Ed Reavy was born in Barnagrove, Mudabawn, Co Cavan in 1898. He emigrated to the USA as a teenager with his family in 1912 and settled in the predominantly Irish area of  Philadelphia known as Corktown. Barring visits home in 1922 and much later in 1969, he spent his life there until his death in 1988. A plumber by trade he played the fiddle and composed hundreds of Irish tunes.
“Our house was blessed through the years with visiting musicians who came to hear Dad play and to exchange tunes with him”, his son Joe recalled. “Louis Quinn and Lad O’Beirne, from New York, came often; they were Dad’s closest friends in the music world at that time. Pat Roche, the great dancer from Chicago, would drop in with Frank Thornton whenever they were in town. Michael Coleman, the legendary Sligo fiddler, also visited on occasion. And of course there were our own Philadelphia musicians like Neil Dougherty (and his son John), Frank Hearne, Charlie McDevitt, Mike McIntyre, Tommy Caulfield, John Vesey, and others who came to hear Dad’s music in Corktown.”
Reavy didn’t begin composing himself until the 1930s. Over 40 years, he became one of the most prolific creators of Irish traditional tunes. It is estimated that he wrote between 400 and 500 tunes in all, of which 127 have been preserved in notational form. He recorded a large number of his tunes onto homemade six-inch disks which he stored in his cellar. But heat played havoc with many of them, damaging the disks beyond reclamation. Only in the 1960s, with the interest and aid of his sons Joe and Ed Jnr, were Ed Reavy’s surviving compositions properly collected and put on paper.

In 1971, about 80 Reavy tunes were published in Where the Shannon Rises, a book that Armagh-born fiddler and close friend Louis Quinn (1904-1991) helped to put into print. By that time, many of the tunes in the book had already passed into the active tradition of most players, some of whom were unaware that the Cavan man had written them.

Eight years later, Mick Moloney produced an album, Ed Reavy (Rounder), that featured such instrumentalists as Paddy Cronin, Liz Carroll, Billy McComiskey, Brendan Mulvihill, Martin Mulvihill, Louis Quinn, Maeve Donnelly, and Eugene O’Donnell performing Reavy compositions. Among them were The Hunter’s Purse, arguably Reavy’s most popular tune; In Memory of Coleman, named for the great Sligo fiddler, and Maudabawn Chapel. A hornpipe, The Lone Bush, is about a remarkably resilient shrub outside his family farmhouse in Cavan.
Louis Quinn, once asked how you can tell a Reavy tune, said: “If a tune does not have a good melody, an original good melody, and if it doesn’t have rolls and runs and triplets and double stops that are actually part of the tune, not ornamentation, and it doesn’t play from the E to G string, it’s probably not an Ed Reavy tune.”

According to his son Ed: “He often commented that the basic problem with Irish traditional music is that it’s played on the first two strings of the fiddle and none of his tunes played on just the first two strings of the fiddle. He felt strongly about that and it’s reflected in the tunes he composed. He composed in keys no one else composed in, and would sometimes change keys in the middle of a tune.”
Ed Reavy died in Philadelphia in 1988.

Ed Reavy: For books and audio go to http://www.reavy.us/

Joe Shannon was born in 1920 near Kiltimagh, in Co Mayo. All of his seven older brothers played traditional music. When he was a young boy, his cousins and neighbours gathered at night at his family’s home to play fiddles, flutes, tin whistles, and melodeons. Joe began to play the tin whistle, but at first had a hard time keeping up with the others. “I had to learn,” he said, “because there was nothing else, and at that time, when I was a kid, there was no radio. There would be people that would come from the villages around that would come into my house because they knew it was a musical house, see. I heard all this traditional music being played while I was growing up in Ireland, and I never lost it.”

In 1926, his family immigrated to the large Irish community in Chicago, Illinois, looking for a better life. Joe was introduced to uillean pipes by his uncle, Eddie Mullaney, who taught him the basics of playing this most difficult of Irish instruments. Encouraged by his cousin and using an instrument lent to him by another musician, flutist Paddy Doran, Shannon learned to play pipes while still in elementary school. “I was so small,” he recalled, “I had to stuff books around my stomach to keep the pipes from falling off me.”

Joe Shannon. "American style of piping."

Later, Joe said, the pipe maker Patrick Henneley “provided” him with a full set of pipes. Although he never took formal lessons, he was heavily influenced by local musicians and especially by the early recordings of the famed pipers Patsy Tuohey and Tom Ennis. In 1934, He was invited to play in the Irish Village at the Chicago World’s Fair with the céilí band organised by step dancer Pat Roche. After the World’s Fair, Roche’s Harp and Shamrock Orchestra made several recordings for Decca.

When the Roche group disbanded, Shannon continued playing at Irish functions throughout the Chicago area. However, opportunities for public performances of Irish music waned during the Depression, World War II, and the immediate postwar period. Local musicians played for fund-raisers and community events, but the significance of Irish music in the daily lives of the Chicago Irish seemed to fade. Shannon was part of this larger societal shift as the priorities in his life changed. He married and had a family, and to earn a living he became a fireman and put aside his music.

