Treacherous Orchestra are one of the brightest prospects in the Scottish “traditional” scene, transcending hackneyed notions about instruments such as the fiddle and accordion with rousing concerts that seem to owe as much to modern dance music as they do to Celtic influences.
They have proved to be an undoubted highlight at the past couple of Celtic Connections festivals (read our review from 2011 here), and the group this year released debut album Origins.
The launch at Glasgow’s ABC this Saturday in the final weekend of the festival is sure to be one of the biggest and best parties the city will see this year. (Visit here for ticket details.) We talked to accordionist John Somerville about the process behind the new record.
He explained: “The new album that we’ve got coming out is the culmination of a couple of years of hard work. Lots of late nights and lots of extended recording sessions.
“Being a 13-plus band plus guests, obviously there’s a lot of work that’s entailed with putting together an album that features that number of musicians.
“We’re excited to have it out, it’s the culmination of a lot of work. I think it’s one of those things where, when there’s so many people involved, it’s just a sense of relief to have something out – and also it’s great to listen back to. A lot of guys did a lot of work on the production, and they were very careful to make sure that every instrument on the album gets its own place and is heard.”
So how does a band with 13 members manage to create music together? John said: “When we go to create music, it can happen in a number of different ways.
“We’ve got six or seven composers in the band. What we find is that most people tend to turn up at a rehearsal with their own tunes, so there’s your source melody. We tend to build up arrangements around that.
“A lot of the time maybe two or three people will take the lead on an arrangement, and drive it forward. But being such a big band, it’s very important to us that we keep all the decisions musically democratic, so we always try everybody’s ideas, though that you can spend up to an hour working on 10 seconds of music at times, because you’ve got to try everybody’s ideas. You hope that the final result is something that everybody is happy with.”
He added: “I think having 13 members in a band – maybe you could argue makes the decision-making process a lot longer, but in terms of the music itself you’ve got far more influences, and lots of inspiration in there.
“What you tend to find there’s a bit of variation in sets, because you’ve got different people driving that forward. It’s a nice thing to have so many people, and from the point of view or being – well, we say an orchestra, we’re not really an orchestra – but we try and take certain elements of what an orchestra would be in terms of sections.
“Having that ability for certain instruments to double up and be able to be sections and play harmonies together, that gives us an advantage over having smaller groups, especially when you’re thinking about bigger sounds and trying to create a more powerful sound.”
TREACHEROUS CELTIC CONNECTIONS
- Interview part 1: Treacherous Orchestra talk about debt to Celtic Connections
- Review from 2011: Treacherous Orchestra betray dastardly genius
- More interviews, reviews and news on our Celtic Connections microsite
People who read this story also read
-
Amanda Holden “thrilled” to leave hospital after life-threatening childbirth drama
The Britain’s Got Talent judge and actress has been discharged and is currently recovering at home.
