Ever since she left De Dannan to begin her solo career in 1987, Mary Black has experimented with finding the proper balance of folk and pop to best suit her magnificent voice. Speaking with the Angel, which includes songs by Dougie MacLean, John Gorka, Sting, Ron Sexsmith, and the folkie's favorite songwriter Anonymous, gets the ratio just about right. The CD includes uptempo pop ditties such as "Message of Love" and "Big Trip to Portland"; smoky, jazz-inflected songs like "Fall at Your Feet"; and of course a good sampling of folk songs like "Turning Away" and "I Live Not Where I Love." On her late-'90s albums Black abandoned her familiar folk-inspired arrangements in favor of a slick, pop sound, but here she has enlisted the help of famed Celtic music producer Donal Lunny, who worked on five songs, to help keep her music from straying too far from its roots. Speaking with the Angel is a CD full of strong performances, but perhaps the most moving is "Moments," a tribute to Sandy Denny, a singer Black still turns to for inspiration more than two decades after her untimely death. --Michael Simmons