In 1967, Eddie Mullaney gave him his set of pipes that were made by Taylor of Philadelphia around 1880, and Shannon began to play again with a renewed fervour. After retiring from the fire department, he devoted himself to his music. He played with the Chieftains, and resumed his local performances at community events.

Over the years, playing jigs, reels, and hornpipes, Joe Shannon developed his own style, utilising an American-influenced kind of ornamentation with single and double grace notes, passing tones, trills, single rolls, double-cut rolls, and staccato triplets. “They refer to my piping as the American style of piping,” he said, “because we’re different than what they do in Ireland, that’s all. I learned from records, recordings of great pipes that were here in the early part of the century in the 1900s, guys that were never in Ireland. The tones are the same but it’s just something that’s in me, see. It seems that I grace every note, and I don’t know, just fast movements of the fingers. I’m doing it, and I don’t know I’m doing it.”

Joe Shannon died on December 26, 2004, of skin cancer at his daughter’s home in Batavia. He was urvived by his son Jim,  daughters Mary Rasori, Noreen Ryder, Kathleen Krywar, Ellen Ford, Barbara Dolan, Nancy Bouloukos and Patty Finegan; 21 grandchildren and two great grandchildren.

Joe Derrane

While a senior at Roxbury Mission High School in Massachusetts, Joe Derrane recorded the first of what eventually became sixteen 78-rpm records that changed the course of Irish-American accordion music. These recordings, made in the late 1940s, featured Joe on the button accordion performing with a combination of ornamentation, rhythm, power, and polish that became legendary in the Irish-American community, as well as abroad. Joe went on to play piano accordion in ballroom dance bands eventually performing a more eclectic repertoire.

Due to a long absence from playing the button accordion, most aficionados of Irish music assumed that he had passed away or was too old to play, especially considering the skill and maturity exhibited on those 1940s recordings.

In 1994, however, Joe Derrane made a triumphant return to performing the button accordion at the Irish Folk Festival at Wolf Trap Farm Park in Virginia. At that event his children, now in their thirties, heard him play button accordion for the first time.

Accordionist Billy McComiskey said of the performance: “It’s really great just to see him. I didn’t realise he was still alive. I knew he was really, really good, but I didn’t know he was that good.”

Since then, Joe Derrane has toured internationally, made numerous recordings, and was named the “Best Male Musician of the Decade (1990-2000)” by the Irish American News. Even with these accolades, he makes an extra effort to teach young accordion students and to conduct instructional workshops in all parts of the country.

He became a National Endowment Awards Fellow in 2004. He lives in Randolf, MA.

Mick Moloney.

Mick Moloney was born November 15, 1944, in Limerick. He began playing tenor banjo at 16 years of age. As a teenager he listened to American folk singers, especially the music of the Weavers and Burl Ives. He remembers that there was not a lot of traditional instrumental music being played where he lived. As he got older, he used to go to neighboring Ennis, just over the River Shannon in Co Clare, to listen to music in the pubs. He tape-recorded the tunes so he could bring them home with him to learn them.

Growing up, he learned to sing traditional songs and to play guitar as well as mandolin and tenor banjo. During his formative years in Ireland, he played with the Emmet Folk Group, and later alongside Paul Brady in the popular and successful Johnstons. His participation with those bands shaped his perspective on and honed his skills in Irish music. He spent five years touring and recording with the Johnstons.

After spending a year in London doing social work, he emigrated to the USA in 1973 to pursue graduate studies in folklore at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, where he later earned a doctorate. Since then, he has devoted much of his time to the documentation and presentation of traditional Irish music and musicians.

Mick Moloney has been a driving force in Irish music in the United States. Much of the national exposure received by traditional Irish artists, such as Martin Mulvihill, Donny Golden, and Jack Coen — all National Heritage Fellows — is the result of Moloney’s work as mentor, producer, performer, and scholar. By recognizing and recording skilled musicians, he was highly influential in bringing Irish music out of pubs and parlours and placing it on stages and in concert halls. In 1977, he co-founded the Irish music group Green Fields of America.

Over the years, Moloney has taught Irish music and culture at universities around the country and conducted annual tours to Ireland to introduce Americans in particular to Irish culture. He has made numerous recordings in partnership with other Irish musicians, including Derry fiddler Eugene O’Donnell, button accordionist James Keane, and singer-guitarist Robbie O’Connell. To date, Moloney has released three solo albums.

In 1999 he was awarded a NEA Fellowship.

Flute player Mike Rafferty has been honoured by the US National Endowment for the Arts with a 2010 Heritage Award.

Born in 1926, Mike Rafferty grew up in Ballinakill, East Galway, on a 12-acre farm. In the heart of a locality steeped in the very best of traditional music, he learned to play music from his father, Tom “Barrel” who played flute and uilleann pipes. Rafferty learned many of his music skills in the old way, by listening over and over again to local musicians. In 1949, he emigrated to the United States, joining his sister. He soon married and raised a family of five: Kathleen, Teresa, Michael, Patrick, and Mary Bridget.

