Dalla (COR) were a colorful and creative folk band from Cornwall. They were active from the late 1990’s to 2017; during that time they revived music performed in the Cornish language and gave a significant overall boost to the region’s folk music activity.
The five Dalla albums, released between 2001 and 2013, showcase a band that moves confidently between uptempo dance music (I assume in the Cornish Nos Lowen style), atmospheric ballads and very richly arranged folk music that often bears echoes of Continental folk traditions, even stretching to the Balkans where clarinets and 5/4 and 7/4 times are part of folk music; Dalla’s music features both those elements. Clarinets and related reed instruments are not typical of Celtic music in most of the British Isles but are in the picture in the more southern and eastern areas of ancient Celtic cultures.
All this makes Dalla’s albums exciting and very colorful and entertaining. As a pure amateur, I find it impossible to detect which elements in the tunes directly reflect Cornish folk music and which are part of the larger European heritage, filtered through these fine musicians, but as far as musical pleasure is concerned, it does not really matter 🙂
Dalla on the Web:
