When I first met Tricia she had been playing the fiddle for a couple of years, mostly self taught except for a couple of trips to the Willie Clancy summer school. With Northern Irish family but brought up in Derbyshire, not only was she not exposed to much Irish music in her youth, the area was so remote that she had to learn how to drive a Landrover as a teenager just to get to school!

Despite this distance, she found herself drawn to the fiddle at the age of fourteen. She has come from being a very accomplished multi-instrumentalist at a young age to one of the Tradition’s great players. It's not just what she can do with her hands, it's also what she chooses not to do with them. In the time she has been residing here in Ireland, Tricia has absorbed the tradition at much deeper levels than just technique. Whilst her technique is spot on, what struck me most about this recording was the depth of atmosphere she was able to create, particularly on the solo tracks. Her rendition of ‘Seoithín Seo’ and the hornpipes, ‘Scully Casey’s’ and ‘The Men from Mallow’ belie her young years and demonstrate her massive respect for what's gone before her. She has also added some of her own compositions that sound as old as the hills themselves. This girl has practically inhaled all the collections and never misses an opportunity to visit older musicians to learn all they have to offer, and it shows!

 Joined on this CD by some of the great musicians she has met and befriended, including the wonderful singer from Cork, Josie Harrington; you get the chance to hear one of the finer 'traditional' recordings I've heard in a while. Like the documentary that can genetically explain the modern day Irish person's compulsion for spuds, I can only surmise that it was a genetic predisposition that drew her out of the Landrover and into Martin O'Malleys recording studio in West Clare to produce this quality example of Irish fiddling. God bless her blood!

 Siobhán Peoples