With encouragement from fellow musicians from home who also emigrated, Rafferty began to play music more frequently and in 1976, he joined a group of Irish musicians invited to perform at the Smithsonian Institution’s Bicentennial Festival of American Folklife. Rafferty subsequently toured with music and dance group the Green Fields of America and has appeared at concerts and festivals all over America. As a tradition bearer from Ireland he was influential in helping Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann (CCE) establish itself in North America through the Martin Mulvihill Branch. Since then, a branch has been named after him, the Michael Rafferty Branch both in New Jersey.

An outstanding proponent of the East Galway style of flute playing, Mike Rafferty devoted more time to teaching and playing music when he retired in 1989. He appeared on many recordings and has recorded three albums with his daughter Mary, an accomplished flute and accordion player: The Dangerous Reel, The Old Fireside Music, and The Road from Ballinakill. Rafferty released his solo CD Speed 78 in 2004. “No Irish traditional musician on either side of the Atlantic has created a more impressive body of recordings over the last nine years than flute, whistle, and uilleann pipes player Mike Rafferty,” wrote the Irish Echo in 2005. In 2009 at the age of 82 he recorded The New Broom with New Jersey fiddler Willie Kelly, whom he mentored, and accompanist Donal Clancy who is married to Mike’s daughter Mary.

He has devoted a lifetime to exploring, performing, and teaching Irish music to students on both sides of the Atlantic. In addition to teaching at the Catskills Irish Arts Week, he has taught through the New Jersey State Council on the Folk Arts Apprenticeship Program. In 2003, he was named Irish Echo’s Traditional Musician of the Year.

Mike Rafferty has never learned to read or write music, instead picking up tunes in the traditional manner – by ear. However, his repertoire of over 600 tunes has been transcribed by his longtime student Lesl Harker into two books: “300 Tunes from Mike Rafferty” (2005) and “Second Wind: 300 more Tunes from Mike Rafferty (2008).”

See also: raffertymusic.com/

Johnny O'Leary. "if I heard you play a tune once, I'd have it.''

Johnny O’Leary was born on June 6, 1923, in Maulykevane, about seven miles from Rathmore and four miles from Gneeveguilla in County Kerry. The young Johnny was always listening to the tunes when Tom Billy Murphy from Ballydesmond, also known as The Blind Fiddler, used to teach Johnny’s uncle, Dan O’Leary, to play the fiddle.
Johnny’s first instrument was a melodeon, bought by another uncle, Jerry O’Leary, in Clancys of Killarney for 12/6d. At the age of 12, he began to play with the late Denis Murphy at Thady Willie O’Connor’s Hall in Gneeveguilla. The association was to last 34 years and they were to be heard regularly playing together in Dan Connell’s pub in Knocknagree. Another fiddler who left a lasting impression on O’Leary was Pádraig O’Keeffe of Scartaglen.
“At that time, if I heard you play a tune once, I’d have it,” he told The Kerryman newspaper.
Through the late 1940s and the 1950s, Johnny also played with O’Keeffe in the pubs of Jack Lyons and Tom Fleming in Scartaglen.
Broadcaster Ciarán Mac Mathúna first met Johnny O’Leary on a trip to Kerry in the winter of 1955. ”He looks the same today as he did when he was playing in the 1960s,” the told journalist Breda Joy in 2001. “He has a huge repertoire. Any time you meet him, he comes up with new ‘old tunes’ that were hidden away.”
He stayed with the old push and draw of accordion playing, using a C=/D Paolo Soprani. In 1994 Terry Moylan’s book Johnny O’Leary of Sliabh Luachra and an accompanying 28 track CD were issued.

Irish wedding songs and tunes

Here is the selection at Ramblinghouse. Corn is what we feed to the chickens!

1. Eileen Aroon

A song from the old Gaelic order. Most apt sentiment. It was written by the Clare poet Cearbhall O Dálaigh (c.1590–1630) to woo his beloved, Eibhlin Caomhánach, daughter of a chieftain. It worked – they eloped. Lyrics and Midi (should be played slower than given here).

2. She Moved Through the Fair

Written by the poet Padraic Colum at the start of the last century. Based on one or more folk songs, it has the memorable finishing lines
“It will not be long, love,
Till our wedding day”
Sinead O’Connor’s version
Has its own Wiki page.

3. The Spinning Wheel

Written by the Limerick-born poet John Waller (1809 – 1894) and made popular by Delia Murphy. Harpist and singer Mary O’Hara recorded a beautiful version in the late 1950s.

4. Peigin Leitir Mor

Lively Connemara love song in Irish. Also danced to as a polka.
O goirim goirim í, Agus goirim í go deo
Míle ghrá le m’anam í, Sí Peigí Leitir Móir.
(Trans)
Oh I call her, call her my sweetheart;
1000 loves to her my Peggy of Lettermore.
Dubliners version on Youtube

5. Believe Me if All Those Endearing Young Charms

Thomas Moore wrote the lyrics that are popular today in 1808. Atmospheric John McCormack recording on Youtube

6. Irish Wedding Song

Not strictly an Irish song, as it was written by Australian Ian Betteridge but hugely popular nonetheless:
Here they stand, hand in hand, they’ve exchanged wedding bands
Today is the day of all their dreams and their plans
Lyrics

7. Nora/Maggie

Rewritten by Sean O’Casey from the song When You and I Were Young Maggie published in Canada in 1864. He changed the name to Nora for a character in The Plough and the Stars. Recorded by Maura O’Connell (Youtube)  and De Danann under original “Maggie” title.

