Old Segotia | Seán Mac Erlaine & Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh
“It feels like a set of open-field improvisations between old friends, drawing on a store of folk melodies, as well as the in-the-moment architectures of jazz...manifesting like some kind of ghost light – liminal to the point of evaporation. Add to that the spirits of invention and extension, and you have a beautiful, otherworldly set that defies convention and categorisation.” ~ Songlines, Feb 2026
“Reverent and intimate, more like breathing than traditional ambient music...
what makes this project so entrancing: it resembles the sounds of nature organized for human consumption, rather than music in the usual sense. ~ Alec Hanley Bemis,
Brassland Records, 2026
“This is music to get lost in, its flighty, weightless musings draw the listener in. A delicate beauty has been born." ~ The Irish Times, five best trad albums of 2025
“Together in Mac Erlaine’s studio they have created the illusion of a small ensemble, playing a delicate, understated music that always carries a lighthearted edge...They share a rare approach to melody, using it as a colour for painting in between gaps. Mac Erlaine and Ó Raghallaigh share a concern for beauty in sound, and their album searches for it tirelessly." ~ The Wire, March 2026
From the opening notes – arriving as if in mid-air – to its final, cheerful burblings, Sean Mac Erlaine and Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh’s Old Segotia is an album about friendship: both musical and human, the product of two distinctive musicians visiting each other’s worlds with a sense of veneration, and a sense of joyful wonder.
Here, Mac Erlaine (This is How We Fly, Quiet Music Ensemble) and Ó Raghallaigh (The Gloaming, This is How We Fly) meet on common ground developed over 20 years of playing together, with Mac Erlaine’s musical language rooted in jazz and sonic experimentation, and Ó Raghallaigh emerging from an Irish traditional music that he has shaped and reshaped in a deeply personal way.
In this place, Mac Erlaine and Ó Raghallaigh’s music is profoundly integrated and emotionally textured: at times bursting with explosive energy, at times almost sighing into life, but always searching. Here are the touching unison duets of ‘Cantandor’, the lyrical wanderings of ‘Swallow Dive’, or the flirtations with finding a groove in ‘Reverse Burst’.
The palette of instruments speaks to the album’s feeling of abundance, with Mac Erlaine performing on clarinets, chalumeau d’amore, three different flutes, car hooter, percussion, live electronics, Wurlitzer, synthesiser, vocals and alto saxophone; and with Ó Raghallaigh bringing his signature hardanger d’amore sound plus a turn on the flute and live electronics, too.
With the title echoing a well-worn Dublinese expression for “friend”, Old Segotia plays out with ‘Oiche Crua Sna Sleibhte’ (A Hard Night in the Mountains), with ornithologist Seán Ronayne’s field recordings of birdsong rising out of the musicians’ playful explorations, offering a taste of life echoing music, echoing life.
credits
released November 7, 2025
Produced by Seán Mac Erlaine.
Recorded, mixed and mastered by Seán Mac Erlaine in Studio Sáile, Dublin, in 2025. The field recording on Óiche Crua Sna Sléibhte is by Seán Ronayne, recorded at Glenbower Wood, Co. Cork.
Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh photography
Benedict Schlepper-Connolly design
All compositions are by Seán Mac Erlaine and
Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh, and are copyright the composers.
Pressed in Ireland by Anthem Vinyl. Produced with the support of the Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon.