direction and ravaging everything that it passes by. I was feeling liberated and that all these thoughts that I had during these 15 years, keeping them inside, suddenly rushed out and filled the whole place. Only that these thoughts weren't just words, but they were combined to notes and music. They were the stories that wanted to get out of me. It was the journey, that I started along with Johanna, but there was no map, nor a destination. It was our common journey, which although had no common beginning and evolution, somewhere on its way would overlap.

When the album was released, Johanna told me: "What do you think? Will there be a second album too?"

I totally agreed with that, because not only did I enjoy writing music with my sister, but it also gave me a great sense of freedom. Most bands make a record and then they leave on a tour. However we didn't do that, exacly because I was still in school and furthermore I didn't feel ready to appear on stage at all. So, Johanna suggested -as long as Uaithnia had now officially become our band- we made a small tour three years later, when I would have graduated from school.

However I was given the opportunity for a live appearance sometime later, completely by chance. During that semester at school I was dealing with a project, called World History through Asterix comics. As goofy as the topic might sound, I adored it, because since I was young my favourite comic books had been Asterix and Donald Duck. The teacher who arranged the project asked us to look through all these comics (of course, everybody had them!) and each of us had to choose one culture that they liked, so we could work upon that one. However I didn't need to do this. My mum always used to say that the Gauls were of a Celtic race, that's why I took this as a foundation to my research. Thus, I decided to work on Celtic music. The best choice for me. In a nutshell, I searched a lot for Celtic music, not only from Ireland, but also from the other islands.

I had installed several albums on my phone, which I had randomly discovered. After school I used to walk to Elvenes, almost to the borders, listening to Celtic music. I slightly started to distinguish the genres between them. To start with, I could distinguish whether the music I was hearing came from Ireland, from Scotland, from Wales, from the Isle of Man, from Cornwall, from Brittany or even from Galicia. Then, I could distinguish the kinds of dances and the instruments between them. I learnt about the types of pipes, at least about those played in Ireland and Scotland, as I didn't know much about the medieval or other kinds of pipes. The traditional pipe, that is the pipe that you all know, which is a woodwind instrument and has a more metallic sound, is the Scotish bagpipe. The Irish kind of pipes are named uilleann pipes, because in Irish uilleann or uillinn means elbow.* (It is spelled Ee-leen in the dialect of the village I live in,  whereas in standard Irish it's spelled Ee-lee-ayn). As you can understand, the second kind of pipes isn't played by blowing with the mouth, but you press its bags with your elbow, so that the air comes out. That's because the Irish pipes have a mechanism that causes the air to get out, when your elbow presses it. However the sound is slightly different. Irish pipes have a mellower sound and you can use it, while playing music at home. On the contrary, if you try to play Scottish bagpipes at home the glass windows will smash and you'll be lucky if your neighbours don't call the police. I had furthermore bought an album with Welsh songs and I was trying to play it myself. I had loved that album so much that I promised myself that someday I would arrange it in my own way.

After Christmas, 2011, I phoned Vivian, who was already living in Dorset. She was so glad to hear me again and of course I forgot to mention that, although I had never been again to Ireland since 2006, I used to visit Vivian in the UK, where she was hosting me and I was playing with her daughter. I told her about the project in the telephone, the one we presented at school and how much more I had fell in love with Celtic music. Then, I couldn't hold myself back and unconsciously told her what I was thinking: