The human voice was celebrated in all its elastic glory in the suitably sonorous acoustics of Kelvingrove Art Gallery at this transporting Celtic Connections concert. First up, festival director Donald Shaw introduced a newly commissioned setting of an old Gaelic text, the ‘Carmina Gadelica’, by his former music teacher Norman Nicholson, rendered with hymnal dignity by Glasgow Chamber Choir.

Massachusetts-based harmony quartet Windborne elicited a stampede to their merch stall following a witty, characterful and fascinating set of socio-political folk songs from around the world. Numbers included an English-led miners’ lament retooled as a plea for musicians in the streaming age, a Deep South work song with Trump-era relevance, a medley of offbeat regional French carols and, best of all, a mesmeric demonstration of a Corsican vocal tradition, performed around one microphone.

In contrast to Windborne, there was no contextual chat to accompany the polyphonic magic of Mystery Of The Bulgarian Voices, only an invitation to get lost in their idiosyncratic sound, be it dramatic and dynamic, strident and skipping or wreathed in bewitching melisma. This veteran female choir are longtime ambassadors of a Bulgarian folkloric tradition characterised by ravishing modulating legato notes, esoteric harmonic intervals, and guttural ululation decorated with little yelps, trills and chatter about who knows what. Their enigmatic set was peppered with a number of contrasting duets, from impish and conversational to heady and haunting, with one remarkable ensemble piece of woozy dissonance truly embodying the mystery of these voices. 

Mystery Of The Bulgarian Voices reviewed at Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum, Glasgow, as part of Celtic Connections.