Tag: Halfway To Summer

Halfway to Summer is the third album from Scottish singer songwriter Colin Macduff and will be released on March 7^th. Macduff describes the album as “This new collection of songs is mainly about the joy (and challenge) of seeking to ‘be here now’ in the present, rather than focusing over much on the past and future”.

Macduff has written nearly all the songs and music, has a gentle picking style which permeates the feel of this album, has the support of two handfuls of musicians of repute and musical wizardry – one of whom is Angus Lyon, deserving a particular mention as Producer and for contributing keyboards, bass and cello across the album.

If I were to describe the album in a short phrase? It’s the kind of album you can put on the CD player and feel the smoothness wash over you, while you sit quietly thinking, “That’s just lovely”, perhaps most of all on ‘That Fiddle Knows’. Then you listen to lyrics and you realise there’s a sophistication to this gentleness. As he listened to the fiddle of Jenna Reid on his previous album, Macduff found himself thinking, “That fiddle knows” and it became this song. The opening lyrics are:

“That fiddle knows
Of joy, of pain.
Over time the
Tunes ingrain.
Deft fingers,
Well angled bows,
The wood gets wise:
That fiddle knows”

The remaining verses only build on this, Macduff’s half-spoken delivery hooking the listener’s attentiveness. But the song is also a prelude to a couple of equally lovely fiddle tunes, ‘Leaving Larchfield’ (his old family home) and ‘Captain Macduff’s Reel’.

The title track is all bounce and joy – but gentle bounce and joy, even with a trumpet in the arrangement as befits a lyric about the “First sunrise in May / Up before five, it’s a beautiful day / Feeling alive”. These capture the sheer joy of being out in the hills again with blue skies after Winter … but they also have a matching symbolism for Macduff personally “after a good set of post-radiotherapy blood results”.

If that weren’t enough to get you to listen to this album, the quirkily smiling track, ‘My Father’s A Songwriter Now’ has the eloquence of Flanders and Swann, without their in-your-faceness. It moves through the surprise of his father writing songs about the family, then wanting to gig, and then baffling the family completely by writing a hit and becoming cool. It’s lovely – and the end of the chorus has an old-fashioned ‘not-the-rhyme-you-expected’ to bring a further smile to the face:

“It’s lyrics by day, and music by night
Drawn like mad moths to the troubadour light
They all think they’re Joni or Loudon Wainwright
How do we tell them they’re all really ……. not quite?”

Elsewhere, ‘Freckles’ is a sympathetic song about teenage pregnancy; ‘The Hands Of The Hill’ has an inspired vocal from Shirley Barr; ‘Tattoos Can Dream’ anthropomorphises tattoos in a cheery accordion manner; ‘After Dreams Come True’ is a reflection on successes and losses from climbing the greasy pole, but it reflects gently, in the manner of a grandparent’s ruminative support, reminding of the importance of love as well as success; and the album closes with ‘Today’, written by Macduff and Maria Quinn (piano and vocals on the album):

“We’re on the winning side of wise
And we’re here now today …
… We know it could be otherwise
But here we are today”

It’s an album to listen to so you can revel in its gentle mastery of songwriting and playing – and, if you’re in a bad place, to make you feel good.

Macduff is a product of Boo Hewerdine and Findlay Napier’s Bird on a Wire mentorship scheme for aspiring songwriters, and he says of his three albums, “I am not a gigging musician so do get in touch if you find my music of interest. One of my main goals is for others to sing and record my songs. If any of the songs are meaningful and/or move you then I am a happy songwriter!”

There are no live music dates to steer you towards, then – but there is a contact form on his website.

Mike Wistow

 Website: https://www.colinmacduff.com

‘Halfway To Summer’: