Whether playing their native Cape Breton or as far from home as Japan, The Cottars are received with enthusiastic audiences who clap, sing, and stomp their feet. The two brother/sister pairs are only in their teens, but their music is indicative of a group with many years of experience. The MacGillivray and MacKenzie familes met at a festival in Cape Breton in 2000. Within six months, the four kids (Fiona and Ciaran MacGillivray, and Roseanne and Jimmy MacKenzie) were performing as The Cottars, a term that refers to the Scottish peasants and laborers who arrived in Cape Breton between 1793 and the 1840s as a result of the Highland Clearances. Things have happened fast for The Cottars since then. They've toured with The Chieftains. Besides winning the 2003 Best New Artist honors at the East Coast Music Awards in Nova Scotia, it was there that Rounder Records' Ken Irwin found them "striking," "rootsy," and Fiona's voice full of "emotion and purity." And Rosie really has the Cape Breton style fiddling down.

The four play piano, guitar, electric guitar, whistle, bodhran, accordion, fiddle, percussion, and tenor banjo. They all read music, as well as play by ear. Recorded in both Cape Breton and Nashville with production assistance of Allister MacGillivray and Gordie Sampson, respectively, the 44-minute "Forerunner" album also has guest artists who add bass, bouzouki, guitar, piano, drums, percussion or cello. With the exception of guest vocalist Jimmy Rankin on "Atlantic Blue," liner notes don't indicate exactly who's playing when. 

The Cottars' set on "Forerunner" ranges from the opening delicate song (Karine Polwart's "Waterlily") to a more commercial closing cover of Tom Waits' "Hold On." Other contemporary renderings come from Sinead Lohan ("Send Me A River") and Canada's Ron Hynes ("Atlantic Blue"). They also cover Waits' dramatic "Georgia Lee" at mid-set. Their repertoire also has plenty of supercharged instrumental medleys incorporating jigs, polkas, hornpipes, strathspeys, and reels. Whether slow or fast numbers, they have been arranged with verve and intensity.

If Celtic-based music has an equivalent of bluegrass music's Nickel Creek, then it is likely The Cottars. Their musicianship, charisma, exuberance, sheer force and powerful energy will take them far. It will be interesting to see what directions they take. Their style and influences indicate that the four young folks have four feet in tradition and four feet in the future. They've already grown considerably in musicianship, are building a large fan base, and I see "Forerunner" as an exceptional harbinger of even greater things to come. (Joe Ross)