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Jeff Meade

Arts

“Shadow of a Gunman” Comes to Philly

Josephine Patane and Dexter Anderson

That’s the Irish People all over—they treat a serious thing as a joke and a joke as a serious thing.
—Seumas Shields

People make assumptions about poet Donal Davoren. When he takes up lodging in the flat of friend Seumas Shields in the Dublin slums, the other tenants make a rash assumption. They assume he is a gunman for the Irish Republican Army, and at a particularly turbulent time—1920, during the War of Independence. It’s a charade Davoren is happy to play out, especially since it helps him woo and win another tenant, the winsome Minnie Powell.

Plays about mistaken identity are often played for laughs. Sometimes this one is. But Irish playwright Sean O’Casey doesn’t let the audience off that easily.

“Shadow of a Gunman” is the first play in O’Casey’s Dublin trilogy. It makes its debut courtesy of Philadelphia’s Irish Heritage Theatre Dexter April 10-26 at the Skybox at the Adrienne, 2030 Sansom Street in Center City. Dexter Anderson plays the title character. Peggy Mechum and John Gallagher direct.

All of the action takes place in Shields’s tenement flat. On a practical level, this makes the play easier to present, says producer Armen Pandola.

“It’s easier for the set designer,” he explains. “There’s not a lot of set changing going on.”

On another level, concentrating the action to one room was part of O’Casey’s modus operandi. “O’Casey was a big believer in time and place. It all takes place in one time and in one place.”

That one place, a room in a tenement, happens to be situated amid a sea of violence and discord. It was a time of revolution, a time when nationalists struggled to regain their own country by force of arms—and a time when almost anyone who was Irish, regardless of their loyalties, could be stopped, humiliated, brutalized, put away and possibly killed by paramilitaries acting on behalf of the British government.

“Shadow of a Gunman” focuses on those caught in the crossfire. “O’Casey had a very different view of the revolution,” Pandola says. “It was the people who suffered for it.” In this sense, everything that transpires in that one room encapsulates all of the suffering into one place and one time.

As with any play featuring Irish characters, American-born actors face a difficult challenge—how to actually sound Irish without crossing the line into territory. PR Director Kirsten Quinn has a lot of useful tips as she coaches the actors, but one in particular is particularly interesting: “If you imagine putting a cork in your mouth and talking around the cork … that’s Irish. “You don’t want to sound like a leprechaun. This is a standard Dublin dialect.”

Listening to the actors rehearse one night last week in a long, mirrored room cluttered with chairs, it’s clear that they’re “getting it.”

You’ll hear more Irish accents as the months go on. The next two plays of the trilogy are yet to come: “Juno and the Paycock” in the fall, and “The Plough and the Stars” next spring, to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising.

“Shadow of a Gunman” wasn’t exactly “The Sound of Music” when it debuted at the Abbey Theatre in 1923. “It was a huge risk for him (O’Casey) to put up this material,” notes Pandola. And ”The Plough and the Stars” touched off something of a riot.

This is gritty stuff, and it does a pretty fair job of playing with your emotions. For all of its gentle humor, “Shadow of a Gunman” grabs you by the throat toward the end. Don’t miss it.

April 3, 2015 by Jeff Meade

News, People

Adventures in Paradise, Part 2

Cullen and a Caribbean leprechaun

On St. Patrick’ Day, Cullen Kirkpatrick leads one of the smallest, shortest and most unlikely St. Patrick’s Day parades anywhere. It’s on a sun-drenched beach in Cabarete, in the Dominican Republic.

It’s a time of year when St. Patrick’s Day parades in the Philadelphia area might make their way past the reviewing stand in cold, windy weather—and from time to time in freezing rain or wet snow—climate conditions so horrendous that a band can march and play for blocks without seeing a soul along the parade route. As pipe major of Irish Thunder Pipes and Drums in Swedesburg, Montgomery County, Kirkpatrick knows all about that. He’s been pipe major since 2002, and he marched in the band for years before that.

