Nerea

An international convergence of influences has richly informed one of the most recent recordings of Cape Breton music.
Footprints marks the first recording by Nerea Gourlaouen-Alonso. Born in California of a French father and Spanish mother, she was raised in Inverness County through her school years, and currently resides in France where Footprints was recorded. Actually, France was where some of the CD was recorded, because Nerea’s fiddling and footwork recorded in France was sent back across the Atlantic to Lakewood Sound Studio where the piano accompaniment of Ryan MacNeil on piano on three cuts, and Pius MacIsaac’s guitar work on two more of the 10 track recording.
Nerea has been living in France for the past two years where her family moves for a number of reasons. “After a strong illness that hit my family they decided to return to Europe. They thought Brittany would be an interesting starting point, as it's the Celtic region of France and is full of music and dance.”
Despite the move, Nerea has been playing her music whenever and wherever she can. In a phone interview with the Oran Nerea explained that in France she has been playing gigs, and when not booked for a performance she will take her strathspeys, jigs and reels to the street corners. Those gigs and street performances give her an opportunity to market Footprints.
Nerea explains that while going to school in Cape Breton she, “was possessed with a love of music and dance.” Taught by various masters, she learned to play the island’s distinct style of fiddling, which, she notes, arrived in this area with Scottish immigrants in the 1700s, and that a little flavour of other island cultures, the Acadians, Irish and Aboriginal, produced a beautiful mosaic of music that has been preserved to this day.
“I've been learning the traditional music of Brittany and playing it. The more I learn about new styles, however, the more Cape Breton music takes over me. Almost in the form of a virus,” Nerea says, adding that, “I've been mainly playing for the past six months but I also study by correspondence with the Nova Scotia Education system.”
Since arriving in France in 2005, Nerea Gourlaouen-Alonso has also been exploring the traditional music of her ancestral roots, and in 2006 joined the Breton dance troupe, Eostiged Ar Stangala, as a musician for that group’s summer tour, Breizh Side Storiou, winning first place as Champion de Bertagne at the Festival de Danse de Guingamp.
“Even if I can't play Cape Breton music here all the time, I try to introduce it as much as possible. I'm planning to start teaching Cape Breton music and stepdance soon,” the fiddler says. “Since I moved here I've been to Scotland twice, once to Ireland, once to the England and once to Italy.”
And does she expect to return to Cape Breton soon?
“Well it depends, whose playing at West Mabou next week?,” she teases. “I might swim over for a square set or two. It's been too long since my last dance. But I step-dance every morning to get the day started. I was hoping to go in October as a detour to California (where my sister lives). But suddenly plans changed as my sister is expecting her second baby in January. But definitely I will be back. Maximum 2009. Believe it or not, this past winter I missed those good Cape Breton snow storms.”


With Footprints, Nerea remains firmly rooted in the Cape Breton tradition, fill her first album with tunes from the spectrum of Cape Breton genres, many traditional, and others chosen from the compositions of composersa such as Neil Gow, John Campbell, John Morris Rankin, Dan R. MacDonald and Glenn Graham.
Footprints comes to a conclusion with the 10th and final cut, titled Steps, with Nerea’s step dancing providing the rhythm.
While the fiddler herself remains in France, her music is available on both sides of the Atlantic.


- by Frank Macdonald (The Inverness Oran)

An international convergence of influences has richly informed one of the most recent recordings of Cape Breton music.
Footprints marks the first recording by Nerea Gourlaouen-Alonso. Born in California of a French father and Spanish mother, she was raised in Inverness County through her school years, and currently resides in France where Footprints was recorded. Actually, France was where some of the CD was recorded, because Nerea’s fiddling and footwork recorded in France was sent back across the Atlantic to Lakewood Sound Studio where the piano accompaniment of Ryan MacNeil on piano on three cuts, and Pius MacIsaac’s guitar work on two more of the 10 track recording.
Nerea has been living in France for the past two years where her family moves for a number of reasons. “After a strong illness that hit my family they decided to return to Europe. They thought Brittany would be an interesting starting point, as it's the Celtic region of France and is full of music and dance.”
Despite the move, Nerea has been playing her music whenever and wherever she can. In a phone interview with the Oran Nerea explained that in France she has been playing gigs, and when not booked for a performance she will take her strathspeys, jigs and reels to the street corners. Those gigs and street performances give her an opportunity to market Footprints.
Nerea explains that while going to school in Cape Breton she, “was possessed with a love of music and dance.” Taught by various masters, she learned to play the island’s distinct style of fiddling, which, she notes, arrived in this area with Scottish immigrants in the 1700s, and that a little flavour of other island cultures, the Acadians, Irish and Aboriginal, produced a beautiful mosaic of music that has been preserved to this day.
“I've been learning the traditional music of Brittany and playing it. The more I learn about new styles, however, the more Cape Breton music takes over me. Almost in the form of a virus,” Nerea says, adding that, “I've been mainly playing for the past six months but I also study by correspondence with the Nova Scotia Education system.”
Since arriving in France in 2005, Nerea Gourlaouen-Alonso has also been exploring the traditional music of her ancestral roots, and in 2006 joined the Breton dance troupe, Eostiged Ar Stangala, as a musician for that group’s summer tour, Breizh Side Storiou, winning first place as Champion de Bertagne at the Festival de Danse de Guingamp.
“Even if I can't play Cape Breton music here all the time, I try to introduce it as much as possible. I'm planning to start teaching Cape Breton music and stepdance soon,” the fiddler says. “Since I moved here I've been to Scotland twice, once to Ireland, once to the England and once to Italy.”
And does she expect to return to Cape Breton soon?
“Well it depends, whose playing at West Mabou next week?,” she teases. “I might swim over for a square set or two. It's been too long since my last dance. But I step-dance every morning to get the day started. I was hoping to go in October as a detour to California (where my sister lives). But suddenly plans changed as my sister is expecting her second baby in January. But definitely I will be back. Maximum 2009. Believe it or not, this past winter I missed those good Cape Breton snow storms.”


With Footprints, Nerea remains firmly rooted in the Cape Breton tradition, fill her first album with tunes from the spectrum of Cape Breton genres, many traditional, and others chosen from the compositions of composersa such as Neil Gow, John Campbell, John Morris Rankin, Dan R. MacDonald and Glenn Graham.
Footprints comes to a conclusion with the 10th and final cut, titled Steps, with Nerea’s step dancing providing the rhythm.
While the fiddler herself remains in France, her music is available on both sides of the Atlantic.


- by Frank Macdonald (The Inverness Oran)