Barde

I was lucky enough to hear Barde at the Mariposa Festival in Toronto in the 1970s. And I was smart enough to buy their first album, which I have kept in excellent condition. I was blown away by their performance at Mariposa, and I wish that I had bought their second LP when it came out. In any case, I plan to convert the one I have to CD so as to preserve it, and so I can listen to this GREAT band more easily and not have to worry about caring for the LP. If you want to hear an innovative, energetic, and truly original Celtic sound, listen to Barde!

Barde was the first major Canadian Celtic band. Their first album "Barde" 1977 was heralded as a departure for Celtic music. Influenced strongly by the Chieftains and the Bothy Band, these Montreal musicians (Richard Chapman, Chris Crilly,Pierre Guérin, Toby Kinsella, Ed Moore and Eliot Selick) recorded and toured throughout Canada and the Eastern US from 1977 to 1980. After then there was a parting of the ways for three of the members. New non-Celtic musicians joined for a couple of years of touring and one more album: "Voyages." This final album is generally regarded as an unfortunate departure from the band's strength into more inward-looking compositions and concerts featuring rock sidemen. A bright flame of innovative arrangements of ancient music, Barde's Celtic albums featured intricate melodic and rhythmic resurrections of Renaissance, Baroque and classical influences. Vocal arrangements were often choral and grand. Barde was considered to be at the forefront of both the Celtic revival in North America and the adventurous new experiments in pan-Celtic fusion. This was the first Celtic band to include African percussion and a deftly disguised quasi-orchestral approach to this exciting music.
Following appearances in New York and Chicago, Rolling Stone listed Barde on its 1979 New Year's Wish List. Enthusiasm for Barde's music has not faded in the thirty years since its demise. An advertised 1998 reunion concert in Montreal sold out in a day. One admirer even chartered a plane to Montreal, only to find that the venue had been shut down for late-night noise complaints. It is rumoured that all the tracks from the first two albums are to be uploaded in the near future. Let's all keep Googling.