Our local CCE branch, Irish Music Traditions, is hosting an annual summer workshop, Saturday June 17th, followed by a concert with Liz Carroll and John Doyle.
Instructors are:
Ray Campagnoli - Bodhran
Liz Carroll - Advanced Fiddle
John Doyle - Stringed Accompaniment
John Doyle - Stringed Melody
Kathleen Donohoe –Traditional Irish Singing
Geraldine Duffy – Irish Language
Geraldine Duffy – Lecture “Who are the Irish?”
Mike Dugger - Accordion
Mike Dugger - Irish Band
Rob Greenway - Irish Flute
Grainne Hambly - Concertina
Grainne Hambly - Harp
Mary Kilcullen - Tin Whistle
Ruairi Kilcullen - Sound Equipment and Staging
John Maschinot - Uilleann Pipes
Scott Russell and Susan Davis - Set Dancing
Mike Simpson - Intermediate Fiddle
Mike Simpson - Music Reading and Theory for Irish Musicians
All classes will be held on Saturday, June 17th, 2006, at Glenwood Academy, 440 E Ponce de Leon Ave, Decatur, GA 30030. Registration and details at www.irishmusictraditions.org or call 404 593 8523, or 404-931-6109
John is an excellent piper. Plays a Kirk Lynch set if I recall correctly. I recall first seeing him at the ATL Ren Fest about 9 years ago…second live piper I had met…then with the Buddy O’ band a few times in concert. Last saw him at the Chicago tionol years back…think it was the year which was also the last tionol Al Purcell attended as well. John is a brilliant unassuming man and musician. Need more like him in this world.
the fun started friday night with a session/party to do last minute organization and assembly of the student packets..the work only took about 20 mins and meanwhile the session was in full swing. Great tunes, lots of fun.
As far as I could tell everything went smoothly on Saturday, with about 41 students across all the classes. I spent most of the day locked in a classroom with Jack D. and John M. Learned a lot from both…(gotta work on tighter tripletts!). Jack’s Angus B set is beautiful and sounds great.
A highlight was when John played the B set and Jack tuned his fiddle down to B..great sound.
Spent the last class period in “Irish Band” taught by Mike Dugger. He did a great job breaking down how bands do (or should do) arrangements, hooks, tails, building sets, setting a mood, etc. He had some excellent sample cuts from CDs to exemplify each of his points.
Not that I plan to be in a band at any time soon, if ever…but wanted to know more about what I’m hearing on CDs and why some sound so much better than others.
After I emerged from classes, most of the clean up work was done..so I packed up and motored home to my daughter and her friends’ combined birthday parties.
Then Tricia and I went down (now my third trip to Decatur this weekend @ 45mins each way…sigh, too bad to have to spend MORE time driving my new MINI Cooper!) for the Liz Carroll and John Doyle concert.
All we can say is WOW! Each of them are tremendous musicians on their own..but together they were outstanding. If you ever get a chance to hear them, don’t pass it up.
Excellent concert…arrived home about 1:30am…could have stayed later for the after concert session but couldn’t keep my eyes open any more.
for the Liz Carroll and John Doyle concert.