The Irish music is ratcheting up in advance of high holy month, which is just about a week away.
Both Gaelic Storm and the Chieftains are headed our way this week. Gaelic Storm will be at the Ardmore Music Hall in Ardmore on Wednesday, Feb, 25, and The Chieftains will be on stage at the Wilmington Grand Opera House in Wilmington on Tuesday, February 24.
Full Set, the hot supergroup of trad music, will be making a return appearance at The Irish Center on Friday, February 27.
Local groups are also gearing up. The Theresa Flanagan Band will be at McGillicuddy’s in Upper Darby on Sunday then at Washington Crossing Inn in Washington Crossing on Thursday night. Catch Slainte (Frank Daly and CJ Mills of Jamison) at the Ashburner in Philly on Thursday night and Jamison at Keenan’s North Wildwood on Friday night. This week spend “Irish Tuesday” with performer Oliver McElhone at Maggie O’Neill’s in Drexel Hill and head over to the AOH in Swedesburg for their Irish music night with McHugh and O’Neill. Blackthorn will be appearing at a benefit for the Western Delaware Valley Lions Club at Penn Oaks Country Club in West Chester, also on Friday night.
And as if Friday night wasn’t busy enough. Brian Conway, John Whelan, Mary Courtney, and Brendan Dolan will be performing at West Chester University. They’re all top notch trad performers.
‘t the less musical side of things: On Saturday, February 21, the Delco Gaels Indoor League kicks off at Maple Zone in Boothwyn, and the Officer Daniel Boyle Scholarship Fund Annual Social takes place at the FOP Heroes Hall in Northeast Philadelphia.
And next week, be sure to mark your calendars for the Duffy’s Cut Fundraiser at Maggie O’Neill’s Pub in Drexel Hill, with songs by Karen Boyce McCollum “and the Lads.” It’s also the weekend of the annual Gael Scoil, an immersion in the Irish language for kids, at Notre Dame High School in Lawrenceville, NJ.
After next week, make sure you come back here frequently since our calendar changes almost hourly. We hope to see a lot of you around somewhere, because we will certainly be around somewhere.
Joan Diver of the Screamng Orphans–at Valley Forge this weekend.
I can tell you where I’ll be all weekend—at the 23rd Annual Midwinter Scottish-Irish Festival at Valley Forge. The lineup of bands is fabulous and includes local musicians such as Jamison, the John Byrne Band, RUNA, Timlin and Kane, Oliver McElhone, and Charlie Zahm, as well as far-away favorites like Searson, Brother, Albannach, the Screaming Orphans, Rathkeltair, the Brigadoons, the Sean Flemng Band, and The MacLeod Fiddlers.
It’s going to be cold outside this weekend. Come in, taste a little whiskey, learn to ceili dance, pick up a few words in Irish or Scottish Gaelic, and enjoy the music. Watch out for the swordplay. The Companions of the Cross and Live Steel will also be there, showing you how to fence. And if you see us, come up and say hello.
Continuing this week, the plays Misalliance by Shaw at Walnut Street Studio 5 and Long Live Little Knife at the Off Broad Street Theatre, along with the opera, Oscar, about Oscar Wilde, at the Kimmel.
Galway Guild will be rocking the Bristol AOH on Friday night and they’re the Irish music you’ll be hearing at Paddy Whacks on Welsh Road and the Boulevard on Saturday afternoon.
The Irish conversation group will be meeting again at Falvey Library, room 204, at Villanova, on Thursday. This is not a beginner’s group.
Then on Friday, the Delco Gaels’ Dance Like a Star fundraiser takes over the Springfield Country Club for an evening of music, dance performances, and comedy. See our story for more details. On Saturday, the Gaels’ 2015 Indoor League starts at Maple Zone in Boothwyn. There are about 150 children enrolled in this youth Gaelic sports program.
On Saturday, February 21, there will be a benefit to raise money for the Officer Daniel Boyle Scholarship Fund, which benefits families who want to send their children to Christian/Catholic schools but don’t have the tuition money. It takes place at Heroes Hall on Caroline Road in Northeast Philadelphia.
Bill and Karen Reid launched the Mid-Winter Scottish & Irish Festival 23 years ago. They’ve triumphed over snowstorms, unexpected construction building projects, falling ceiling tiles … we can even remember when the lights went out for hours.
Problems like that might have stopped anybody else, but for whatever reason—perhaps because it is so well planned and skillfully orchestrated–nothing stops this festival.
