On 7 January 2015 occurred the 101st anniversary of the death of the notable Limerick traditional music collector Patrick Weston Joyce (1827–1914) whose published and unpublished music collections have been digitised by Irish Traditional Music Archive staff in the course of the past centenary year, and are now freely available on its website (formerly the PW Joyce Irish Music Microsite).

Joyce’s music collections are of great historical, social and regional interest, but their overriding contemporary value is as a source of music. His music notations, published song words and ballad-sheet collection, and the ITMA interactive music scores created from his melodies, all constitute a rich seedbed of traditional music and song for re-creation by musicians and singers of the present day.

To mark the occasion of the anniversary and the end of the centenary year, ITMA has added to its Joyce Microsite a selection of videos recorded recently by its staff on location in Newport, Co Tipperary, and Kinvara, Co Galway, and in its studio in Dublin. The recordings feature a number of contemporary musicians and singers – all of whom have had their own previous and varied connections with the music and song of Joyce – performing their re-creations of sample items from his collections. They have kindly agreed to be recorded for presentation here.

Nicholas Carolan and Danny Diamond, 7 January 2015

North Connacht, and in particular South Sligo, has produced a disproportionate number of outstanding traditional musicians relative to its size. From an area measuring approximately 400 square miles, taking in north Roscommon, north east Mayo and south Leitrim, an abundance of outstanding musicians have emerged, most notably fiddle and flute players. Some of the most celebrated and influential traditional music comes from this area, with duets like fiddler Fred Finn and flute player Peter Horan. In an area of such rich musical heritage the three musicians heard here have achieved a special place in traditional music’s Hall of Fame.

Michael Coleman (1891–1945) Kilavil, Co. Sligo.
James Morrison (1891–1947) Riverstown, Co. Sligo.
Paddy Killoran (1904–1965) Ballymote, Co. Sligo.

They became known as the ‘Sligo Masters’ or the ‘Holy Trinity’ of Sligo fiddle players. A combination of circumstances led to this exalted position. All three were musicians of outstanding technical prowess and this fact alone may have served to make their music influential; however, a major factor in their universal popularity and influence was their commercial recordings. All three emigrated to the USA and recorded extensively with the Decca and Columbia labels, amongst others. These 78 rpm recordings were widely distributed in the USA and Ireland becoming hugely popular. Many tune combinations that are still widely played today were first put together on these seminal recordings. Renowned radio producer and researcher Harry Bradshaw has conducted extensive research on this subject and he concludes: ‘No other musician [as Coleman] in the history of traditional music has been so imitated. His influence pervades the entire Irish tradition today’ (Companion to Irish Traditional Music, Fintan Vallely).

Though the eighteen recordings featured here are a mere taster of the music of Sligo’s ‘Holy Trinity’ they illustrate beautifully the vibrancy and lyrical musicality of the music of South Sligo.

Brian Doyle, 1 October 2015

The latest CD by Josephine Keegan, the prolific Co Armagh fiddle and piano player, composer in the traditional idiom, and collector and publisher of Irish traditional music, was launched in the Poitín Stil pub and restaurant, Rathcoole, Co Dublin, on 25 May 2011. Entitled A Few Tunes ‘Now and Then’, the CD features traditional tunes and new compositions by Josephine on fiddle, accompanied on piano by Kathleen Gavin McLoughlin, by Sean Maguire, and by Josephine herself, and it was introduced to the crowded attendance by Dublin singer Phil Callery and Cork fiddle player John Daly.

Organised by her friend and fellow fiddle player Ita Garvey as part of the regular Wednesday night traditional-music session in the Poitín Stil, the launch was attended by musicians from Sligo, Clare, Cork, Kildare, Dublin, and the North, who joined for hours in an impromptu session of music in the old style led by Josephine herself, with the occasional song. The selections given below will give a flavour of the proceedings, which were recorded for the Irish Traditional Music Archive by Danny Diamond and Nicholas Carolan, and which can be heard in full by visitors to the Archive. There are over 40 commercial recordings (in different formats) featuring Josephine Keegan and 5 books by her in the ITMA collections.

