November 2011
So we had a great time. The programming we did during the day got very positive feedback from the audience... we had a full house both days.
Here are some observations from the two day event:
Session Leaders, the idea was to showcase folks that lead sessions that may not play music full time, but they are certainly capable, interesting musicians.
O'Shaughnessy's Pub: Sheila Doorly-Bracken, Frank Quinn and Pat Quinn. This pub session is known for it's lively tunes and mix of songs, these musicians did not disappoint in this regard. They moved between lively reels and jigs to plaintive songs like "City of Chicago" with ease.
The Grafton Pub: with Pat Finnegan... displaying his fine, tough flute style, sharing his tunes with us in a very steady and strong style, with no compromises.
The Halsted Harp: with us doing what we do, very tight uilleann pipes and fiddling with a wide variety of tune types. Showcased both the uilleann piping tradition and the south side tunes we have learned from our great mentors!
Families That Play Together:
The Rices: Noel, Cathleen and Kevin Rice brought their band, Baal Tinne, to showcase their unique take on Irish music, with arrangements and very tight playing between Noel and his kids, they were quite proud of what they bring to the music.
The O'Sheas: Joe's son Mike could not make it due to an injury of his hand, so Joe asked Pat and I to join him. We were happy to accomodate him and I thought perhaps we could ask Martin Hayes to join us, since he and Joe were such good friends. He was gracious enough to join us and we had a rollicking good time! With Joe at the helm, we went through some great Clare ceili band tunes... what a treat to play with the two of them, Pat and I were honored to help out!
The Careys: Gerry brought his son Kevin, his daughter Orla and Jonathon Whittall from his band to play with him.. After a bit, Martin Hayes also joined him on stage... So we had some more fine Clare music from all of them. Gerry had Orla sing a beautiful song and they finished with some dancable Clare reels...
The program worked very well for the two days and we were very proud of it!! Well done everyone!