A recent addition since 2012 to the range of instruments taught at the annual Willie Clancy Summer School in Miltown Malbay, Co Clare, is the tenor banjo, an instrument introduced into the playing of Irish traditional music in the early 20th century. Heard in some numbers on recordings of Irish band musicians in the United States from the 1910s, it came into its own in the music in the 1960s, under the influence especially of the Dublin banjo player Barney McKenna, and it has been enjoying a new burst of popularity in recent years.

As well as now being taught at the School, the banjo has also been featured there at well-attended recitals by the tutors, pupils and others, including accompanists, held in a marquee at the local GAA ground. The organisers of the WCSS have facilitated the Irish Traditional Music Archive in recording these recitals since their inception in 2012, and a selection of the recordings is presented here.

With thanks to the organisers of the WCSS for their facilitation; to Clare banjo player Kieran Hanrahan, organiser of the banjo classes there; and to the featured performers.

Nicholas Carolan, Brian Doyle & Treasa Harkin, 1 June 2015

The banjo has been a popular instrument in American culture, particularly in jazz and minstrel music, since the early 20th century. It is now generally accepted that the banjo originated in Africa and was introduced to the United States as a consequence of the slave trade. In its original form, it would have been constructed from timber gourds and hide skin with hemp or gut strings. In the United States the instrument underwent numerous modifications, such as the addition of frets, tension hoops, synthetic skins and steel strings. Gradually the banjo was integrated into mainstream popular American music.

However the popularity it was to gain in Irish traditional music most probably began with the invention of the four-string or tenor banjo in the opening years of the 20th century. This differed in a number of ways from earlier models, but most significantly the tenor banjo had four strings instead of five, had a shorter neck and was played with a plectrum. It was tuned at a higher pitch than its modern equivalent, but in fifths, similar to the mandolin, and thus complemented the fiddle. It also had the advantage of being loud, making it suitable to play in the noisy, poorly amplified venues of the time. Another factor in its popularity was the ready availability of high quality instruments, at affordable prices, by makers such as William Lange of Paramount fame, with a factory on 225−227 East Twenty Fourth Street, New York.

This selection of early 20th-century recordings reflect the sounds of the pioneers of this ‘new’ instrument in the tradition. Without there being teachers to imitate, a range of styles and approaches developed:  James Ryan, from Paddy Killoran’s Pride of Erin Orchestra, tended to use the banjo largely as a backing instrument; Michael Gaffney adopted a plain melodic style, while the virtuoso playing of Mike Flanagan was a mixture of melody and chords held together by a wonderful underlying sense of rhythm.

The earliest-known commercial recording of Irish traditional music played on the banjo dates back to 18 December 1916, when James Wheeler recorded with accordion player Edward Herborn for the Columbia label.

We hope you enjoy this eclectic mix of early banjo-playing styles from ITMA’s collection of 78 rpm discs.

Brian Doyle, 1 February 2016

During the late 1950s and early 1960s Dr Tom O’Beirne, now of Mohill, Co Leitrim, was a medical student in Dublin and an enthusiast for Irish traditional music. He had acquired a domestic reel-to-reel tape recorder and used it to record musicians in his flat in Rathgar and in the Irish music club that then operated in Church St in the city. He also recorded traditional music from Ciarán Mac Mathúna’s radio programmes on RTÉ, and from the ‘Bring Down the Lamp’ series on RTÉ Television. A selection of these recordings is presented here; Dr O’Beirne’s voice can be heard identifying some of the selections.

Irish traditional instrumental music was growing in popularity in Dublin from the early 1960s – aided by the public performances of groups such as the Castle Ceili Band and Ceoltóirí Chualann, and by radio and television programmes – although it was at the time nothing as popular as were traditional songs and ballads.

Older Dublin musicians, like the accordion player Sonny Brogan and the uilleann piper Tommy Reck, played regularly with older immigrant country musicians, like the flute player John Egan from Sligo, and celebrity players visiting the city, like flute player Paddy Taylor of Limerick & London and the accordion player Joe Cooley of Galway. A new rising generation of Dublin instrumentalists was also to be heard, among them banjo player Barney McKenna, flute and whistle player Dessie O’Connor, and fiddle player Sean Keane. Much of the music then current in the city is to be found in Breandán Breathnach’s first printed collection Ceol Rince na hÉireann (Dublin, 1963)

The technology of tape recording had been introduced commercially in the late 1940s in the United States. But it was only used in the professional domain in Ireland until the later 1950s when domestic reel-to-reel tape machines began to become widely available. Awkward to use and normally depending on mains electrical supply, these held the field until the 1970s when they were generally abandoned for the inferior but more convenient cassette tape recorder.

