Pádraig O’Keeffe was born in October 1887 in Glounthane, near Scartaglen and Castleisland, Co Kerry. His father, John, was a school principal and he was the eldest of nine children. His mother, Margaret O’Callaghan came from a musical family and his uncle, Cal O’Callaghan, was a well-known fiddler.
After training in Dublin he became a schoolmaster [...]

Attendances were up on last year at Muskegon for the Michigan Irish Festival…

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

Biography of the Irish traditional music fiddle player Mairtin Byrnes from Co Galway.

Paddy Canny was born in Glendree, near Tulla in Co Clare, in 1919. His father Pat played the fiddle, as did both his brothers, and the blind fiddle instructor Paddy MacNamara boarded with the family during the winter and gave music lessons to many local children. His mother, Catherine McNamara, came from Feakle. In 1961 [...]

Julia Clifford was born on June 19, 1914, into a musical family at Lisheen, Gneevgullia in the Sliabh Luachra area north of Killarney, Co Kerry. The travelling fiddle teacher Padraig O’Keeffe tutored both Julia [...]

Fiddle and concertina player, singer, composer and storyteller, Martin (Junior) Crehan was born on January 17, 1908, in Bonavilla, Mullagh, Co Clare, into a house of flute players, concertina players and dancers. His father was a teacher at Shanaway National School. Junior learned concertina from his mother and later when learning fiddle was greatly influenced [...]

ALTHOUGH now an iconic figure of Donegal fiddle music, as a musician John Doherty was very much an individualist. But more than any other musician, he did draw attention to that county’s distinctive fiddle style.
The musical lineage of the Doherty and McConnell families goes back many generations of Travellers that alternated between settled and life [...]

Frankie Gavin was born in Corrandulla, on the eastern side of Lough Corrib in County Galway, in 1956. There was a lot of music in the family. His father played the fiddle. His mother, Mary Crehan from Ballygar, and her brothers all played music on either fiddle or accordeon. His brother Sean plays the accordion [...]

Fiddle and concertina player John Kelly was a central figure in Irish traditional music in the middle decades of the past century. Without him we would very probably have had no recording of the piping of Johnny Doran. In fact he is the only musician known to have recorded with Doran.
Born in 1912 in Rehy, [...]

Denis Murphy was born on November 14, 1910, at Lisheen, Gneeveguilla Co. Kerry. His father Bill had a fife and drum band which performed at local events like Knocknagree races and he played flute, fife and fiddle. Bill married Mary (Mainie) Corbett, herself a fine singer, and they had eight children, of which Denis was [...]