On Monday, at 23:25 Irish time (which I believe is 3:25 p.m. U.S. Pacific Time), TG4 is rebroadcasting “Rocker Chick an tSean Nóis”…a half-hour documentary on SF Bay Area sean nós singer Nikki Ragsdale. The program is in Irish, with English subtitles, and is available on-line at www.tg4.tv.
Nikki was heavily involved in the rock scene in London and Munich in the 60s and 70s. Then she visited Ireland and fell head-over-heels in love with Irish traditional music and Irish culture. She’s now a respected sean-nós* singer (and quite a good bodhrán player as well!) and fluent Irish speaker, who shares her home with a giant Irish wolfhound and an Irish-speaking African Grey Parrot.
In one scene, at a session in Nikki’s house, those of you from the Bay Area may recognize a few familiar faces, including yours truly (though fleetingly…I’m the one in the background with the light-colored harp), Vicki Parrish and Michael Robinson of Standing Stones (http://www.standingstones.com/index.html) and Galt Barber and Janet Herman of Dance Around Molly (http://www.folkplanet.com/dam/index.html).
Anyway, I thought that some here might be interested! If you want to watch it, just go to www.tg4.tv at the correct time, and it should launch automatically. I expect it will also be in their archives sometime soon.
Redwolf
- For those who might be unfamiliar with it, “sean-nós” means “old style,” and is the classical form of Irish singing: Always in Irish and unaccompanied, usually solo, with very specific ornamentation. It’s the type of singing that gave us most of the slow airs we love to play so much.