The reviews below are for both individual performances and the band as a whole.

Reviews for the CD "Mists of Ennistymon"

- "For fans of Traditional Celtic music DANNSAIR has recently released their fourth album 'Mists of Ennistymon', just in time for St. Patrick’s Day revelry. Led by frontman Russ Doherty, and backed by a sonic array of flutes, fiddles, drums, bass and guest vocalists, DANNSAIR not only leads us on a musical journey through Ennistymon, County Clare, but also the Celtic region of Astorias, Spain, Breton on the French coast, and the Hebrides Islands off the Scottish shore. From the hauntingly beautiful title track to reels like Rocky Road to Dublin 'Mists..' never gets bogged down in any particular style. Recorded by Dominic Camardella at Santa Barbara Sound Design. 'Mists...' is a lovely addition to any Celtophile’s collection, not to mention a true hometown treat." - Mike Gehagan, Santa Barbara Independent, March 17, 2009

- "Guitarist Russ Doherty’s great-great grandfather left Ennistymon for Canada after the famine of 1849. Eventually his children traveled to Chicago where Russ was born. Returning to Ireland with his family (including daughter and vocalist Siobhan Doherty), the opening title cut is a beautifully wistful original melody that invokes a nostalgic feeling for home. Dannsair’s fourth album in as many years then weaves its journey thorough a well-arranged mix of traditional and original compositions that are intimate, expressive and sincere. Dannsair’s instrumental flavor puts the spotlight on fiddles, flutes and whistles, but a solid rhythmic foundation is crafted with guitar, keyboard, bass and percussion. Siobhan Doherty gives us a thoughtful, contemplative vocal rendition of “The Hawk Omen,” a ballad from the Hebrides Islands. She also demonstrates her elegant songwriting abilities with “Remember” (a tribute to her Irish ancestors) and “The Blood Red Sun” (inspired by a large wildfire and co-penned with her father). Siobhan is a recent graduate of UC-Berkeley with a BA in Theater and Dance. Flutist Linda Holland also composed “Ulysses’ Lament” that begins the medley found at track 10. From Chile, Andrea Arrendondo is the album’s other featured vocalist, and she has a beautiful silky voice well suited for storytelling (“Newry Highwayman”), a Richard Shindell composition (“Fleur de Lis”), or reflective love song (“Milagro de Amor”). One of blind Irish harper Turlough O’Carolan’s classic compositions, “O’ Carolan’s Welcome,” is infused with splendid harmonies before it evolves into a rollicking reel called “Rolling in the Barrel.” The members of Dannsair are a multi-generational bunch, and they are keeping traditional Celtic music vibrant and alive while also composing new pieces that capture the same emotion and excitement as those tunes from centuries before." - Joe Ross Reviews, April 2009

- Performance Reviews

- "The night was not over, as there was a St. Patrick's-themed Irish coda to be heard, with special guests Santa Barbara-based Irish music group Dannsair. The performance began with Yaron Gottfired's Irish Suite for Orchestra and Irish Band, and continued through several more traditional Irish numbers before sending the crowd off into a frenzy..." - Charles Donelan, Santa Barbara Independent. Reviewing the 3/18/07 Dannsair performance with the Santa Barbara Symphony Orchestra at the Arlington Theater.

- "At the tail end of Saturday night's performance ... the timely guest Irish ensemble, Dannsair, offered a feisty little Celtic reel, "The Star of Munster," as an encore. Bodhran player and singer Susan Picking mentioned that on St. Patrick's Day, one would have to visit church before visiting the pub. Such an image of propriety seemed symbolic for a concert, where the meat-and-potatoes business of Chopin and Beethoven came first, with Irish-themed music as a novel nightcap. But ... for all its good intentions ... the orchestral parts seemed to bog down the vibrant mobility of the Irish band." - Josef Woodard, Santa Barbara News-Press. Reviewing the 3/17/07 St. Patrick's performance of Dannsair with the Santa Barbara Symphony Orchestra at the Arlington Theater.

