Vielleux du bourbonnais

Vielles & Cornemuses by the quartet Vielleux du Bourbonnais is a very fabulous disque featuring ensemble playing of traditional French instrumental music. As one would expect from the title, the album concentrates on bagpipes and hurdy-gurdy, most of the tunes featuring both instruments with no other accompaniment. The hurdy-gurdy is a viol whose strings are sounded by means of a wooden wheel. Because of its sharp tone, and the fact that several of the strings are drones that sound continuously while the instrument plays, the hurdy-gurdy actually sounds quite similar to the bagpipe, and the two go well together. Like Café Carbons, Vielleux du Bourbonnais play their music with great respect for the melodic traditions they use. The major innovation is the use of bagpipes in several different keys to facilitate playing harmony with one another; this is standard today in French traditional musique, but was unknown 30 years ago. Vielleux du Bourbonnais infuse their musique with great energy and vitality, making 'Vielles & Cornemuses' a fresh & enjoyable album for lovers of bagpipes and hurdy-gurdies. If you don’t know much about this music, however, don’t look for help in the sleeve notes; the booklet has no information about any of the musicians or the music except a brief blurb and credits for the authors; it doesn’t even identify the members of the band. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.