Ross Couper & Tom Oakes, Duo Ruut, Luke Daniels and Rihab Azar, Glasgow Royal Concert Hall, Celtic Connections

A concert featuring three very different acoustic duos, from very different cultures.  Something for everyone or an incongruous mish-mash?

First up was Irish guitarist Luke Daniels accompanying young Syrian oud virtuoso Rihab Azar. The tunes came from all over the Middle East and North Africa, plus the challenge of a set of Irish jigs , Daniels' home territory.  The rhythms might be different from what we're used to, but the delicacy and speed of the playing draws the listener in and it quickly feels natural to be tapping the feet to a different beat.  Plenty of interesting background information too, with Daniels an accomplished raconteur and Azar often amusing in her charmingly accented English.  A lovely experience to start the evening.

From Estonia came Duo Ruut.  Two women, one instrument.  The instrument in question being a Kannel, an Estonian variant of the zither family.  Normally played by one person, the two friends picked one up and, without anyone to teach them, developed their own style of playing.  This resulted in a unique style, both musically and visually.  They play the kannel in a variety of ways, strumming, plucking, bowing and percussively.  And they sit facing one another, side on to the audience, the box balanced on their knees, the pushmi-pullyu of musical acts.  Add in ethereal singing and sensibilities steep in Baltic folk music, and you have a very unusual sound.  Plaintive, eerie, ghostly, romantic, surprising.  At times a little repetitive, and I'd have liked to have heard them using more vocal harmonies, but frequently surprising and they never lost the listener's interest.  Oh, and they laugh.  A lot.  Impossible to dislike.

And finally the headline act, Ross Couper and Tom Oakes, fiddler and guitarist, bringing their Shetland and Devonian backgrounds, mixing them up with Scots and Irish influences, and then playing the hell out of the resulting tunes.  If you want to sum up the two men in two words then Funny and Fast would do well.  Lots of laughs, and well capable of playing the slow sensitive stuff, but renowned for the fireworks and sweat playing that brings wild grins to everyone in the room.  Outstanding.

So to my answer my earlier question - yes, definitely something for everyone, and a learning as well as a musical event.