With thanks to Josephine Keegan, Ita Garvey, and all the other musicians and singers featured here for their cooperation on the night.

Nicholas Carolan & Danny Diamond, 1 August 2011

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

Acetate discs were originally used in recording studios from the 1930s to the early 1950s, before the introduction of tape recording, for making test copies of recordings. They consisted of aluminium plates covered with a thin layer of lacquer, and sound was cut directly onto the lacquer. They were only intended for temporary use and became inaudible after many playings. Acetates were also used in radio work, and some commercial companies recorded performers on acetate disc for a fee.

The eight acetate recordings presented above come from the collection of the late John Brennan, a Ballisodare, Co Sligo, flute player resident in Dublin, and they were donated to the Irish Traditional Music Archive in 2008 by his son John who lives in Denmark, per Peter Sorenson.

John Brennan was friendly with the Sligo fiddle players James ‘Lad’ O’Beirne (1911–80) and Martin Wynne (1913–98), who were resident in New York and whose playing is featured on the discs. Lad O’Beirne, who had emigrated there in 1928, had a homemade acetate disc-cutting machine, and this was doubtless the original source of most of the recordings. Martin Wynne came to the United States in 1948, and seems to have made the first two of these recordings with an unknown pianist in London before emigrating. Lad O’Beirne accompanies Wynne on piano on the latter’s New York recordings. The New York-born fiddle player Andy McGann (1928–2004) is also to be heard on one of the recordings, in duet with O’Beirne on fiddle and accompanied on piano by Jerry Wallace (1929–91). All of these musicians were influenced by the famous New York-based Sligo fiddle player and recording artist Michael Coleman (1891–1945), as can be heard in the repertory and style on the discs.

These recordings seem to have been made in the late 1940s and in 1950. The discs have been heavily used and their sound quality is now poor. The first six have been remastered to the highest level possible by Harry Bradshaw for ITMA; the other two recordings are less audible but are included for their historical and technical interest.

Do you have other acetate discs of Irish traditional music? ITMA would welcome their donation or the opportunity to copy them.

With thanks to record donor John Brennan and to Peter Sorenson for his good offices.

Nicholas Carolan, Harry Bradshaw & Danny Diamond, 1 December 2009

Professor Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin was a former Chair of the Board of ITMA. Recognised from an early age as a talented musician, Mícheál went on to perform to acclaim throughout Ireland and Europe, and in the United States and Asia, on his chosen main instrument, the piano. He created a unique piano style which fused elements of Irish traditional music, classical music and jazz, and these same elements informed his work as a composer.

The recipient of frequent commissions, he composed mainly for solo piano, for voice and piano, for piano and orchestra, and for traditional instruments and orchestra. Among his larger-scale compositions are Oileán/Island (1988), Woodbrook (1992), Templum (1994), and Becoming (1997). He also scored for film, notably for the 1926 silent film Irish Destiny, which he accompanied live.

Beginning in 1975 with an eponymous LP on the Gael Linn label, he recorded and produced a series of some thirteen long-playing records for Gael Linn, for Virgin/Venture (commencing with The Dolphin’s Way in 1987), and for EMI (Elver Gleams, 2010). He also produced and played on the recordings of many others.

His numerous musical collaborators included percussionist Mel Mercier, singers Nóirín Ní Riain and Iarla Ó Lionárd, flute players Niall Keegan and Matt Molloy, saxophonist Kenneth Edge, uilleann pipers Liam O’Flynn and Padraig Keane, and the ensembles Tiompán, the Irish Chamber Orchestra, the Irish Concert Orchestra, the Irish Symphony Orchestra, the National Chamber Choir, Hiberno-Jazz, and the Abbey Quartet. Attracted to eighteenth-century Irish harp music and to classical music of the baroque period, he had lately been arranging and performing the music of the harper-composer Turlough Carolan (1670–1738).

