While raised in Lafayette and bred on Cajun and classical music, an Irish-folk influence on Beth Patterson songs resonates throughout On Better Paths. Her combination of progressive folk and Cajun influences while playing the bouzouki is a lively hybrid of world music that makes all the cuts seem exotic on first listen. She successfully blends world and American folk music, but there’s a catch. With the exceptions of the emotionally charged Katrina ballad, “Come Hell or High Water” and the bluegrass-infused “Sugar Cane,” the foreign becomes commonplace as each song seems to be a reworking of the one before it.

Still, what Patterson does, she does well. While the songs may seem to be on a permanent loop, her studies in ethnomusicology at Ireland’s University College Cork obviously paid off. She grasps the material with the hands of a professional musician. On “Avoidance Dream Diversion” and “Koinophilia,” Patterson crafts spot-on Irish folk, but she doesn’t push them past the grounding of her education. She has the know-how and the understanding in music to succeed, but she needs to move from traditional Irish folk hybrids to songs that truly catch the ear with an ambitious, inspired meshing of world music.