8. The Voyage

Johnny Duhan’s modern song about hanging in there through thick and thin was made famous by Christy Moore.

9. My Lagan Love

Written to a traditional air by the Belfast poet Joseph Campbell in 1904. Recorded by Van Morrison, Sinead O’Connor and Dusty Springfield among many others.
Nor life I owe nor liberty
For love is lord of all

10. Carrickfergus/The Rose of Tralee

Reliable, diplomatic, last minute standbys … At Ramblinghouse we fancy Alison Moorer’s Carrickfergus. Youtube

Top airs

Suitable for church ceremony

1. Give Me Your Hand/Tabhair Dom Do Lamh

Composed by the blind harper Ruairi Dall O Cathain in the early 17th century.

2. Aisling Gheal

A hopeful vision. Recorded by Sean O Riada and Noel Hill among others.

3. March of the King of Laois

Melody long associated with the O’Moore family.
On Chieftains 3 album. Youtube

4. Lark in the Clear Air/Caislean Ui Neill

Old Gaelic love song. English lyrics by Sir Samuel Ferguson around 1850. Geraldine O’Grady’s violin version Youtube introduced Ciaran Mac Mathuna’s Sunday radio programme for years.

5. Snowy Breasted Pearl

Collected and translated from the Irish by George Petrie and published in 1855. Midi file at Barry Taylor’s website.

6. Cailin Deas Cruite na mBo/Pretty Girl Milking the Cow.

Beautiful old gaelic song recorded by Danu and Cathey Ryan. Air in Bunting, 1796.

7. I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen

American written, expressive emigrant song. Midi fil

Renowned Donegal fiddler Dinny McLaughlin from Buncrana has been awarded the International Fund for Ireland’s Intergenerational Award. The award is for his contribution in passing on music and dancing traditions. It also recognises the fact that several Inishowen dancing and fiddle teachers have been instructed by Dinny.
“It was nice to know that the work you have done through the years is given some merit”, said Dinny. “They said it was because my students have now travelled the world playing the music I taught them, pupils such as Altan’s Mairead Ni Mhaonaigh and CiaranTourish are playing all over the world.” Other pupils included Liz Doherty and Roisin and Damian Harrigan.
Dinny McLaughlin was born in 1935, in Shandrum near Buncrana in Inishowen, North East Donegal. At the time when Dinny was a boy “big nights” in houses were the main social events, as was the case all over Donegal. People would gather in a house and there would be music, dancing and singing often until morning.
Dinny was interested in the fiddle from a young age, though he was 14 before he got a fiddle of his own. His father, James, played the fiddle although it was a local fiddle player, Pat Mulherne, who became Dinny’s fiddle teacher.
Dinny played with the group Aileach and recorded with them.
Dinny also played with the Clonmany Ceili Ceili Band for some years along with fiddle player Séamus Grant, also an important player in the Inishowen music scene.
A book about Dinny was published in 2005 by Liz Doherty, titled Dinny McLaughlin: From Barefoot Days A Life Of Music Song & Dance In Inishowen.

Ready for school: Former SIPTU boss and flute player Des Geraghty and Sibeal Davitt with friend. Photo: Mark Maxwell.

Great to see that the Larkin Hedge School has now got legs under it. Founded in 2009, to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the founding of SIPTU (formerly the ITGWU), the Larkin Hedge School is now planning its second year. Hopefully it will become an annual event, which, like the Clé Club, will seek to promote the principle that a good trade union movement exists for the cultural enrichment of its members as well as the protection of their rights.

The Hedge School will be held in Liberty Hall, which has close ties with Irish music from the Transport Union pipe band set up in 1913, and which morphed in time into the Fintan Lawlor Pipe Band, to the annual May Day James Connolly concerts it hosted. Luke Kelly and the Dubliners often performed for free at these concerts as did many other great names of the Ballad Boom.

Liberty Hall also hosts the Clé Club which over the last five years has staged dance, poetry and storytelling with visitors from many countries. The Larkin Hedge School hopes to reflect that diversity, with workshops, lectures, classes and concerts. The charge of €10 per day covers all events.

This years Hedge Master are: Peter Browne, Johnny Morrisey, Sibéal Davitt, Gerry (fiddle) O’Connor, Vincent Woods, Neileidh Mulligan, Dónall Ó Braonáin, Nicholas Carolan, Manus O’Riordan, Francis Devine and Mary McPartlan.
Also taking part: Aisteoirí Chronáin, An Goilín Singers’ Club, The Liberties History Group and the British Association for Performing Arts Medicine.

The Larkin Hedge School,

Liberty Hall,

Dublin 1

June 11 – 12.

Hedge School Web Page.

Originally recorded by Liam Devally, the song was made famous in the early 1960s when recorded by Sean O Se to an arrangement by Sean O Riada. From an original poem by Donal O Mullain in the early 20th century, the words have probably been amended (the reference to showjumping champion Eddie Macken in the English version is an obvious change).

