Music / folk
Review: Eleven Magpies, El Rincon
On a warm summer’s evening one of life’s pleasures can be to sit at an El Rincon gig and watch the faces of passers by. With the musicians performing close by the open door sundry dog walkers and others catch an unexpected earful and immediately register something, whether bemusement, delight, scorn or simple curiosity. When the music is as original and indefinable as that of Eleven Magpies such varied responses were understandable. The instrumental band’s acoustic fusion draws on British and Irish folk, American old-time, contemporary classical and a host of other influences all gelled into a consistently lyrical mix of string-driven textures.
Eleven Magpies: Lizzie Westcott (violin), James Gow (cello), Alex Vann (mandolin). Pic: Tony Benjamin
Playing to the jam-packed tapas bar the ostensibly gentle sound of Ian Ross’s guitar, Lizzie Westcott’s violin, James Gow’s cello and the mandolin of Alex Vann raised an exuberant response with each compact number as they began by running through their eponymous debut album in track order. Flavours of flamenco, bluegrass, and Celtic rhythms flickered through bluesy swing and sudden gearshifts of key and tempo. Complex rhythms abounded – composer Ian has a fondness for 11-time and the segue of new tunes In The Shadow of the Castle and Glacier Racing even featured the ambitious (and amazingly successful) feat of Lizzie’s violin playing to its own rhythm against the rest.
Eleven Magpies: Ian Ross (guitar), Lizzie Westcott (violin), James Gow (cello). Pic: Tony Benjamin
These are four very good players and for all that Lizzie shrugged their skills off with “we’re folk musicians” the controlled tonal textures and impeccable unison playing between any two of them had the precision of a classical string quartet. Alex’s deft mandolin is well known from Three Cane Whale and Spiro (the thrumming drive and cascading motifs of Dearborn Bound could have come from a Spiro set) and, indeed Eleven Magpies joins those two bands alongside Spindle Ensemble, Sonder and Red Carousel (among others) in what amounts to a definite Bristol neo-classical/folk acoustic scene. You might include cellist James Gow’s duo JOW with trumpeter Pete Judge in that, as well, and Pete sadly missed a guest appearance as twelfth magpie due to Covid.
is needed now More than ever
Eleven Magpies. Pic: Tony Benjamin
What gives this band their compelling strength is the breadth of Ian Ross’ compositional imagination: a seasoned theatre composer he is well able to capture atmosphere and mood: White Out, for example, deployed a balalaika-evoking theme that subtly implied a Russian winter, while the swoops and gatherings of Murmuration absolutely caught the exhilaration of a sky full of starlings. That track will hopefully feature on a planned second album later this year.
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