Probably the best example of the festival’s endurance is, in fact, the day the lights went out. You couldn’t see your hand in front of your face down in the exhibit hall at what is now known as the Valley Forge Casino. Somehow they managed. There was music and dance, even if the scrounged-up emergency lighting was just barely adequate. Best of all was the Scottish tribal drum band, whose players wrapped sticks and mallets with glow-in-the-dark necklaces, and played a rollicking set.
We’ve put together a few video interviews with Bill Reid. You’ll find out how it all got started, how his son Drew became the musical phenom known as Digeridrew, and how much craziness sometimes goes on behind the scenes.
They’re one of the regulars—and a huge crowd-pleaser—at Bill and Karen Reid’s annual Mid-Winter Scottish & Irish Festival in Valley Forge. They’re certainly the only Scottish tribal drumming band, and the only band at the festival with a mosh pit.
Their music is electrifying, pounding its way down into your heart and soul, challenging you not to jump up and down like a tattooed, pierced marionette.
We’ve captured countless photographs of Albannach over the years—we can’t resist them, either—and we thought we’d share of bunch with you. If you’ve seen Albannach before, maybe our pics will get you riled up before you even get to the festival. (Jump up and down in your house if you want, but don’t scare the cat.)
If you haven’t seen Albannach, we hope we’ll give you a good reason to go.
Gogi O’Donnell practices a dip with instructor Lisa Oster.
For the past three years, Louie Bradley has suited up for the Delaware County Gael’s popular fundraiser, Dance Like a Star, in which eight couples vie for a trophy while raising money for the youth Gaelic sports club. He didn’t dance. He just made a little speech. He’s president of the organization.
But this year, he’ll be suited up and wearing his dancing shoes. His partner is Michelle Quinn, owner of Blush Salon in Newtown Square, who until this year was just contributing her styling skills to the event. “She’s way out of her element,” said Bradley, with a mischievous grin, when I talked to him after Sunday dance practice at Cara School of Irish Dance in Drexel Hill. “I’m out of mine too. I don’t have feet, I’ve got hooves!”
A couple of years ago, Paul McDaid was helping his DJ brother John with the music for DLAS. This year, he’s wearing a tutu, dancing with Heather Crossan. “I said I would do this on one condition,” says the 29-year-old, a recent immigrant from Letterkenny, County Donegal. “I’d do it if Louie Bradley would do it.”
(There’s a family connection here: Louie Bradley and John McDaid are married to sisters; their wives Carmel Bradley and Una McDaid are part of the committee that pulls off this extravaganza at Springfield Country Club every year.)
Some of the contestants, like Colette Morgan of Media, are Delco Gaels parents. “I got asked to be a stand-in at the last minute, and the club has been so good to me and my family, helping us with our travel expenses when the teams travel, that I couldn’t say no—it was a no-brainer,” says the mother of two teens.
One, Dermott “Gogi” O’Donnell, is a coach of the under 12 team. A couple of years ago, he has a small part—as a garda—in one of the dance sketches, but signed up as a contestant this year “because the kids asked me to.”
But you don’t have to be related or a parent to be part of the fun. Beth Hamilton volunteered because a friend who attended last year “told me it had my name written all over it. I love to dance,” says Hamilton, who does tap and jazz at the McHenry Dance Centre in Havertown.
The dancers practice every Sunday with two choreographers, Jennifer Cleary and Lisa Oster. In previous years, the dancers started the event with a waltz, did a group dance, and then each couple stole the spotlight with a special freestyle dance that involves costumes, fancy steps, and sometimes a little acrobatics.
“We decided to change it up this year,” said Cleary. “We’re opening with a foxtrot, then a swing dance, and then each of the couples pulled a decade out of a hat and they’ll be doing dances from that decade.”
The practice schedule can be grueling. In addition to the three-and-a-half hour Sunday rehearsals they’ve had every week since the beginning of January, the contestants meet with Jennifer or Lisa during the week to go over their steps and sometimes the couples get together for extra practice. “I dance in my basement,” says Bradley, laughing.
“We’ve all pretty much been eating, sleeping, working and dancing for the last five weeks,” says Morgan, who is also a fulltime nurse. “It’s been a lot of fun though. It’s stressful learning all these new moves, but hopefully it will all come together.”
It needs to come together by Friday, February 20. Tickets are $45 and aren’t available at the door. You have to order online, or contact Carmel Bradley at pbradley1510@gmail.com (610-789-9697) or Lorna Corr at aidanlorna@verizon.net (610-353-5556). You can also buy votes for your favorite couple online.
Tom Kane strikes a pose, while Trish Daly, right, and Una McDaid react with laughter.