With thanks to Dr Tom O’Beirne for the donation of his tape recordings and for permission to publish selections from them; to Tom Mulligan of the Cobblestone bar, Smithfield, Dublin, for his good offices; and to fiddle player Jesse Smith for his work in digitising them. ITMA always welcomes the donation of such tape recordings or the opportunity to copy them.

Nicholas Carolan & Danny Diamond, 1 August 2010

They Love Music Mightily’: Contemporary Recordings of Irish Traditional Music – An Ceol Comhaimseartha was a joint cross-border audiovisual travelling exhibition of the Ulster Folk & Transport Museum in Cultra, Holywood, Co Down, and the Irish Traditional Music Archive in Dublin. It was on display in various venues from 2000 to 2004. The exhibition was intended to emphasise that Irish traditional music is an exciting and varied contemporary artform. It consisted of stands with giant back-lit transparencies of thirteen leading contemporary singers and musicians, and sound recordings on headphones of the featured performers. The title of the exhibition is a quotation from the writings of William Good, an English observer of the Irish in the 1560s.

The exhibition was initiated by Robbie Hannan (then Curator of Music at the UFTM), advised by Professor Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin of the University of Limerick (former Chairman of the ITMA Board). It was designed by Michael Donnelly of the UFTM, and featured specially commissioned photographs by Paul McCarthy (an independent photographer) and sound recordings by Glenn Cumiskey (then ITMA Sound Engineer), with additional recordings by Robbie Hannan, Niall Keegan (UL), and Paul Dooley, one of the featured performers. It was curated by Robbie Hannan in Cultra and by Nicholas Carolan (Director of the ITMA) in Dublin, with the assistance of Orla Henihan (then ITMA Visual Materials Officer).

The exhibition catalogue (produced by Robbie Hannan and Glenn Cumiskey) was a CD with the recordings and photographs featured in the exhibition, and with notes on the performers and material. It was only on sale in conjunction with the exhibition, and is now presented above.

After being opened in the UFTM in November 2000 by Roisín McDonough, Director of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, ‘They Love Music Mightily’ remained on exhibition there for a year before moving to the National Museum of Ireland at Collins Barracks, Dublin. Managed there by Mairead Dunlevy, Keeper of Art & History in the NMI, and architect Niall Parsons of the Office of Public Works, in cooperation with ITMA staff, it was opened in November 2001 by Dr Ciarán Mac Mathúna of RTÉ Radio and Dr Pat Wallace, Director of the NMI. The exhibition was enlarged for its Dublin appearance by an exhibition of musical instruments from the collections of the NMI and ITMA, a film compiled from the Archives of RTÉ Television (with the cooperation of Cathal Goan, then Director of RTÉ Television and Chairman of the ITMA), a series of public talks – ‘What is Irish Traditional Music?’ (Nicholas Carolan), ‘Traditional Singing in Ireland’ (the late Tom Munnelly, Dept of Irish Folklore, University College Dublin, and former ITMA Chairman), and ‘The Story of Irish Dance’ (author Helen Brennan) – and a recital by Robbie Hannan, uilleann pipes, and three of the featured musicians: Mary MacNamara, concertina; Paul O’Shaughnessy, fiddle; and Paul Dooley, harp. In 2002 the exhibition ran in the Fermanagh County Museum in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh; in 2003 in the Glór music centre in Ennis, Co Clare; and from 2003 until 2004 in the Millennium Forum, Derry City. Having been dismantled and ended its terrestrial life, it begins a virtual existence on this website.

A gallery of the exhibition photographs by Paul McCarthy is available below.

With thanks especially to the thirteen performers who took part in the exhibition, to all listed above and otherwise who contributed to its success, and to the Ulster Folk & Transport Museum and Robbie Hannan, Head of Folklife and Agriculture at the UFTM.

Nicholas Carolan & Danny Diamond, 1 October 2009

A native of Cahersiveen in Co Kerry, Seán’s outstanding recordings Ón dTalamh Amach and The Bonny Bunch of Roses along with his prolific performances since the 1970s portrayed a beautifully discerning, sensitive Irish artist. A talented, accomplished musician his rich, sonorous voice rightly earned him the TG4 Gradam Ceoil, Amhránaí na Bliana in 2006.