So he’s thankful in the extreme for the opportunity to perform in a big tent at Jose O’Shay’s, a pub at seaside owned by Frank Brittingham—former owner of Brittingham’s in Lafayette Hill. He’s been playing pipes in the Caribbean over the St. Patrick’s Day holidays for eight years.

“Being in a pipe band, there’s a lot going on around home. As pipe major, it’s hard to say I’m going to miss two or three parades, but I’m going to do this for as long as I can,” Kirkpatrick says. “It’s really enjoyable, and a really nice break from the winter—especially the last two that we’ve had.”

Kirkpatrick plays throughout St. Patrick’s Day, alternating with longtime Philly favorite and the local duo Two Quid (John McGillian and Dave Cohen). “Maybe the night before, we play for a set or so as people as people walk by on the beach,” he says.

Cabarete is not exactly a five-star resort, but it’s great fun.

“There’s not a lot of Irish down there, but people come out in the hundreds,” Kirkpatrick says. “Thre are a lot of Canadians and French Canadians. Americans are in the minority down there.”

For Kirkpatrick, the highlight is the St. Patrick’s Day parade along the beach. “Frank passes out a lot of plastic Paddy apparel. Everybody in the tent goes marching up the beach. He gets a local Dominican band. Sometimes he brings in these young girls who dance, and they usually have some batons and some crazy outfits going on. I’ll lead it. We’ll walk up the beach a couple hundred yards, and then we’ll turn around.”

Not exactly Conshohocken.

Kirkpatrick gives a lot of credit to Frank Brittingham for that eclectic spectacle on the beach, and, indeed, for the whole day of merry-making. Brittingham, he says, has always been a pioneer, dating back to his ownership of Brittingham’s. His great love of Irish music was well known—Irish music was a constant presence in his sprawling pub on Germantown Pike.

“When he picks up at the airport, he’s listening to Irish music in the car,” Kirkpatrick laughs. “He’s got a bigger selection of Irish music than anywhere in the United States.”

While he’s there, Kirkpatrick carries on the tradition, playing a wide selection of pipe tunes, from marches to reels and jigs and strathspeys.

The pipes—they can be cranky beasts, susceptible to changes in weather—apparently take to the Caribbean climes as well as Kirkpatrick does.

What pipes are not crazy about are sudden changes in climate, which Kirkpatrick has to deal with as soon as he got back, leading the Allentown St. Patrick’s Day parade.

“My pipes were so used to the nice, warm, humid weather, they went into shock,” he recalls. “In Allentown, it was in the high 30s, and windy. I had to do a little bit of maintenance before I could play in Allentown.”

See last week’s interview with John McGillian.

Look for Cullen in this video at about 1:08.

April 3, 2015 by Jeff Meade

News

The 2015 Mount Holly Parade in Pictures

After eight years selling cotton candy, this vendor has perfected his sense of balance.

The second time was the charm.

The Burlington County St. Patrick’s Day Parade–always the Delaware Valley’s first parade of the season–was postponed because of terrible weather.

Last Sunday, it was chilly but bright, and the usual crowd turned out for the march down High Street. Pipers, mummers, dancers, singers, drummers … there was something for everybody.

Here are some photos to remember it all by.

[flickr_set id=”72157649383218694″]

April 2, 2015 by Jeff Meade

News

And As If Pictures Weren’t Enough …

Of course, there was no substitute for actually being at the Burlington County St. Patrick’s Day Parade. It’s always great. But we think we’ve come up with the next best thing: the parade highlights reel.

Sit back and watch. And maybe you’ll see yourself or your band!

April 2, 2015 by Jeff Meade

News

Witness to Conflict, Advocate for Peace

Patricia Campbell, with the Passion for Peace award

Patricia Campbell has seen it all. And you probably don’t want to see what she has seen.

As a community mental health nurse in Belfast, Campbell has witnessed the trauma resulting from years of conflict in Northern Ireland. In spite of the Good Friday Agreement, the wounds of many have failed to heal—on both sides—but certainly among those who were dragged off to prison, tortured or both, all at British hands. Suicide is not uncommon.

