The Irish choral group Anuna relies on both trained and untrained voices to create its hard-to-define sound. The group will present its “Celtic Origins” concert at the Tennessee Theatre Friday.

Don't expect stodgy robes and stock-still singers; Anuna founder out to shake up choral performance

By Doug Mason

• When: 8 p.m. Friday, Nov. 30
• Where: Tennessee Theatre
• Tickets: $26.50 and $39 at Tickets Unlimited outlets (865-656-4444) and www.tennesseetheatre.com

John McGlynn, director of the Irish choral group Anuna, avoids using the word "choir" to describe his group. Even though, in fact, it is a choir.

It's just that he doesn't want folks showing up for an Anuna concert expecting a "regular" choir.

Confused? Well, you should hear McGlynn try to describe what Anuna sounds like. It was a frustrating experience for him and his interviewer.

The group - which performs Friday, Nov. 30, at the Tennessee Theatre - combines trained and untrained voices to create a new sound

Or maybe it's an old sound. Who knows? They didn't have digital recorders in medieval times, when the Celtic music Anuna attempts to re-create was born.

Though re-create isn't exactly right, either. Because Anuna founder and co-director Michael McGlynn (John's twin brother) composes original music for the group. He also resists the label "Celtic" as too confining and not reflective of the group's broad range and influences. Which include the Chieftains and Claude Debussy.

So, what is Anuna?

Best to just listen and decide for yourself. John McGlynn says, "Check out our MySpace page."

"Anuna is 20 years old now," McGlynn says. The original name was An Uaithne (a portmanteau word derived from the names of three ancient Celtic types of music).

The name was changed to Anuna in 1991, after John McGlynn partnered with his brother.

"I'm from a totally different tradition," says McGlynn, a Dublin folk rocker who records his own solo albums.

"I have my own gigs," he says. "The only reason I'm here is because this is revolutionary. There's nothing stiff about it (Anuna). Its (concerts are) very funny. I couldn't be in a regular choir. I have no interest in that at all."

The group includes singers who were trained operatically, which is the norm in Ireland, McGlynn says, even though "we don't have a big operatic tradition."

The group's untrained singers are not amateurs, he says. "They are highly professional," he says. They are also doctors, architects, students, teachers, a systems analyst and an engineer, all of whom put their careers on hold to tour with Anuna.

"Our soundman works for Bjork," McGlynn adds. "And our tour manager, Roy, is tour manager for the Sex Pistols. Every time we travel, we don't use anyone but the best."

Unlike any other choir you are likely to see, the members of Anuna move while they perform. "We were told choirs couldn't sing and walk at the same time," McGlynn says.

Some of the choir members (the usual lineup is 12-14 singers) are stationed in the audience during the concert.

When Michael McGlynn started the choir, he was frustrated by all the operatically trained voices that auditioned, brother John says. It wasn't the sound he was looking for. He had to untrain the singers. Then he stumbled on mixing in untrained voices (John McGlynn, 43, was the first).

The idea to put singers in the audience came from an Anuna concert John attended at a small church in Dublin. One of the singers brushed against him as she made her way to the front of the church.

"Something happened," he said. Something visceral, something animalistic. He could smell the singer, feel the singer's presence. "It was mind-blowing," McGlynn says.

He wants Anuna close enough for the audience to smell them. "I know it sounds bizarre," he says. "But we're all animals. We have these senses, and we don't use them."

McGlynn also convinced his brother to do other un-choir-like things. John McGlynn no longer conducts the choir during the performance. And the group performs without sheet music.

"He was just struggling," McGlynn says of his brother's early efforts to conduct this new thing called Anuna. "I told him: 'You need to start conducting and start looking at the presentation of the group. Create something interesting to look at.'"

From 1991-1993, Anuna performed with "Riverdance." That was right at the beginning, when the show had the world clamoring for Irish dance and music. The group got out before being sucked into the "Riverdance" phenomenon, McGlynn says.

" 'Riverdance' at the time was this massive machine," he says. "It has no more cultural significance now than 'Cats' or 'Les Miz.' It's just a show."

Anuna has no imitators because no one can do what his brother does, McGlynn says. "He's a genius, even if he is my twin brother."

Anuna has filled the 5,000-seat Royal Albert Hall in London, McGlynn says, and everywhere the group goes, audiences respond "with standing ovations every night, sometimes in the middle of the second act.

"We're just a bunch of really ordinary people doing something extraordinary."

Doug Mason may be reached at 865-342-6441.