Album Notes

What is there to know about Tara MacKenzie?
The short story is, She is selling a cd here of very warm and relaxing world/ Celtic Trad. Music.
The introduction to some tidbits of information about Tara are as follows.

Tara has called Canada, Ireland ,Hungary and the Netherlands home in her 34 years, and is passionate about indigenous languages and music. Since posting her music on the web and playing out at festivals occasionally, Tara has received many accolades from renowned irish artists, songwriters and canadian folk heroes alike. Her CD, “simple irish ballads and other songs for singing” had excellent customer reviews and strangely, individuals seemed to buy multiple copies at a time. Then they came back and bought more copies till there were only a handful left. One customer ordered a spool of 40 copies for their school!

Irish Music has been a natural part of Tara's daily life since childhood. It was said early that Tara could sing on pitch before she could speak words.
The daughter of a West Belfast man (a wonderful singer himself) and an English woman from Barrow in Furness, both were strong advocates of traditional singing and rebel music, which in all cases the apple did not fall very far from the tree.
For Tara, growing up in the cultural melting pot of Malton, Ontario in the 70's, it was easy to continue on with the culture imported with her parents and live in Irish grandmother. The standard was having to take irish dancing lessons and she started playing any instrument she could get her hands on.

Tara spent most of her 20's roaming/playing gigs around Europe ( Ireland, Hungary,Romania, Netherlands) with YWAM in various Christian rock outfits doing everything from busking to sometimes playing at very large concert venues in many countries.

After falling for her handsome husband, she decided to move permanently to Canada in late 1998. The traditional music was always nearby and active for Tara as a solo artist. Primarily a singer, Tara also plays Harp, Tin whistles,keyboard and guitar on the recording.

One evening after being asked to open for a David Francey concert (he is a wonderful human being), She fell into playing several ontario folk festivals, notably on main stage at Summer Folk. One interesting story regarding this evening, is that Don Bird, an artistic director of note, uncharacteristically hired Tara ( an unknown to him) on the spot for a main stage spot opening the festival. An accolade many would chew their own arm off for.
Since, Tara has had the privilege to meet and share stages with many wonderful Trad/Celt groups in Southern Ontario, earning a modest reputation as a Trad singer with a memorable voice. For this, Tara is eternally grateful for the blessing of sharing time and space with passionate people who continue to hone the art of the historical and future music of the celtic countries.

all of this huffing aside, it is a lovely cd, you will enjoy it, please buy it either in it's physical or digital form. you won't be sorry. promise.

For interest sake, the musicians on this recording are as follows

Tara MacKenzie: Harp, Irish whistle,guitar, voice
Kiera McArthur: Cello, Voice
Trevor MacKenzie: Guitar, recording engineer
Tammy Kroezen: Piano; Piano Accordion
NIck Barclay: Piano

Joel Morelli: Guitar
Bob Robins: Guitar


visit Tara at MYSPACE
www.myspace.com/taramackenzie
also a great source for reviews and accolades...:)