Within the communities divided during the Troubles, Campbell says, those divisions remain. In many cases, they are more pronounced now than they were in the days of open conflict.

Severe health care budget cuts will make it harder to deal with the community’s ills.

Campbell has also visited Palestine, where she sees parallels between Northern Ireland’s minority Catholic population and the government of the UK.

Regardless of where she bore witness to injustice, Campbell has dedicated herself to justice and peace.

Last Sunday, Campbell visited Philadelphia to receive the Passion for Peace Award at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in the city’s Chestnut Hill neighborhood.

We took a few moments before presentation of the award for a conversation. Here’s what she had to say.

March 27, 2015 by Jeff Meade

News

St. Patrick’s Day Isn’t Over: Two Parades This Weekend

It was chilly in Mount Holly last year, too. That didn’t stop anybody.

Horrible weather forced the postponement of two big St. Patrick’s Day parades—Conshohocken and Mount Holly. But the operative word here is “postponed”—not “canceled.” The weather Saturday is expected to be really cold—partly cloudy with a high of 38 degrees—and it’s not a whole lot better on Sunday—sunny and 40—but hey, there’s no snow or ice. So the parades must go on.

Conshy steps off at 2 p.m. on Saturday down Fayette Street. It’s always a big parade, and you can bet it’ll draw a crowd, regardless of the cold.

In Mount Holly, the parade begins at noon on Sunday, right through the heart of town. Also a big parade.

Here’s what you have to look forward to.

Mount Holly 2014

[flickr_set id=”72157641723086293″]

Conshohocken 2014

[flickr_set id=”72157642454991584″]

March 27, 2015 by Jeff Meade

News

Adventures in Paradise, Part 1

John McGillian and Dave Cohen in a small but warm St. Patrick’s Day parade.

Given the lion-or-lamb nature of March weather in Philadelphia—mostly lion—St. Patrick’s Day wasn’t bad: mostly sunny, with a 68.

But you can bet it was a lot better in the laid-back paradise village of Cabarete along the northern beaches of the Dominican Republic: sunny, with a high of 90.

It might not be traditional Irish weather, but Philadelphia accordion player John McGillian. In fact, he’s been heading to Cabarete to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, with his guitar-playing partner Dave Cohen, for the past eight years. Recruited by Philly-area Irish music legend Cletus McBride, McGillian and Cohen—performing as Two Quid—perform most of the day at Jose O’Shay’s, an Irish pub owned by Frank Brittingham. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because he once owned the restaurant that still bears his last name in Lafayette Hill.

“I just got back,” McGillian said in an interview this week. “I was there from the 14th to the 21st. I was hired to play one day, but we give Frank a couple of nights acoustically as people walk by.”

Brittingham promises the tourists an authentic full day of Irish music and dance, and that’s what they get: McGillian and Cohen, McBride, Irish Thunder piper Cullen Kirkpatrick, and three dancers from the Henry School—Caitlin, Bridget and Molly Mahon. There’s even a parade on the beach.

As for the tourists, McGillian says, “most of them come from from Canada or Europe. It’s not a resort. You’re on your own. It is a zoo. But it’s beautiful—a tropical island. It’s a little piece of Spain because everyone is speaking Spanish.”

He confesses, “The only words I’ve learned so far are “Cerveza (beer), per favor” and “muchas gracias.”

McGillian and his partner landed the Celtic Caribbean gig when Brittingham asked McBride—who was then performing at Brittingham’s St. Thomas pub—who he’d recommend to play on St. Patrick’s Day at Jose O’Shay’s. “I used to play the odd gig here and there with Cletus,” McGillian recalls, “and Cletus said John McGillian because I was his fave.”

McBride called McGillian out of the blue. “It was a surprise. I had no idea. I went down the first time, and then Frank kept getting me back.” His partner from Five Quid went along as part of the deal. “Dave is one of the best musicians I’ve met. I’ve been playing with Dave. I’ve been playing with Dave the last 20 years all over Philadelphia, New Jersey, and through the Tristate area. No one touches us for a two-piece.”

