My God! Isn’t that the Rakes of Dubbyuh he’s playing? 
djm
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen such long fingers before. It may just be a trick of the photography, but his smallest finger seems much longer in relation to his ring finger than mine does. It is a very beautiful photo.
I have never heard it discussed but I often wondered if he suffered from Marfan syndrome.
Wow, he looks so different in that photo! I recognized the pipes before I recgonized his face.
That’s a great photo Kevin ! Where did you get it? I first met Seamus at Slattery’s (the music club, up stairs) He played a reel so fast everybody was waiting for him to stumble, but he didn’t…and I said “greetings from the pipers of California, Leo Purcell says Hello” etc. Seamus aknowledged that he had been to L.A. in 1964, but he didn’t remember any pipers…Denis Brooks, said “of course he didn’t, he was 3 sheets to the wind” “Leo and I took him everywhere in L.A.” Well 2 years later I had two visits with Seamus at his famous caravan (mobile trailer in US parlance) at Naul. I even got a ride in that 2 tone blue Ford Zephyr (looked like a scaled down 1956 Ford Victoria 4door) He was so proud of that car! He had a mechanic tweaking the carb and engine, all the time, and claimed that it would get 200 miles to the Gallon, that’s an Imperial Gallon,(1 quart more than the US kind).
Anyhow, we had to go to the Pub nearby… that was across this very busy “trunk road” that went out to the airport. We stopped at the intersection, and put, put, putted across with 2 Lorries, from both directions, headed right for us, I closed my eyes ‘cause I thought we were going to be hit by at least one of them! When I reopened my eyes, I had a flash about that great musician’s timing, or the working brakes of the Trucks, had kept us safe, There’s other details, I’ll save you, needless to say, the trip back to the trailer was the exactly similar situation in reverse, but we made that one, as well, as I am still here writting this…Seamus’ face did remind me of the actor Peter O’Toole (could they be related?) Oh, and a witty reconteur, limericks, stories, the Gaelic, Pipes…RIP Seamus!
Sean Folsom
I love the history and details of your posts, Sean. Keep them coming! You’re a great addition to this forum. Kevin got the photo on the Library of Congress web site for folklife. Enter Alan Lomx on the search feature, then click on Britain, Scotland, and Ireland. Here’s the steps I took.
http://www.loc.gov/folklife/
http://www.loc.gov/folklife/lomax/
http://www.loc.gov/folklife/lomax/britain/britain.html (has Ennis photo)
I decided to follow up Peter’s post, since I had not heard of Marfan syndrome. I learned alot about that and then, as one does when searching the web, somehow ended up at a rather nice photography exhibit where I was surprised to find this picture. It is just interesting to see him as the collector instead of the one being collected.:
“Séamus Ennis worked as a full-time collector from 1942 until 1947, concentrating on the collection of traditional music and songs. He worked in west Munster, Galway, Mayo, Cavan, Donegal and the Scottish Gaeltacht. Colm Ó Caodháin was one of his finest informants and gave Séamus Ennis hundreds of songs and a wealth of lore.”
To get to the exhibit, click on “Enter” on the homepage, then “Photography”, then on “more” and finally on the link to the on-line exhibit.
http://www.ucd.ie/irishfolklore/
Cynth, Breandan Breathnach wrote: ‘Ioldanach, skilled in many arts, is the description which best fits Seamus Ennis’
He photographed rather well. This is one I took in 1981, he was showing how he played his C natural.
Marfan syndrome, also known as arachnodactyly, believed to have affected Abraham Lincoln and violinist Nicolo Paganini, who looks very spidery in the depictions we have of him. Of course he was also said to be in league with the Devil. Come to think of it that’s what most Southerners would say about Abe too!
I’d seen that photo of Seamus and Colm somewhere before. I don’t think too many people collected from Seamus unless you mean all those people on the outside of the frame with Nokia tape recorders! Gawd those things would CLICK too, tapes made in the 70s always end with this flourish of cigar lighters/robotic crickets.
I happened on a website with all of these photos Jean Ritchie took in the 50s, a lot of Seamus playing in front of the dresser, against a tree, on a rubbish bin! And a few of Leo and Leon Rowsome playing for little kids. Great stuff! Perhaps one of you can dig out that link for us to see.
Incidentally “Faith to ye, blithe morning pipers!” is something Seamus said on a bit of video from 1980, walking into a piping class (I assume at the Willie Clancy Summer School), next thing he says to Liam O’Flynn (the teacher) is “Are your drones functioning?” “Reasonably well, Seamus, reasonably well!”
At this website are quite a number of pictures of Jean Ritchie recording Seamus Ennis. I realize now I don’t know who took the photographs. http://www.library.nuigalway.ie/Pickow/search.jsp?q=Seamus+Ennis&offset=0&captions=on&maxResults=20
I like this one in particular for the smile:
OH, I was just going to mention that disproportionately long fingers, toes, arms (arachnodactyly) could be one symptom of Marfan syndrome but it could affect the heart, eyes, lungs, nervous system as well. It is a disorder of the connective tissue. Apparently some people have more serious and widespread problems than others.
A person, if I have understood correctly, could have these unusually long fingers (arachnodactyly) and have any number of different syndromes or maybe even none.
It is a genetically transmitted illness and apparently each family might have a different collection of symptoms. The most serious risk, I believe, is that there could be a problem with progressive heart deterioration, but now they can identify the problem early and take preventative measures.
My feeling was that it would be impossible for us to know if he had this syndrome based on the photos.
http://www.marfan.org/nmf/index.jsp
The photos of Seamus Ennis and Jean Ritchie were taken by her husbahd George Pickrow.
Many of the recordings made by Jean were on the record that I produced for Seamus called “Forty Years of Irish piping” These were beautiful recordings made on a one track mono Nagra.
All the best,
Pat Sky
the trip back to the trailer was the exactly similar situation in reverse,
Wow! In reverse! The guy could do it all!
t
That’s George Pickow, not Pickrow.
Lovely stuff!
A link rather than an images to help battle narky bandwidth issues:
http://www.uilleannobsession.com/photos/seamusennis_anim.gif
Patrick.
Please don’t… be ruthless.. spill the bean, this is great stuff Seán!
Patrick.
Boy, looks like Jean Ritchie really gets in the groove when she’s recording someone. 
At first I thought it was a young Alec Baldwin I was looking at! Didn’t know he was a piper…
“Hello Liam. How are your drones functioning?” - I have this on an old video made by RTE in the 70’s or very early 80’s… brilliant stuff.
Careful now,
Páidín.