Also on the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem album The First Hurrah! (1964)

In 2009 John Spillane recorded it on the album Irish Songs We Learned At School

An Poc ar Buile
By Donal O Mullain
Ar mo ghabáil dom siar chun Droichead Uí Mhórdha,
Píce i m’ dhóid is mé ag dul i meitheal,
Cé chasfaí orm i gcumar ceoidh
Ach pocán crón is é ar buile,
Alliliú puilliliu,
alliliú tá an poc ar buile.

Do ritheamar trasna trí ruilleogach
Is do ghluais an comhrac ar fud na muinge,
Is treascairt dá bhfuair sé sna turtóga
Chuas ina ainneoin ar a dhroim le fuinneamh

Alliliú puilliliu, alliliú tá an poc ar buile.

Níor fhág sé carraig go raibh scó (scabhat) ann
Ná gur rith le fórsa chun mé a mhilleadh,
Is ea ansin do chaith sé an léim ba mhó
Le fána mhór na Faille Brice,

Alliliú puilliliu, alliliú tá an poc ar buile.

Bhí garda mór i mBaile an Róistigh
Is bhailigh fórsaí chun sinn a chlipeadh,
Do bhuail sé rop dá adhairc sa tóin air
Is dá bhríste nua do dhein sé giobail,

Alliliú puilliliu, alliliú tá an poc ar buile.

I nDaingean Uí Chúis le haghaidh an tráthnóna
Bí an sagart paróiste amach ‘nár gcoinnibh,
Is é dúirt gurbh é an diabhal ba dhóigh leis
A ghaibh an treo ar phocán buile!
Alliliú puilliliu, alliliú tá an poc ar buile.

The Mad Puck Goat
(Translated by James N Healy)
As I set out with pike in hand
To old Dromore to join a meitheal,
Who should I meet but a tan puck goat
And he roaring mad in ferocious mettle
Alliliú etc.
He chased me over bush and weed
And through the bog the run proceeded
‘Till he caught his horns in a clump of gorse
And on his back I jumped unheeded
Alliliú etc.
There was ne’er a rock with no passage through
Which he didn’t jump, and me like Eddie Macken
But when he lepped clean down Faill Breach
I felt like a load of old wet sackin’
Alliliú etc.
When the sergeant stood in Rochestown
With a force of guards to apprehend us
The goat he tore his trousers down
And made rags of his breeches and new suspenders
Alliliú etc.
In Dingle the following afternoon
The parish priest came to call us to order
And he swore from the pulpit each Sunday in June
“Twas the devil on the back of his own grandfather
Alliliú etc.

Piper Sean McKiernan. Befriended Willie Clancy.

Piper Seán McKiernan lives in Carna in Co. Galway, and is a native Irish speaker. His mother’s family home in Coillín, Carna, where he now lives, is situated in the heartland of the great sean nós and folklore tradition. Seán’s grandfather Pádraic Mac Con Iomaire was acknowledged as man with a huge store of native lore.

Seán McKiernan was actually born and reared in Boston. His early attempts at music included singing into the back of the radio, later on trying out the melodeon, before finally settling on the pipes.

Filled with curiosity about the pipes he was put in touch with Leo Rowsome, paid the princely sum of £10 for a practice set and began to teach himself. He returned to Ireland in 1965 having completed much of his education in the States.

At this time he was becoming familiar with Willie Clancy’s music from old Gael Linn 78 recordings. He became enthralled by Clancy’s piping and visited him in his home in Miltown Malbay many times. Willie Clancy undoubtedly became the biggest influence on his music and a close friend and a mentor.

Nowadays Seán McKiernan divides his time between Carna and Cork, where he teaches classical piano in the Cork School of Music. In recent years he has performed at Tionóls at home and in the States. He has performed in the Pipers Club in Dublin and is regarded by many as one of the great living pipers. He won a TG4 Traditional Music Award in 2010.

I’ve never been to Coolea in West Cork. But as the years roll by, I get a clearer picture of its landscape. I vividly recall RTE footage of Sean O Riada standing elegantly in his sittingroom, one hand resting on the piano, as tells us in his schoolroom manner about, say, Johnny Doherty and the Donegal regional style.
Over fortyyears later my imagination is carried back to the Coolea gaeltacht and the O Riada home, this time to the kitchen, as I listen to a new CD, Triur sa Draigheann, recorded there on basic equipment by Peadar O Riada, Martin Hayes and Caoimhin O Raghallaigh.
As I listen, I try to guess which tunes are Peadar’s own compositions. I can only be sure about two. And as I open the sleevenotes, it turns out to my surprise that all 19 are by Peadar, for as Martin Hayes points out: “If I didn’t know otherwise I would have thought that they were old tunes from the 19th century, possibly of Sliabh Luachra and Clare origin.”

The ‘Draighean’ of the title is the name of the O Riada home. It is the Irish for blackthorn which is common to the area and which, along with Peadar’s interesting sleevenotes on each tune, take the imagination back outdoors: to the river across from the house where, as I recall, Sean O Riada fished for trout in the old RTE footage, and beyond into the West Cork landscape. Beyond the river lived John the Rookery O Riordain, which is also the title of a jig which started life with the sound the horses made as John led them along the road.

