“A vehicle for the kind of (mostly) good-natured squabbling that makes other people’s marriages so entertaining.”

Editorial Rating: 5 Stars (Outstanding)

Hands up, I’m not normally a music reviewer. But, as the chap who introduced Sandy Brechin to Ewan Wilkinson, I like to think I have sufficient skin in the game to say that Elsa Jean McTaggart’s one-woman show (co-starring her husband, Gary and younger sister, Irenie) is a delight. It’s an eclectic showcase of music and song drawn from the highlands and islands. It’s also a vehicle for the kind of (mostly) good-natured squabbling that makes other people’s marriages so entertaining as well as for that spoken-word storytelling which is as essential an accompaniment to traditional Scottish music as whisky sauce is to haggis.

The Fleming Theatre is big and it’s a full house yet this could be a cosy pub on a rainy night somewhere north of nowhere. Sitting right at the back, I lose nothing of the intimacy and charm, that spontaneity which takes so much practice and rehearsal. This is a show about people as much as it is about place. For all that it’s a powerful reminder of the skill and artistry required to journey in, let alone master, traditional music making, it’s McTaggart’s quiet confidence in her jaw-dropping brilliance that unleashes her sparkling on-stage persona like a bottle of bubbles hacked at with a cavalry sabre.

As we wend our way through an offering of cherished familiars, exciting new compositions, and less-remembered classics we find ourselves transported to a quieter, calmer way of living than is usually on offer in Edinburgh in August. No self-respecting North American reconnecting with their roots, no homesick exile all-too-briefly returned from South Britain, has any business not seeing this fabulous show.

Come for the music. Stay for the banter. Get your traditionally stretched Harris tweed coats on and go see this!

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