Second Language Music presents COLLEEN

Event information

After almost five years away from the stage, Cécile Schott (aka Colleen), returns to live performance in support of her stunning new album, 'The Weighing of the Heart' - her first for Second Language. Singing for the first time on record, and to dazzling, numinous effect, the dexterous Frenchwoman deploys violas da gamba, guitar, woodwind and Moondog-inspired percussion across a litany of finely wrought tableaux vivant songs. The combined influences of Arthur Russell, Moondog, Brigitte Fontaine and the musics of the African continent loom large in her new work, and the live show will be a direct reflection of this new direction, offering an absorbing fusion of the delicately spun and the rhythmically persuasive, embracing a pastoralism that is both lyrical yet rooted to the earth; at once hazily baroque yet accessible and universal.

Support comes from multi-instrumentalist Nick Palmer - aka Directorsound - whose beguiling new Second Language album, 'I Hunt Alone,' features spangled fairground waltzes and mellifluous faux soundtrack chamber-folk; a record whose charm is matched by the astonishing dexterity of Palmer's has-to-be-seen-to-be-believed stage show.

Opening the evening will be gifted singer-harpist Áine O'Dwyer who proffers a potent combination of plangent, arpeggiated folk beauty and soaring vocal melodies alloyed to an almost feral Gaelic earthiness. Her debut album is released by Second Language in April.