I’ve had the great pleasure these last few weeks to be reading Recollections of a Donegal Man, the memoirs of Packie Manus Byrne that were compiled and edited by StevieJ. Today is Packie’s birthday, a good day to wish him well and thank him for the treasure trove of stories and memories he shares in this lovely book, stories of work, of families, of 3- and 4-day parties, of schools, of changing times…and of course, of music.
Just a few quotes, the first with a striking explanation of why the tradition needed to be respected.
He talks about playing whistles and mouth organs as a very young boy:
…My Uncle Patrick was a marvelous whistle player. That was me mother’s brother. He used to come to visit us very often, and I would always hide, because I was afraid of him. If I played a bum note he’d clout me! The people were very strict about music in those days. It had to be done right, because it was an insult to the traditional tune if you didn’t play it as well as the listener thought it should be played…
…Yes, the music and the songs were really important to us. Sometimes, you know, I would wake in the night with a song or a tune going round in my head. 'Twould be mostly a tune that I had heard for the first time and it would just click–part of it would sink in. I would have no thought of it when I went to bed, but I would wake with this tune turning round in my head and I was stuck with it!
…And very often on a breezy day I could hear a tune in the rustling of a tree. In fact a lot of the old tunes were composed from that: some fiddle player would hear music in the roar of the waves or something, and he would sit down and make a tune out of it. That used to happen to me especially if I was up late the night before and didn’t get much sleep. The following day I would be doing something and this music would come out of a tree near me. And I wasn’t the only one, there was lots of us like that.
…In our life, music was number one. As far as I was concerned, anyway, that was the most important thing. Finding enough food was a secondary consideration. We always did though. I used to really pity people who couldn’t sing or play an instrument or couldn’t pick up a tune. I used to think, what have they? I didn’t know there was anything else. I thought they were lost for life because they couldn’t play.
Thanks to you, Packie Manus Byrne, and happy birthday! <img src="//pfaffmanager.sfo3.digitaloceanspaces.com/sites/chiffandfipple/original/2X/7/7bd73fcfd7d30c956a23738f11ccd6efc1ac1c53.gif" width="15" height="27" alt=":party:" title="party"/>
Carol
PS Packie's musical memories are captured beautifully in the tunebook _A Dossan of Heather_...you can do a search here on the board for more info. --C
