Novelist Michael Cunningham previews new Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh & Thomas Bartlett album

And I need music to remind me that it’s possible­—just barely possible, but still—for human beings, whether they’re musicians or writers, to express that which technically can’t be expressed at all.

By which I mean… well, the ineffable mournful gorgeousness of our lives… the joys and sorrows too subtle to explain directly… our collective sense of time blowing through us, of our own buoyant if fragile hearts, our need to connect in ways we can’t really describe even to ourselves…

Music that conveys anything like that is, as I’m sure you can imagine, difficult to find.

I’ve been playing a new album by Caoimhin Ó Raghallaigh and Thomas Bartlett, and I know I’ll be listening to it, every morning, for a long, long while.  Although it’s beautiful, the word “beautiful” has been cheapened by overuse.  Yes it’s beautiful but it’s also heartbreaking and mysterious and insistently, insinuatingly alive.

That said…

Like all the best music, it can really only describe itself.  I could only truly convey it to you by playing it for you.

Since that’s not possible, I hope you’ll play it for yourself.

Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh & Thomas Bartlett’s self-titled debut album is released on 13 September on Real World Records. Two tracks, ‘Kestrel’ and ‘Strange Vessels’ are available to stream now.

Pre-order/Listen