Mícheál also led a highly productive inter-related life as an educationalist. He himself was educated locally by the Irish Christian Brothers; at the Music Department, University College Cork; and at the Department of Social Anthropology, Queen’s University Belfast, where he completed his PhD in 1987 on the Dublin traditional fiddle player Tommy Potts. He was particularly influenced by his teachers Aloys Fleischman, Seán Ó Riada, and John Blacking.

Working as a dynamic and inspirational music lecturer in UCC from 1975 to 1993, he opened up university education to traditional musicians without classical music training by devising new entry requirements and courses, and he created an ethnomusicological model that has been widely imitated in third-level education. He attracted a range of talented students from all parts of the country, and widened their horizons by involving them in the organisation of ambitious festivals, in the publication of CDs, and in the establishment of archives.

When recruited as Professor of Music by the University of Limerick in 1993 with a brief to establish postgraduate music courses and research, he founded the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, an evolving cross-cultural music, song, and dance educational institution with a concentration on global performing arts. It currently offers over twenty-five programmes in music, song, and dance, and in related areas such as music therapy and festive arts, and has a student body drawn from over 50 countries. Mícheál was the driving force in the creation of the Academy’s magnificent new building on the banks of the Shannon. Succeeded as Director by his colleague Sandra Joyce, he became Emeritus Professor of Music on his retirement in 2016.

Mícheál published numerous articles in magazines and journals, many on the subject of his PhD; he edited Bunting’s Ancient Music of Ireland with Donal O’Sullivan (1983); and, as assistant editor of Aloys Fleischmann’s posthumous Sources of Irish Traditional Music c. 1600–1855 (1998), he managed the last stages of the project and, with others, brought it to print.

He spent periods as a visiting professor at Boston College (where he established a traditional music archive) and the University of Notre Dame, Indiana. His academic awards include honorary Doctor of Music from the National University of Ireland; honorary alumnus of Boston University; O’Donnell Chair of Irish Studies, University of Notre Dame; and honorary Doctor of Music, Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

As a highly articulate and charismatic public figure, Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin gave unsparingly of his time and energies. He was the Chairman of the Irish Traditional Music Archive for two terms, 1993–99; a board member of the Irish Chamber Orchestra, Dagda Dance Company, the UL Concert Hall, and the Contemporary Music Centre; Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann Ard-Ollamh of Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann, Clonmel, 2006; and inaugural Chair of the Irish arts promotion agency Culture Ireland 2005–14.

Much in demand as a conference keynote speaker, in Ireland and abroad, he responded generously to frequent invitations to launch festivals and publications and to give public interviews. He regularly broadcast on radio and television programmes, in English and Irish; a highpoint of his career as a broadcaster was, with Philip King and Nuala O’Connor, the 1995 RTÉ and BBC television series River of Sound, which charted the changing nature of Irish traditional music.

WRITTEN BY Nicholas Carolan, 12 November 2018

Carl Hession is well known as a piano accompanist in traditional music for many years, performing alongside Frankie Gavin, Joe Derrane and The Moving Cloud as well as many others.. Carl Hession is well known as a piano accompanist in traditional music for many years, performing alongside Frankie Gavin, Joe Derrane and The Moving Cloud as well as many others. He is also a composer and orchestral arranger having worked with The Boston Pops, The Dubai Symphony, The Liverpool Philharmonic and next September with The Monaco Philharmonic.

During his lifetime he has spent 35 years teaching music at Coláiste Iognaid in Galway as well as lecturing at NUIG. His father Mike was also a well known traditional musician playing uilleann pipes, fiddle and tin whistle. The Hession house in Salthill was well known for its traditional sessions and people like Willie Clancy, Seamus Ennis, Ted Furey, John Kelly, Leo Rowsome, Joe Burke as well as countless others were regular visitors. From these sessions Carl began to accompany Joe Burke and went on to win The All Ireland Trio with Joe and Kathleen Collins.

