Irish national television, that is. The Irish language channel TG4 is filming a Christmas special in San Francisco, and has asked Mary McLaughlin to sing “Oíche Chiúin” (“Silent Night”) to close the show. The harper who usually accompanies her isn’t able to be there, so guess who’s playing?
It’s just a simple accompaniment (and we’re at the end of the program, so we’ll probably end up either getting cut short or having the credits scrolling across our faces), but I’m really stoked! I don’t know yet what the actual name of the program is, or whether it will be archived on TG4’s website, but will let you know.
If the station is currently broadcasting, the show being aired should start after a brief buffering period. If not, or if you’d rather watch something other than what’s currently being shown, most of the station’s programs are archived, and accessible via the buttons to the left of the screen (“cartlann” means “archive”):
Cúla 4: Children’s programming
Ceol: Music programming
Spórt: Sports programming
Dráma: Soap operas and the like
Cúrsaí Reatha: News/current events
Faisnéis: Documentaries
Siamsaíocht: Entertainment (things like game shows, reality shows, etc.)
Cláir Eile: The infamous “other” category…i.e., anything that doesn’t fall into the above categories.
Some of my favorite shows are “Aifric” (on Cúla 4), “Paisean Faisean” (on Siamsaíocht), “Aingil sa Chistin” (on Siamsaíocht) and "Daithí ar Highway 61 (on Siamsaíocht). A lot of folks also love “Ros na Rún”… a long-running soap opera (on Dráma). They also currently have the brilliant film adaptation of the classic Irish novel “Cré na Cille” on the “Dráma” site…a must-see!