Beyond that again are the mountains where the composer as a boy hunted for rabbits and hares with his friends and their dogs. The result is the jig Fiach. Then there are tunes to do with the new County Hall, Cork footballer Anthony Lynch and Kilnamartyra fiddler Connie O’Connell.
The rhythm of a small stream passing over a rock was the beginnings of the five-minute slow air and song Trathann an Taoide which also mourns the death of a friend and choir member Diarmuidin Maidhchi. The lyrics are by local poet Donal O Liathain.
An so I learn more about the nature of the composer’s West Cork landscape and its people and its culture.

The poet and philosopher John O’Donoghue said: “I’m always amazed about Irish music, for instance, how in some way the lines of the landscape find their way into the music, the memory of the landscape almost …”

Like Paddy Fahey’s East Galway. I love that anecdote about the student who asked him where he got his inspiration.
“Well,” replied Paddy, a farmer all his life, “I composed one in that hollow over there . . . another by those bushes in the next field … and another one on my way from the barn.”

Peadar O Riada, who studied music in UCC under Aloys Fleischmann, is also leader of the Cuil Aodha choir, famous for its performance of the O Riada Mass. On this album he plays concertina, accordion, tin whistle and Indian tambura on the slow air. Martin Hayes from East Clare, is a fiddle player you must know. A talented young musician who likes to experiment within the tradition,  Caoimhin O Raghallaigh plays hardanger fiddle and viola. This album is everything I expected from these three artists. For musicians seeking new tunes, this should prove to be a rich source. – RN

Triur sa Draighean, Peadar O Riada, Martin Hayes and Caoimhin O Raghallaigh, POR 010 .
http://www.peadaroriada.ie/

Dervish. Live from Hargadons Pub in Sligo

Dervish made history as their Sligo pub session on May 2 was beamed to over 30,000 people on the internet for the release their Live Album & DVD From Stage to Stage.

Dervish celebrated their 21st birthday in style as the band played a dynamic pub session of traditional Irish music at the local Hargadons pub on O’Connell Street, which was broadcast on livetrad.com to a global audience of over 30, 000 people. The webcast, which peaked at around 11 000 simultaneous online connections at one stage, had messages coming in from all parts of the world every minute while the group performed some of their best-known material from their 10 album catalogue.

Dervish singer Cathy Jordan could not hide her excitement as she read requests from all over Ireland and places like Portland Oregon, San Francisco, Holland, Indonesia, Germany, Austrialia, as she joked and interacted with the online and the local pub audiences.

Dervish band member Shane Mitchell said “It was a truly remarkable experience for us and one of the highest points of our career to date. There was a real sense of occasion throughout the evening and it was amazing to think that there were so many people looking on line.” Dervish were joined by local musicians Philip Duffy, Declan Corelle, Oisin Mac Diarmuda, Damien Stenson and Teo Page for the grand finale ending.

Website: dervish.ie

Cuban, Irish and Canadian Celts share music and dance traditions …

NUIG is starting a new two year diploma in Irish music at the Galway campus this September. The diploma is offered on a part-time basis one evening per week (Wednesday) and runs over a two year period, at the end of which students will receive a Diploma in Irish Music Studies. Topics covered over the two years include The Journey and Influence of Irish Music 1750-2006 (Year 1) and Negotiating Identity through Irish traditional music and dance (Year 2).

The programme is intended for anyone with an interest in modern Irish culture and traditional music.

According to the University, the course provides an introduction to the ways in which music and literature have contributed to the creation of identity among Irish communities on the island of Ireland and beyond.   The course investigates the ways in which Irish writers and those involved in the revival of Irish traditional music and dance were actively involved in the formation and reformation of modern Irish identities. It provides insights from music, dance, poetry, television and film of the ways in which Irish performers and writers have been actively involved in imagining and re-imagining Ireland from the eighteenth century through to the present.

According to course coordinator, Tim Collins:  “It will have broad appeal to all and no previous knowledge of the Irish language or of Irish music is necessary”.

Application forms are available from:

Admissions Office
NUI Galway
091 492199
Fax 091 495566
admissionsnuigalway.ie

Find out more

Ms. Samantha Williams
Centre for Irish Studies
Phone 091 492051
Email: samantha.williamsnuigalway.ie
www.nuigalway.ie/adulteducation

On-Line-Diploma

Dr. Michelle Comber
Centre for Irish Studies
michelle.combernuigalway.ie
www.irishstudiesonline.org

TG4’s televised competiton for dancers of all ages, disciplines and codes, An Jig Gig, is returning for another season. In a nail-biting final last December, Irish Beats triumphed over World Champion Clodagh Roper, Celtic Roots, and The Mark Donnellan Memorial Team. The search for An Gig Jig Champion 2010 is now under way.
Hosted by Róisín Ní Thomáin, the show will again see hundreds of acts, from all different styles of Irish dance, and all age groups, take to the stage. This year’s three judges are:
Breandán de Gallaí, former lead dancer with Riverdance. A hard man to impress and any dancer going on stage in front of him, aiming to be crowned the best Irish dance act in Ireland, will have to be good..
Dearbhla Lennon, also a former lead dancer with Riverdance, has performed at the top level in Irish dance for years. Like Breandán, she is an expert in the field, and will quickly weed out the ordinary from the talented dancers.
Labhrás Sonaí Choilm Learraí, a champion sean-nós dancer, and a strong supporter of the older styles of Irish dance.
To apply to take part in the competition, click on the programme website at www.tg4.ie/jiggig

Auditions will take place on:
Friday 7th May: Killarney, 5pm – 8pm
Saturday 8th May: Cork, 10am – 1pm
Saturday, 8th May: Limerick, 4pm – 7pm
Sunday, 9th May: Galway, 10am – 1pm
Sunday 9th may: Dublin, 4pm – 8pm
Successful applicants will be invited to RTE studios in Dublin to take part in the show.

