Celtic Connections review: Vicente Amigo/Carminho - Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

WOULD this be the occasion on which the duende – the Andalucian term for the elusive power that informs truly great singing or playing, would align itself with its Celtic equivalent, what Scots travellers call the “coynach”? Well, maybe aye, maybe no.

Vicente Amigo/Carminho

Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

* * * *

There was certainly passion aplenty from the rising Portuguese fado star Carminho – Carmo Rebelo de Andrade. Her superb singing was crisply accompanied by three guitars – Spanish, acoustic bass and the bright-toned Portuguese model, but the full force of her singing was best highlighted in a riveting unaccompanied prelude. Maeve McKinnon briefly joined her, interleaving Gaelic and Portuguese song lines in a nice gesture, but it was the sultry force of the fado singer that really hit home.

Celebrated flamenco guitar virtuoso Vicente Amigo, premiering his Tierra Celtic collaboration, opened with a simmering solo extemporisation and was gradually joined by second guitar, percussionist and handclapper/singer, the music gradually unspooling itself and lingering in a fairly mellow groove as a double-bassist and drummer joined in. He was then joined by keyboards and a Celtic Connections home team of flautist Michel McGoldrick, fiddler John McCusker and accordionist Donald Shaw, who tend to provide lyrical, sometimes faintly Irish-sounding melodies, over which Amigo’s formidable guitar work carved intricate patterns.

It went down a storm, although this particular Celtic Connection didn’t generate quite the kind of fusion spark one might have hoped for.