After spending most of his early life playing traditional piano he then branched out to both classical and jazz piano. He studied for his ALCM and LLCM with London College of Music and won The William Lloyd Webber gold medal for his LLCM results. He also played jazz piano and recorded with world renowned violinist Stephanie Grapelli and guitarist Louis Stewart. He went on to study for a B.Mus degree in UCC with Professor Fleischmann and in his final year with Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin. In the past few years he has composed many tunes in a traditional style as well as writing orchestral classical compositions. In his compositions he delves into the knowledge he has gained from his traditional, classical and jazz experiences.

Saileog is a musician, sean nós singer and composer, who has played traditional and classical music on piano from a very young age, and also plays traditional music on fiddle and viola.. Her father Peadar is a sean nós singer from Connemara, her mother Úna Lawlor is a classical violinist and her siblings Eoghan and Muireann are also singers and musicians. She has a BMus degree from UCC, where she studied many different kinds of music. Having graduated with a BMus (2009), UCC awarded her the Seán Ó Riada Prize, for a study of the Songs and Singers of Iorras Aithneach.

She has released two albums to date – I bhfíor-dheiriú oidhche and Roithleán. I bhfíor-dheiriú oidhche, is an album of sean nós songs which Saileog learned from Seamus Ennis’ collection, (housed in the National Folklore Collection, UCD) from various singers in Iorras Aithneach, Connemara. The songs were collected in the early 1940s, and are a combination of songs that are no longer sung and unusual versions of more well known songs, chosen from the collection.

Roithleán is a mostly solo album of traditional music, sean nós songs, and also features some tunes composed by Saileog, with guest musicians on some of the tracks, including Muireann Ní Cheannabháin, Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin, Jack Talty, Marie McHugh, Tim McHugh and Eoin Ó Beaglaoich. Roithleán was awarded Albam Thraidisiúnta na Bliana (Traditional Album of the Year) by Nós magazine in 2018.

In 2014, she did research work for the project Amhráin Ó Iorrus, a compilation recording of songs from Erris, North Mayo, which were collected from Mayo singers in Chicago at the beginning of the last century. The project was initiated by Séamas Ó Mongáin and Síle Uí Mhongáin.

Saileog also features as a guest on Ensemble Ériu’s debut album (2011), on the Tunes in the Church compilation album (2013), on Treasa Ní Mhiolláin’s Lán Mara album (2019) and on the Rogha Raelach Volume 1 compilation (November 2020).

In 2018 Saileog and Maitiú Ó Casaide composed and arranged music for Darach Mac Con Iomaire’s play, Baoite. Some of the music was composed between both musicians, and other parts in collaboration with sound designer Steve Lynch. Baoite was commissioned by the Abbey Theatre, and performed for ten days in An Taibhdhearc, as part of the Galway# International Arts Festival 2018. In 2019, the play was commissioned by the Abbey Theatre and performed again for several nights in the Peacock Theatre, Dublin, in May 2019.

In February 2020, Saileog took part in Úna Monaghan’s Aonaracht project at the National Concert Hall in Dublin, performing a piece for piano and electronics.

One of Saileog’s ongoing projects is arranging sean nós songs from Connemara and Rinn Ó gCuanach, along with Ailbhe Nic Dhonncha and Pádraic Keane.

Saileog also teaches classical and traditional piano, traditional Irish fiddle and sean nós singing. She has been teaching privately and also giving occasional workshops since 2009.

Saileog is currently NUI Galway’s 2021 sean nós singer in residence, and is also currently working on some new solo compositions.

Compositions

1. An Bhinn Bhuí [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], reel
2. Jacqueline & Tommy’s [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], hornpipe
3. Méaracáin Mhordáin [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], reel
4. Port Eoghan Páraic [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], slip jig
5. Port Mhuireann Anna [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], slip jig
6. Ríl an Ghoirt [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], reel
7. Spraoi an Spidéil [comp. Saileog Ní Cheannabháin], jig