Reviewed by David Faulkner

Carol Arblaster is an American harpist living in Wells, married to an English evangelist. But 'American harpist' should not infer Joanna Newsom's left field music. Arblaster is more conventional. On this debut CD she plays a selection of hymns. Most of the tracks are vocal and her soprano voice has a pronounced vibrato. Not all the hymns translate to her style of music comfortably: sometimes the tempo sounds too pacy and they can lose some of their weightiness. The Celtic connection is also partly tenuous, both in terms of some hymns' origins and the liner notes' debatable assumption that the story of Joseph of Arimathea bringing Christianity to Britain is established fact. While researching this review I came across Arblaster's 2005 follow-up 'Brendan Soul' which contains some of her own compositions. Having listened to tracks from that on the web I suggest that 'Holy Thorn' is the outline for which 'Brendan Soul' is the fuller picture.