Regardless of the locale, the music is pretty much the same as what you might hear in a local pub on St. Patrick’s Day, and they also play for the dancers. “We’ll do a couple of songs, and then the girls will come out with the hard shoes on and dance away.”

There’s also a dance floor so the tourists can step out. That’s when they’re not wind surfing or kite surfing—two activities for which Cabarete is well known.

As for McGillian, he’ll be happy to throw on the loud shirt and shorts and play “Whiskey in the Jar” at beachside pretty much forever.

“It’s a gift,” he says. “It’s gonna end one day, so I’m gonna accept as long as its being offered. It’s the best gig out of town.”

And when he returns to Philadelphia, he’s happy to share his stories with his fellow musicians—the ones who suffered through three or four gigs on St. Patrick’s Day, just possibly on a day when the Delaware Valley was blanketed in snow.

“I’ll rub it in whenever I can.”

Next week: Cullen Kirkpatrick.

March 27, 2015 by Jeff Meade

Arts, Music

Strumming a New Tune

Zakir Hussain (photo by Jim McGuire)

Back in December, premier Irish guitarist Tony Byrne got an unusual email. Would he be interested in going on tour with Indian tabla player Zakir Hussain and his troupe of Indian and Celtic musicians?

“Are you free, are you interested?” Byrne recalls. The answer was easy. “Being on a stage like that, I couldn’t say no.”

Speaking from his hotel room outside Washington, D.C., on the fourth night of the tour, Byrne has absolutely no regrets about playing in Hussain’s show “Pulse of the World: Celtic Connections.” He joins some of the world’s best Indian and Celtic musicians: Rakesh Chaurasia, bamboo flute; Fraser Fifield, flute and pipes; Jean-Michel Veillon, flute; Ganesh Rajagopalan, violin; Charlie McKerron, fiddle; Patsy Reid, fiddle; John Joe Kelly, bodhran—and Hussain himself, widely acknowledged as the master of the Indian tabla drums, one of the most devilishly complex percussion instruments on the planet.

Celtic Connections explores the surprising ties between the rhythms and melodies of two distinctly different genres of world music. Those connections can be close indeed.

“A lot of these styles of music are linked, especially through percussion instruments, and a lot of the wind instruments as well,” says Byrne.

Still, the instruments, the styles of playing them and the musicians themselves are different enough that the contrasts are also pretty clear—and if some of it sounds like experimentation, it’s because it often is, says Byrne.

“The Indian musicians who are playing with us will pick up on a motif in a small line we play, and then they can come back to you with a little four-note phrase. It’s like they’re echoing back to you, and call and answer. You have a match, and a mismatch at the same time.

“They can dip in and out. That’s really fun when that happens. The more concerts we do, the more that that happens. We have a blueprint, but we can all deviate from that. It’s great to see that developing. It’s almost like jam sessions. That’s really exciting.”
Earlier in his musical career, Byrne was a rock drummer, and when he learned to play guitar, he incorporated a lot of percussion into his right-hand technique. That’s good when it comes to rhythm, but Byrne has to hang in there with the melody as well, which can be complex.

“I’ll always lock into John Joe and Zakir’s playing but I also have to lock into the chords,” Byrne says. “You try and cover all the bases.”

Even though Byrne’s style of play is powerfully percussive, that’s no walk in the park, either. John Joe Kelly is most directly in Byrne’s sightline, he says, “so we naturally, almost instinctively think together what to do.”

Zakkir is a bit more challenging. “Zakkir can play in any time signature. The guy has never missed a beat in his life. Its mesmerizing to watch him do it.”

If you’re a musician, though, that kind of challenge is what you live for.

“You’re always striving and trying to making it better,” Byrne says. “You become more focused and you become really alert. It is a challenge but it’s an exciting challenge as well.”

Pulse of the World: Celtic Connections will roll into Philly on March 27 for a concert at Painted Bride Art Center, 230 Vine Street. The show starts at 7. Tickets and info here.

March 20, 2015 by Jeff Meade

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