Solas – “As I Went Out Walking” (audio) (premiere)

Irish American roots music band Solas has been around for 20 years thrilling audiences with their forward-looking Irish music. Many amazing musicians have played in Solas over the years, including fiddler Winifred Horan, accordionist Mick McAuley, and founding member Seamus Egan. For their brand new record, All These Years, releasing today, Solas has brought back all of the musicians and singers who have passed through the group over the years and they also introduce a brand-new vocalist, Moira Smiley, who previously worked with tUnE-yArDs.

“We thought it was a way for us to celebrate the past with all of the people who had been important to us over the years,” says Egan. “But we didn’t want use this as an exercise in nostalgia, because we weren’t interested in that at all. Even though we’ve been at it 20 years, I think creatively we’re still as excited about the possibilities as we were back then.”

Today we have the pleasure of sharing the beautifully folky album “As I Went Out Walking” track, which features a stunning wistful fiddle. Smiley tells PopMatters that “last year, while I was a guest on my friend, Sam Lee’s Nest Collective Radio in London, Sam played me Tom Munnelly’s 1975 recordings of Irish Traveller singers, including Mrs. Mary McGrath singing ‘As I Went Out Walking’. I fell in love with Mary’s deep voice; her humor and pathos while singing this song of betrayal with a little twist. You can find variations of this text on both sides of the Atlantic — and many melodies. Mary’s melody seemed to fit perfectly with the five-string banjo, and then the arrangement took flight in the Solas recording session this past summer.”