It’s eight years this weekend since the great Micho Russell died. So once again the Micho Russell memorial weekend came around. For a change I went to the concert this afternoon. Very strong winds have been pounding West Clare relentlessly these past few days and when I drove the car down past Doonagore castle into Doolin huge waves were coming into the bay below, sending salty spray right over the top of the cliffs.
It’s a bit unusual to have a concert in the afternoon but it’s grand, the family can go and you don’t have to cope with drunken drivers on the way home. Since the Micho commemoration started a purpose build ‘cultural centre’ has been erected on the Roadford side of Doolin.
The concert was held there and started with our local 15 year old concertina whizz kid Edel Fox, which had my eight year old son chuffed as she is his friend and concertina teacher. She played very nicely as usual. Next up was Paddy Canny on fiddle with a bit of help from Kieran Hanrahan, at 85 Paddy is one of the last of the truly great fiddle players of his generation we have left so it was as ever a thrill to have him play and he was in great form, music that can’t be beaten for subtleties and little intricacies. If the cocnert had ended after his part I would have gone home a happy man. It didn’t end there though, next up was Seamus Tansey, a character, even if I don’t care that much for his style of playing. Seamus is a big man, he came on stage dressed in black trousers and a blue shirt around his waist was a huge belt with several holsters each holding a flute. ‘I apologise for looking like an American cop’ he said before he tore into it with great gusto.
Next up was Feakle singer Kate Purcell who did a fine job, also on were Liam O Flynn and Arty McGlynn, fine a job as Mc Glynn did, the pipes don’t need any guitar as far as I am concerned. Flynn did a fine job as expected, his bass drone was a bit off during the first set, before he started the second he saw me pointing a big telephoto lens at him, realised he wasn ‘t the only piper In the house , nodded in recognition and tuned the drone. Fair play to him. He played a few tunes on the whistle, which sounded slightly more inspired than his piping. Guitar and whsitle went well together doing a fine rendition of the air Cailin na Gruaige Doinne. Another tune he played was the Tommy Peoples reel which opens the Kevin Crawford album. However, Liam had just recently learned the name Bobby Casey used to have for the tune, and a great name it is too: ‘The Farting Badger’. Please take note, we’ll be calling it that name from now on.
The traditional raffle was next, my son winning second prize, lucky bugger, he won something the last concert we went to as well. ‘I have picked a big tin of biccies’ he said. It said ‘Famous Grouse, 1 litre’ on the tin. That was a bit of a disappointment for him so.
Closing off were Joe Burke and Ann Conroy, not my style of music but they are good at what they do.
As a parting note a few fiddlers came on: Michael Kelleher, Joe Rynne, James Cullinan to play a few tunes with Kieran Hanrahan while a few of lovely local dancers did a couple of figures of the set. By then everybody was heading towards the kitchen where a huge amount of lovely free food and wine was being served.
After stuffing myself with soda bread covered in salmon we drove off to look at the waves pounding Moher. Then home quickly to load up the fire with turf, it will freeze tonight.
It was great, next year 21-23 feb it’s on again.
[ This Message was edited by: Peter Laban on 2002-02-24 05:15 ]
Nice posting Peter…almost made me feel like I was there…sounds like a good time. -brett
I played once on the street in Kilarney
with a 15 year old concertina player,
but as it was several years ago she
must have been a different one. What
a lovely concert! Thanks for the account.
A colorful, thought-imaging note Peter. Thanks for sharing it!
Wish I’d been there. Thanks for sharing, Peter.
Christian
Peter,
Thanks for sharing your experience. It sounds like an absolutely wonderful and delightful time was had by all, and I would love to have been there!
Actually, my husband, 15 yr old son and I will be in Ireland this summer. We will be staying with friends in Cork, and possibly with the friend’s mother in Clare - maybe we will get a chance to meet you and maybe play a few tunes!
Sue