Long-time London resident Brian Rooney heads the list of recipients of the TG4 Gradam Ceoil 2012 (Traditional Music Awards) announced on February 2. Born and reared near Kiltyclogher in north-Leitrim, Brian’s fiddle playing soon earned him a place at the very centre of London’s vibrant traditional music scene in the 1970s and his recordings then [...]

Singer Tommy Makem has been nominated as a potential inductee into the Irish American Hall of Fame. “Mr. Makem is a pioneer as far as Irish folk music is concerned, and well deserving of this honour if he is to receive it,” said Mike Shelvin, a member of the Irish American Heritage Center’s board of [...]

Flute player Tim McHugh from Newport in Mayo was announced as winner of the Seán Ó Riada gold medal and prize money of €2500 on Friday night. He was amongst 15 traditional flute and whistle players who took to the stage in the Rochestown Park Hotel in Cork on Friday 13 [...]

After a rollercoaster week of about-turns and top level political intervention, Derry has been selected to host the 2013 All-Ireland Fleadh, the first time the event will take place in Northern Ireland.The 31-member central executive of Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Éireann met in Dublin  yesterday (January 28) to decide between Derry, Sligo and Ennis for an event [...]

Former Stocktons Wing member Steve Cooney’s marriage to singer Sinead O’Connor has ended. “Steve is lovely, so it’s not his fault, but mine,” the singer told the Irish Independent (14/4/2011). “it was not an extremely happy marriage. I am heartbroken about the marriage breaking up,” she said.
The split occured three weeks ago, just eight months [...]

The Obama Administration has refused to allow Irish American traditional musicians (and Irish musicians resident in the US) to participate in the Second Annual Celtic Festival in Cuba from April 15-26.
The festival is being organized by Irishman Kilian Kennedy who discovered during a vacation in Cuba a lively Celtic tradition sustained by immigrants and descendants [...]

The London Feis is to rise from the ashes of the London Fleadh. Spurred on by the recession at home, promoter Vince Power has spotted the opportunity and is reviving the Fleadh, the Irish music festival whose rise and fall marked the flow and ebb of the previous wave of Irish emigration.
Bob Dylan, who headlined [...]

Singer Paul Brady confronted Communications Minister Eamon Ryan at a music seminar in Dublin over what he perceives as the Government’s failure to protect the livelihoods and rights of Irish recording artists.
Paul Brady said he didn’t believe the Government was taking a strong enough line when it came to banning and blocking [...]

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” (because people thought he could fill a barrel w ith wind), who played flute [...]

Aimee Farrell-Courtney from Ratoath in Co. Meath was crowned World Bodhrán Champion 2010 at the annual festival in Milltown in Co. Kerry on June 7. Aimee came first of 15 entries in the senior competition,  judged by Donal Lunny, Connor Lyons and Sandra Joyce. She has being playing the Bodhrán for 13 [...]

The Irish Music Rights Organisation (IMRO) has moved against several top Irish blogs, demanding they pay hundreds of euro annually to continue sharing songs – even if they are sent to them by the artists and labels themselves, according to the Guardian newspaper.
So far, IMRO has contacted only three Irish blogs, but [...]

Last year the Kilfenora Ceili Band marked their hundreth birthday with a hectic schedule, including Glastonbury Festival. So time for the centenarians to hang up their instruments? Far from it, the Kilfenora continue to evolve. Their performance at Glor in Ennis on April 24 looks interesting, with additional players and unusual instruments joining them.
“The [...]

Altan mark 25 years as a band on Febriary 17 in the British Midlands …

Donal Lunny talks about university life in Limerick …

Opening of new Comhaltas centre is boycotted by [More]

For his new album, fiddler Kevin Burke teams up with composer Cal Scott

As the economy worsens, traditional music can help heal and bind us.

The Mulcahy Family from Co Limerick share their talents at the Masters of Tradition Festival

24 hours after the De Dannan row, the Wolfe Tones are on radio arguing over who owns the name …

Although he had to be assisted on and off stage and only sang five songs, Cavan fans couldn’t get enough of Shane MacGowan