O'TRIDAL

As usual with this band who define themselves as ‘inventive and unclassifiable’, it's a real head turner. What could be more natural with an album recorded live in the summer of 2024, at the Festival du Roi Arthur in Bréal-sous-Montfort (Brittany).

In just five years, O'Tridal have already made a name for themselves on the Breton music scene. Their unclassifiable music is open to the influences that have marked the rich career of these three friends, all of whom were brought up in the bagadoù school: Kemper for flautist and piper Yeltaz Guenneau and Penhars for guitarist Tibo Niobé and drummer Kentin Julliard.
With this Live album, you're sure to feel the almost tribal vibrations of their music and all the infectious energy they're capable of. This album is all about Breton music, that's for sure, but it's also sprinkled with rock, jazz, world and oriental influences, as on the track that introduces the concert. Here and there the trio draws inspiration from a wide range of styles, from Ireland to Armenia, from Mali to India, via the Mascareignes and its Réunionese maloya.
Tibo's guitars move from one influence to another, knowing no boundaries, while Kevin's percussion provides a relentless rhythm. All of which is enhanced by the powerful, ethereal flights of Yeltaz's flute.
So many visas for a passport to somewhere else, invariably returning to the sources of Breton music here and now, beyond fashions and sclerotic standards, because it's very much alive.
There are nine tracks on this astonishing album, and I'll spare you the titles as four of them have the same title, that of a suite from Loudéac. All you need to know is that six of the nine tracks are written by the band, and the other three are traditional Breton tunes. Ronds de Loudéac, kas a-barh, polka, scottish, cercle circassien follow one another, drawing the dancers into a frenzied round.
Far from being a compilation of their two previous records, this Live album will let you experience the trance that inhabits the dancers during their concerts or festoù-noz, as if you were there.
From start to finish, original and breathtaking. A band with a lot on their plate.

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