January 3, 2007
Christmas in Cape Breton
By Carsten Knox, InfoMonkey

Twenty years playing music for a living is the kind of career bands dream of, but few manage to do it with any kind of consistent success. Fewer still become cultural institutions, but Cape Breton’s Barra MacNeils can rest assured their achievement is etched in stone.

The Sydney Mines-based clan of Celtic performers have brought their tradition of family music-making to the world, and can count themselves, along with names such as Rita MacNeil, The Rankins, and Mary Jane Lamond, as one of Nova Scotia’s enduring cultural exports.

That said, the new millennium has been fairly quiet on the Barra MacNeils recording front. The band’s last studio release was 2000’s Racket in the Attic, which succeeded their first Christmas recording from 1999.

Now they are back with Christmas II, and a 20th anniversary retrospective release is planned for 2007. They certainly haven’t been off the radar, though, what with periodic touring, as well as the ubiquitous Barra MacNeils TV Christmas Special from 2000 which is still being shown on stations across Canada and the United States.

On their way home for the holidays, the Barra MacNeils started their five-week December tour in British Columbia, and will take the Rebecca Cohn Stage for three shows, two on Friday, December 22nd and one on the 23rd . I spoke with multi-instrumentalist Stewart MacNeil at the band’s stop in Belleville, Ontario.

Is this a fairly regular thing, the December tour?

It has been. Last year we went out with Rita, and it was the same idea, a national tour.

Do you and Rita have any familial connection?

Both Rita and ourselves have roots that go back to the Isle of Barra with the MacNeils, but there’s no close relationship. Aside from being a great friend, and support. One of the reasons we made our first Christmas album in 1999 was we were a guest on her Christmas specials. We had some really positive mail from it, people wondering where they could get a hold of our versions of different carols. So, we made the first album, and we made the TV special that aired on CMT and PBS in Canada and the US.

So, we sat down in July and we weren’t playing a lot of festivals this summer. We said, well, it’s probably time to do another Christmas project. This is the second album we’ve had the whole family play on. All At Once was the first time we did it with everybody. We wanted to make an album that was similar in feel to the first one. I think in many ways we’ve achieved that. The response has been great. The album features well known carols and also more obscure ones. It’s also nice to have Tommy Makem on board.

Yes, he does the spoken word part on “Childhood Christmas”

He’s just so good at that. His voice is so recognizable. And also having the Iona [Gaelic] Singers involved. It really made the album feel like the first one and we’re very proud of it.

Do you think you might do a second seasonal TV special anytime soon?

We are planning to do some sort of special in the New Year. At this point I don’t think it’ll be a Christmas one.

I was wondering why there’s been an absence of recorded material from the Barra MacNeils in recent years.

Well, there was a little space in between there where our parents got a few new grandchildren. Life was busy going on, I suppose. We toured a bit and we went through a management change at that point. As far as collecting material and writing, that’s an on-going process. But coming back and having the whole crew all at once, it was certainly worth the wait. We’re heading to Dublin in August and we have a request to go to Denmark for the Tuna Festival.

So, the year ahead looks busy, then?

It’s funny, a band that’s been together for 20 years, you know, sometimes you think, well, how much longer are we going to do this? It seems like the phone rings and we’re constantly getting new fans for what we do. It’s a timeless kind of music. In those regards we’re very fortunate as to what we do.

You must be taking time off for the holidays. Since music is such a part of your lives professionally, do you still play at home for fun?

Absolutely. It’s nice when you’re home, there are sessions that go on. It’s just great to get out and see the people. I like to make the comparison: the weekly music sessions are like gentleman’s hockey. It’s not always about how good you play, but sometimes the beer is better.

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