Tom Kane pulled an impromptu “Saturday Night Fever” pose in the hallway outside the rehearsal hall at Cara School of Dance in Drexel Hill last Sunday. Kane, owner of the Brick and Brew in Havertown, is one of 16 amateurs who will be vying for top prize in the fourth annual “Dance Like a Star” fundraiser for the Delaware County Gaels youth Gaelic football club on Friday, February 20, at the Springfield Country Club in Springfield, Delaware County. This was our favorite photo–and maybe our favorite moment–of the week.
One of the great things about Robin Hiteshew’s photo exhibit in New York this week was this: he hasn’t only documented the older stars of traditional Irish music, he’s also captured images of some of the rising stars, too.
Robin took the photo of All-Ireland fiddle champ Haley Richardson at the Philadelphia Art Museum, according to mom Donna.
There were a lot of photos from the exhibit, but this is one we liked best.
Robin Hiteshew joined the Philadelphia Ceili Group to learn how to dance.
It didn’t take long before he had moved well beyond learning jigs, reels and polkas. The entire world of Irish dance, music and culture opened up to him quite unexpectedly—right from the start.
“People were very welcoming,” Hiteshew recalls of his first night of lessons in the early fall of 1978 at the Water Tower Recreation Center in the Chestnut Hill section of Philadelphia. “When they put on the music for dancing, and I heard those wonderful jigs and reels, it was like the muse bit me. The next thing you know, I was going down to all the record shops on South Street looking for Irish music.”
He was so inspired, he booked a flight to Ireland just under a year later, searching out the pubs and bars where traditional Irish tunes were played, soaking up the music and chatting with the musicians. “I heard Irish music three out of the four nights I was there.”
One thing led to another, and Hiteshew soon found himself in the Philadelphia Ceili Group, eventually rising to a leadership position. In time, he came to realize the importance of documenting the many Irish music superstars—although they probably wouldn’t think of themselves in those terms—who passed through the city. Ultimately, that documentation found its fullest expression in the form of yet another of Hiteshew’s passions—photography, until recently done the old-fashioned way—on film. “I knew right from the beginning that what the Ceili Group was doing was important. And so I began to document.”
Hiteshew came to know many of those musicians as they traveled through Philadelphia for Ceili Group concerts. “Musicians would wind up staying with me in those days, and I would photograph them the next morning after the concert,” Hiteshew recalls. “With Irish and early mornings … well, they were a little groggy, and sometimes they were getting on the next plane, but they were very gracious. A lot of them are sitting, holding their instrument or playing.”
Some of the photos were also taken in Ireland.
Hiteshew quickly came to understand the importance of documenting the old guard, but also the new young musicians who in turn went running with the music, making it their own. “In two cases,” Hiteshew says of his portraits, “it was a father teaching his child.” (Such as Mike and Mary Rafferty.)
The now extensive collection, he says, “demonstrates the passing of the tradition, from one generation to the next, and the vitality and relevance of the tradition in the 21st century.”
The fruits of Hiteshew’s labors were recognized Thursday night at an exhibition at the Irish Consulate in New York City.
So many faces, 50 in all, lovingly preserved in stark black in white, incredibly crisp silver prints: Leitrim flutist Eddie Cahill, fiddler Paddy Reynolds (“The Music Master of Dromard”), County Sligo master fiddler Andy McGann, Chicago fiddler Liz Carroll, singers Mary Black and Dolores Keane, multi-instrumentalist and folklorist Mick Moloney, the late great Belfast flutist and Altan co-founder Frankie Kennedy, the family trio of Seamus, Siobhan and Rory Ann Egan (taken when they were very young), and so many more … including Philadelphia’s own young All-Ireland fiddler Haley Richardson.
The simply framed prints lined the walls of the consulate’s bright 17th floor exhibit space. There were so many guests it was hard to move. Some of the region’s all-star musicians were also on hand, including fiddlers Tony DeMarco and Don Meade, and piper Jerry O’Sullivan. Later on in the evening, about a dozen of them played a rocking impromptu session—and then it got a lot harder to move, because no one was moving. They were just standing there listening.
Most who attended Thursday night’s event at the Consulate seemed overwhelmed by Hiteshew’s lifelong labor of love—including the Consul herself Barbara Jones. “This is Ireland,” she said as she gestured around the room. “Fifty photographs that have never seen the light of public space. This is the work of a genius.”
“And of course,” she added, drawing laughs from a large local contingent, “that genius is from Philadelphia.”
Hiteshew, for his part, takes a more modest view.
“I want the viewer to know something about the person in the photo and want to know more. If you look at a photo and it speaks to you, then I feel like I’ve done my job.”
Plans are currently under way to move the exhibit to Philadelphia. Stay tuned.