Dates for the recording of the series:
There are ten First Round shows and they will be recorded over the following dates:
Wednesday 26th May 2010
Thursday 27th May 2010
Friday 28th May 2010
Wednesday 2nd June 2010
Thursday 3rd June 2010
Friday 4th June 2010
One winner will be picked from each of the First Round shows. There are then three additional shows to whittle the ten First Round winners down to one overall series winner.
The Quarter Final will be recorded in RTE, Dublin, on Thursday 10th June and the semi finalists return to RTE, Dublin on Thursday 17th June.
Finally, the dance acts that have made it all the way to the Series Finale will return to RTE, Dublin on Thursday 24th June 2010.
Any style of Irish dance is eligible for the show. Also, there are no age restrictions on contestants. The number of people in each act is also not restricted, and can range from one upwards.
For more information contact Mark at Adare Productions on 01 2843877 or email mark@adareproductions.ie.

FAME came in his 60th year to singer and fiddle player Dessie O’Halloran of Inishboffin The year 2001 saw him travel from his Atlantic island home off the Galway/Mayo coast to perform in Europe and America.
His song Say You Love Me was the vocal hit of Sharon Shannon’s 2000 album The Diamond Mountain Sessions. John O’Regan has

Dessie O'Halloran: Innishboffin singer and fiddler

described it as “an up-tempo slice of Irish/Cajun style Vaudeville.”
Since then he has released his own top-selling album of songs and tunes, The Pound Road, named after the road on Inishboffin on which he lived. Animals taken from tenants because of rent arrears were brought along that road to the pound.
In his early teens he learned to play fiddle on the island from Pat Cloherty and he credits islandman Bernard Tierney with being one of his singing mentors. His mother played the accordion and, as he puts it, “some of my father’s people were good singers.”
With his brothers Vince, an accordion player, and Malachy, he emigrated to England in the late 1950s. They worked on the buildings and played the Irish pubs in the evenings. In 1976 Des and Vince recorded an album for the Topic label. Aptly named The Men of the Island, it is now a much-sought-after recording.
Return to ‘Boffin
He returned to ‘Boffin in 1980. In the mid-80s he became part of the popular Inishboffin Ceili Band, which performed to delighted audiences in Galway’s Roisín Dubh. Many musicians would sit in, including Matt Molloy and Sharon Shannon, with whom Dessie was to form an enduring friendship.
Visitors to Days’ pub on the island are used to his personable style. “When he sings in the pub and even when it’s just him, everybody takes notice,” Sharon Shannon told the Irish Times. “Desmond’s voice is rugged and totally unaffected.”

He heard the song Say You Love Me back in his London days on an EP by country singer Hall O Browne. A Kentuckian, he fronted a band called the Timberliners. Since Dessie revived it, it has been recorded by an Irish country an western band.
The Pound Road was produced by Donal Lunny with guests Cathy Jordan of Dervish, Sharon Shannon and Eleanor Shanley. The songs are mainly those Des picked up in his youth on the Island: Courtin’ in the Kitchen, Katie Daly, Patsy Fagan, The Boys of the County Mayo and Eileen McMahon, which Cathy Jordan recorded a few years back.
There are two fiddle pieces from Dessie: Tomin O’Dea’s and Mairtin Byrnes’ Waltz.
The album concludes with the American gospel song Will the Circle Be Unbroken, dedicated to his brother Christy who died earlier this year.
Dessie is also a very good sean-nós singer, and regularly sang in Oireachtas sean-nós competitions. Nor, seemingly, has the Gaeltacht begrudged him his success, inviting him in September 2001 to perform at Connemara’s Pléarácha Festival.

Discography
The Pound Road, Dessie O’Halloran, Grapevine.
The Men of the Island, Dessie and Vince O’Halloran, Topic.

Also
The Diamond Mountain Sessions, Sharon Shannon. Grapevine.

