GERRY O'CONNOR  Journeyman Lughnasa Music ****

At a time when we've come to expect everything right here, right now, it's a sobering experience to be exposed to a collection born of a lifetime's gestation. Gerry O'Connor, Louth fiddler and member of Lá Lugh and Skylark, hasn't let haste be the defining feature of his solo début. His music speaks a language as accustomed to reaching back as it is to looking forward, fingering its history with the same loving care that it does the present.

Which is not to say that Journeyman delivers a knockout punch on first listening. In fact, like most albums that wend their way into your long-playing list, this is likely to take its own sweet time burrowing its way into your affections. Populated by a swathe of diverse tunes, gathered together by a shared spirit rather than by a shared geography, it ebbs and flows around O'Connor's deliciously fluid bow hand and his rich woody tone, from the opening Jig In A through the glorious somnolence of Úr-Chnoc Chéin Mhic Cáinte to the closing dexterity of The Left Handed Reel.

O'Connor celebrates his roots and name-checks his influences, from John Joe Gardiner to Gabriel McArdle, with relish. Featuring Gerry's son Dónal on piano (and on a fiddle so harmonious that their shared gene pool could never be denied), and with strategically placed guitar, bodhrán, accordion and cello lending further riches to the gathering, this is a sublime collection.

www.gerryoconnor.net