Mary Jane Lamond

Plenty of singers become well known but few of them get there by being truly original. Mary Jane Lamond, however, is in a class of her own. There are people in Cape Breton who still speak Gaelic but there aren't many of them. Lamond became fascinated with the language while completing a degree in Celtic studies at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. Through her contacts with older residents of the Scots Gaelic community in Cape Breton, and through her own research in the university archives, Lamond found a wealth of material worth resuscitating from archival limbo. The fact that Lamond has a beautiful voice and possesses an innate sense of creativity also makes for a winning combination.

Lamond first drew attention to her vocal gifts on "Sleepy Maggie," the Ashley MacIsaac hit on which she sang Scottish Gaelic lyrics. In the same year (1994) Lamond released her first album, Bho Thir Nan Croabh, her only release that's no longer available. The fact that traditional material sung in an ancient Gaelic language was given innovative, modern arrangements risked being controversial in some circles but her crystalline voice and bold approach were hard to resist. While Cape Breton has long been known for its fiddle players Lamond brought a new dimension and an energizing force to the island's traditional music. In the process she found a niche for a nearly lost oral traditional and gave it a place in a larger international community of music fans.

The universal appeal of Lamond's approach was confirmed over the years by numerous nominations for Juno and East Coast Music Awards. The four albums that followed her debut, all of which are still available, serve as a portal to an ancient and mysterious world where songs have the allure of the mythical sirens. —Paul-Emile Comeau