- "Fabulous performance Sunday with SB Symphony...I loved it!!!!" - Renee Hamarty, Music Director, Arts & Letters, Summer Opera Under the Stars. Reviewing the 3/18/07 Dannsair performance with the Santa Barbara Symphony Orchestra at the Arlington Theater.

- Musician Reviews

- "The intense applause that greeted violist Leah Lucas as soon as she stepped onto the stage signaled the arrival of the popular favorite. Once she was a few bars into Ernest Bloch’s Suite for Viola and Orchestra (Movements III and IV), it was obvious that she possesses a major talent as well as a sunny, room-filling personality. She negotiated the sinuous melancholy of the slow movement and the sly jauntiness of the fast with equal aplomb. She deserved every decibel of the wild ovation she received." - Gerald Carpenter, Santa Barbara Independent.
Reviewing the 6/15/06 UCSB Symphony Concert in Lotte Lehman Hall.

- "In the finale of the exciting, cerebral, and ever-underrated concert series from Ensemble for Contemporary Music, geographical poetics and dynamic extremes made for a happy convergence.

Things started out gently, with the tart ripples of Katherine Hoover’s “Canyon Echoes,” for flute and guitar; Shivhan Dohse [flute] and Sean Taylor attended beautifully to the task. Based on an Apache folktale, the work glides from moments of tangy dissonance to impressionistic colors.

Speaking of poles, Mamlok’s impressive 1995 work “Polarities” is fueled by that notion, putting a quartet of piano, flute, violin, and cello (David Shere, Emily Noble [flute], David Ruest, and Devin Burke) through varied paces. Deceptively clean in structure, its three movements are alternately fast and fragmented, slow and languid, and, finally, a mercurial mixture thereof, as energy zones oscillate in tempo and harmonic tension.

Violist Leah Lucas was, in some way, the evening’s protagonist performer. She closed the concert in the electro-acoustic embrace and clever sonic maze of Beutler’s “The Pursuit of Truth,” for solo viola and a tape chock full of samples. Better yet, Lucas nailed the concert’s most introspective piece, Mamlok’s 1983 solo work “From My Garden.” Blending arco and pizzicato, sometimes simultaneously, and framed by an opening and closing in a darkened house, the work is a small masterpiece of dark, lovely, reflective writing, somewhere between the composer’s serial and neo-classical tendencies. In short, it was a concert suggesting that new music is alive, well, and vibrant with sometimes contrary, yet peacefully coexistent ideals." - Josef Woodard Santa Barbara Independent.
Reviewing the Ensemble for Contemporary Music at Lotte Lehman Hall, UCSB on 6/6/06.

- "For their performance of two movements of André Jolivet’s Suite en Concert pour flute et percussion (2nd Concerto for Flute), the ensemble had the decisive advantage of Suzanne Duffy’s pure and sensual flute-playing. The Jolivet work is intensely exotic and moody, and this performance sent at least one member of the audience out in search of a recording of the whole thing." - Gerald Carpenter, Santa Barbara Independent. Reviewing the 6/03/06 UCSB Percussion Ensemble concert at Lotte Lehman Hall.

- "The concert concluded with Diemer’s Homage to Poulenc, Mozart, and MacDowell for Flute, Cello, and Piano (2004), which, as a composition, was pleasantly odd and free-form, and as a showcase for Suzanne Duffy [flute] and Goeffrey Rutkowski, rather an eye-opener. Whatever twists and turns the score made, the flautist and the cellist not only went with the notes, but gave them the freshness and vivacity of improvisation. On the keyboard, Diemer provided a confident and generous framework for their soaring, stunning virtuosity." - Gerald Carpenter, Santa Barbara Independent. Reviewing the 5/04/06 Emma Lou Diemer & Mozart concert at the Santa Barbara Music Club.