Born near Bodyke in East Clare in 1916, Martin Rochford started learning fiddle aged ten. He was won over to the uilleann pipes when he heard the travelling piper Tony Rainey playing. In a note to Liam McNulty of the Pipers Club in the late 1980s, Martin wrote:
“I remember a Saturday evening in 1935, the Model Y Ford had just come to Ennis, and Tony Rainey was playing in O’Connell Square in the town. He played a full set, concert pitch, and he was a great regulator player. He had a lady collecting money while he played. Among the tunes he played was The Heather Breeze and it was so good that someone, from Kilmaley, I think, asked him to play it again.” He added: “Rainey used to sell the pipes when he got very dry.” (Published in An Piobaire).
So taken was Martin by him that he decided to learn the uilleann pipes. Tony Rainey sold him a practice set. He later formed a friendship with another travelling piper, Johnny Doran, who often visited, parking his caravan nearby and playing in the house. Felix Doran was another regular visitor. Martin learned The Swallow’s Tail from Johnny and always played his version of The Copperplate. Leo Rawsome was another visitor to the district.
Sean Reid, the piper and engineer, who did a lot of work encouraging young pipers in County Clare in the 1940s in particular, was introduced to Martin. In 1947 he brought a group which included Martin Rochford, Paddy O’Donoghue and Willie Clancy to Dublin to compete in the Oireachtas (Willie Clancy won a first).
Martin played the fiddle and uilleann pipes in the easy East Clare style, like his friend Paddy Canny, with whom he often played, and Paddy’s father Pat. In the latter years he continued to play the fiddle but could only manage a practice set of pipes due to a swelling in his hands.
Martin drove a lorry, farmed and worked his lime kilns while raising a family with his wife Kathleen. He was very friendly with Willie Clancy, he knew Junior Crehan for 60 years, Tommy Kearney was a great friend and the younger generations visited him regularly; Kevin Burke, Martin Hayes, (he plays Martin Rochford’s on the Live in Seattle album), Mary MacNamara all have a lot to thank Martin for and plenty of pipers called all the time as well. There are strong and interesting similarities in the fiddle styles of Martin Rochford and Martin Hayes from Feakle. He welcomed the playing of younger musicians, but was critical of fast music at “hurricane speed.”
The Clare Champion wrote of him in their obituary: “He never regarded his heritage as his own private property but rather as something which he should encourage and pass on. To this end he was always willing to meet fellow musicians to teach and write tunes and his house was a Mecca for lovers of Irish music worldwide.” He died in October, 2000.
With special thanks to Peter Laban and Eugene Lambe.

BORN in Nelson, New Zealand, his grandfather came from Wexford. As a child he would hear Irish music on some of his father’s record collection, including fiddler Sean Maguire.
He was inspired to buy a harmonica after hearing the blues playing of Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee in concert. He developed an eclectic range of styles and recorded over a dozen albums. “I enjoy switching between styles, as it keeps a concert fresh and exciting,” he told one interviewer.
He moved to London in 1992. A suggestion that he do an instructional tape on Irish music on the harmonica led to his New Irish Harmonium album. The album made a big impression in Ireland where Power was readily accepted as a musician.
Brendan entered the All-Ireland Championships “just for the crack” in 1993 and won. This was despite being put in the “Miscellaneous” category alongside bouzoukis and dulcimers and so on.
His stylistic innovations and breathtaking ability on the harmonica have led to numerous appearances and recordings with other musicians such as Altan, Arty McGlynn, Mary Black, Ray Charles and Sting. He has also recorded feature film scores.
However he finds his image as an Irish musician “a bit strange to me, as it’s only one aspect of what I’m interested in … It’s kind of a double-edged sword, as it’s nice to be known for playing Irish music, but it means I have a label now that doesn’t really reflect the diversity of what I’m into.”
He joined the Riverdance music team for a while in 1998-99. “It was scary to start with, and extremely boring after a few months,” he commented later.
Brendan’s curiosity about the limitations of the harmonica has led him to experiment with modifications, design and different tunings. “If I like the sound of a particular piece and style of music, I’ll wonder if it can be played on harmonica – even if it means chopping up and returning the instrument to get the correct flavour of that style.”
In the late ’80s Suzuki manufactured one of his models, The Power Reed and Valve System. He has recorded with artists including Sting, Van Morrison, James Galway, Shirley Bassey, Paul Young, Altan, Mary Black, played on many Hollywood soundtracks (such as 2008 Oscar winner Atonement) and performed in the Kremlin.

See also: The Irish Harmonica

Clannad. Videos removed from YouTube after row with TG4.

Traditional Irish music acts and songwriters will now get a cut of revenue from YouTube, as part of a new licensing agreement, according to The Sunday Times. Google, the owner of YouTube,  has done a deal with the Irish Music Rights Organisation (Imro) and the Mechanical Copyright Protection Society Ireland (MCPSI), which will see the company pay copyright holders for every ‘view’ of videos that contain their music, even if it is only played in the background.

The deal will run until the end of 2012 and follows a similar agreement YouTube made in Britain in 2009. The collection companies will get a lump sum payment, which will be distributed to artists based on the hits recorded at YouTube. The deal is also believed to provide for a retroactive payment back to 2005.
YouTube has agreede to provide data on the hits so Imro and MCPSI can decide how to distribute the fee to its artists. However, as many traditional musicians don’t bother to register with Imro, it is the big names like Sharon Shannon, The Dubliners and Chieftains who will benefit most.
In 2007 YouTube was forced to remove all content from TG4 after ten videos of Clannad were posted online. Youtube received a complaint that its hosting of the Donegal group’s videos breached copyright and TG4 reacted by asking for all of its material to be removed. However, plenty of people keep uploading TG4 material. For example, a half-hour TG4 documentary about melodeon player Johnny Connolly, uploaded last year,  can be viewed over four sections on YouTube. Then there are videos of deceased musicians who may never have heard of Imro or MCPSI.