Celtic Connections

In October 2017, the Kennedy Center welcomed Scottish Gaelic singer and musician Julie Fowlis and her
band to campus for a workshop the morning after she gave a concert, just before they took off for their
next show. Fowlis, one of approximately 50,000 Gaelic speakers left in Scotland, is best known for being
the singing voice of the main character Merida in the Disney Pixar movie Brave. The clear quality and
impeccable control of her voice are perfect for the haunting Gaelic airs and fast-paced puirt à beul, or
mouth music, common to the traditional music of Scotland.

Fowlis never intended to be a performer. However, after a year of performing, the gigs kept lining up
and her career in music was set. The band described the social nature of music in Scotland and Ireland,
which eventually led them all together. Although she studied music in college, Fowlis was not trained as
a singer. Only after experiencing some vocal strain and damage later in her career did she receive vocal
training.

In addition to singing, Fowlis plays a multiplicity of whistles and flutes, the highland pipes, and a bellows-
type instrument known as the shruti box. The shruti box is originally from India and is mainly used in
Indian and classical music, but is now making more frequent appearances in the Celtic folk music scene.
Fowlis’s fellow band members are Duncan Chrisholm on fiddle, Tony Byrne on guitar, and Éamon
Doorley on bouzouki. In between playing and singing, Fowlis and the other band members talked about
their instruments and the traditional music and languages of Scotland and Ireland. They shared some of
the history of the songs they sang and played, from puirt à beul (vocal music meant to imitate the sound
of instruments being played) to airs and ballads about love, war, politics, and work. Often these songs
would be sung by women at work spinning wool or milking cows, and sometimes by men working in
fields or marching to war.

Fowlis shared what it was like growing up in North Uist in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland—one of the
sole remaining places where Gaelic is still spoken as much as English. She told about learning songs as a
child, simply from hearing them sung frequently. Traditionally, none of the songs Fowlis sang would
have had any instrumental accompaniment. Songs were never written down; they were instead passed
down aurally, making variation quite common. Fowlis described how she came across many of the songs
by listening to old archived recordings and then worked with her band to arrange the instrumentation.
The band takes advantage of the aural tradition by utilizing elements of jazz and improvisation in their
recordings and performances.

The visit from Fowlis and her band blessed faculty and students all across campus. “What an exceptional
experience when Julie and her bandmates gifted us their songs and stories,” said one attendee. “Her
clear, lilting voice was something from another time and place, and hearing about her Scottish
upbringing left me feeling like I had come to know her.” The mysteriousness of the Gaelic language and
the haunting melodies of the airs and songs have the ability to draw in people from all backgrounds. The
irresistible music was flawlessly executed by Fowlis and her band, and left the audiences with an
insatiable desire for more.