Loreena McKennitt -- The book of secrets

Loreena McKennitt - The book of secrets

Motto of the CD:

A good traveller has no fixed plans
and is not intent on arriving.

Lao Tzu (570-490 BC)

PROLOGUE
music: Loreena McKennitt
THE MUMMERS' DANCE
music and lyrics: Loreena McKennitt
SKELLIG
music and lyrics: Loreena McKennitt
MARCO POLO
music: Loreena McKennitt
THE HIGHWAYMAN
music: Loreena McKennitt
lyrics: Alfred Noyes, abridged by Loreena McKennitt
LA SERENISSIMA
music: Loreena McKennitt
NIGHT RIDE ACROSS THE CAUCASUS
music and lyrics: Loreena McKennitt
DANTE'S PRAYER
music and lyrics: Loreena McKennitt

The book of secrets - Quinlan Road/WEA, 1997 (CD 19404 / 0630-19404-2)

All songs are performed live on CD-1 of Live in Paris and Toronto (1999).

===> The introduction in the CD-booklet

===> All lyrics on a single page (12.8 kb)

JPEG version of cover (33 kb) GIF version of cover (135 kb)

A bit of comment

It has taken Loreena three years to make a successor of The mask and mirror and she spend this time investigating more about the background of the Celts. In the CD booklet Loreena writes:

I suspect it was my growing awareness of my own wanderlust and curiosity that made me aware of the real sense of connection I felt to the Celtic lineage, as part of that New World extension of a people who ranged so astonishingly far and wide. And the more I learned of pan-Celtic culture and its unexpected turns and twists, the more I was drwan to learn about the Celts' contemporaries, which in tuyrn set me off on tangents which might have little or no connection to the Celts themselves.

This has lead to a CD that incorporates many different backgrounds:

These songs have been assembled like a mosaic, with pieces collected and fitted in one by one. They are also the souvenirs that come of sigting through shards of kistory and scraping away layers to reveal the fragile past (...).

I fear that this Loreena's "wanderlust" has resulted in music that is too complicated, with too many impressions. I prefer the more "simple", less constructed music of Loreena's earlier recording, especially The visit and Parallel dreams. (Maybe this has also to do with the fact that I am not so fond of violin/cello type and oriental style music.) On the whole, though, I think The book of secrets has turned out to be better than The mask and mirror.

My personal favourit on The book of secrets is "Dante's prayer", presumably because the music is kept more simple than in the other songs. Furthermore, I think that "Skellig" and "Mummers' dance" have a good atmosphere, despite the violin/cello sounds.
For some notes about "The Highwayman", the lyrics of which is a abridged poem, see the page with the lyrics.

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