Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

All that was missing as the purity of Scottish voice and the sense of purpose that only two harps and a glockenspiel can bring to the abundant, almost feast like musical table, was the feeling of the Music Room at the Philharmonic Hall being transposed to the Scottish Highlands. It gives the feeling of a cold storm of rampant snow being trampled underfoot by majestic reindeer hoof and well stitched made shoe leather and shiny boot and the slight taste of acridity from the log fire burning within a castle wall with the same swell of passion as the three women who make up the fantastic band Shine.

Almost everything else a lover of the voice could ask for was there in abundance and as the elegant voices matched the intensity of and sheer faith in the strings, the roar of a healthy fire groaning under the weight of hand warming and feet reviving affection was soon dispelled and given back to the period in which it belonged.

The music and hair raising vocals supplied by Shine, Mary Macmaster, Corrina Hewat and Alyth McCormack, was stirring to the point of generous cool and subtle heart breaking splendour. Each note on the twin harps played as if plucked out of existence, as if watching the endeavour of a bold and beautiful spider spinning a web from a void and each song progressed, it was impossible not to feel slightly hypnotised by such intricate arrangements.

The audience inside the Music Room were treated by the three performers to songs that encapsulated a truth of the Christmas period, one that gets lost in the melee of frightening desire to hear piped music forced down the ear canals like an interloper, the spectre at the New Year’s Eve party and the arrogance of consumerism over the natural order of just being thankful to believe that Spring is not that far away.

It was a truth of music that was framed by songs such as The Christ Child’s Lullaby, Carol Miller’s Waltz, Song For John, Fire & Frost, The Holly and the Ivy, Cold Blows the Wind, Patapan and the very beautiful finish to the evening in the form of The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire).

It was an evening in which wherever you looked, the look on the faces was exactly the same, one of enlightened enjoyment; a tremendous evening, one of great and stirring quality.

Ian D. Hall