Sad songs hit harder, I find, when their meaning hangs just out of reach. Aside perhaps from the exquisite ache of Portuguese fado, there is no more desolate sound in the world than a lamentation in Scots Gaelic, sung in a language most of us can’t speak but conveying emotions we seem, atavistically, to somehow understand.

This became clear last weekend while watching Julie Fowlis, the internationally renowned singer from North Uist whose extraordinarily pure voice evokes the power, beauty and savagery of the Hebridean and Highland landscapes, but also connects to some even more profound and universal force.

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Celebrating 21 years in the business with a short tour, and conducting proceedings with an air of brisk, humorous efficiency, Fowlis was performing with a gold-standard ensemble: Michael McGoldrick on flutes, Duncan Chisholm on fiddle, Tony Byrne on guitar and her husband Eamon Doorley on bouzouki; for one night only they were joined by Capercaillie’s founding member Donald Shaw, on piano, organ and accordion. Fowlis played the........

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