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James Keane will be at the Irish Center on Saturday, Dec. 22.
Christmas this year is book-ended by two wonderful events.
On Saturday, world-renown box accordion player James Keane will be performing at the Irish Center with his nephew, fiddler Paraic Keane, and singer/multi-instrumentalist Gabriel Donohue. We’ve heard them all separately and with others and this promises to be one of the most talked-about Irish concerts of the year in Philadelphia. Better be there. Keane’s latest CD, Heir of the Dog, is one of Irish Philadelphia’s favorite trad releases this year. We also hear there may be a Gabriel Donohue CD coming out as well.
(Just a note: You can catch Paraic Keane on Sunday, December 23, with fellow Dubliner John Byrne, at the ballad session at Fergie’s Pub on Sansom Street in Philadelphia.)
The day after Christmas, an Irish tradition lives on in Philadelphia—the Wren Party, sponsored by the Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann (Coal-tus) of the Delaware Valley, at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Glenside. Every year in Ireland, on the Feast of St. Stephen, the Irish celebrate the martyred saint bu getting together, wear costumes in the spirit of the straw men who once hunted down a wren, killed it, and put it on stick which they paraded around town, collecting money, ostensibly for charity. It’s a long story—some blame the wren for giving away St. Stephen’s hiding place, leading to his death. Hence, this celebration of blood-letting and revenge. Yadda, yadda, yadda. There’s no blood anymore, but there’s lots of music, dancing, food, and frivolity. Also costumes.
There’s more coming up in January 2013 (yikes!), including ringing in the New Year at the Irish Center with the Vince Gallagher Band.
Also, if you’re part of an Irish organization and looking for a last-minute good deed to do this year, consider giving Amybeth Weaver a call. She’s the project coordinator of the Irish Tay-Sachs Carrier Research Project at Albert Einstein Medical Center in Philadelphia. They’re looking for organizations willing to provide locations for community screenings for Tay-Sachs, a killer of babies and young children, in 2013.
It’s believed that as many as one in 50 Irish people (and people of Irish descent) carry the gene for this horrible disease. This study was launched this year because there have been three cases in the Philadelphia in the last decade among Irish-Americans—a surprise to many who thought this was just a disease of Jewish children. (The gene occurs in about 1 in 27 Jews and 1 in 27 French Canadians or Cajuns.)
For this study, anyone over the age of 18 who has at least three grandparents of Irish descent is eligible to take the DNA test. (Results are confidential.) The aim is to establish the carrier rate among the Irish. Even if no one in your family has had the disease, you could still be a carrier. The condition only manifests in the children of two carriers. And it doesn’t matter how old you are—even if you’re long past child-bearing–since the study is looking only for carrier incidence. (We oldies at Irishphiladelphia.com got tested at the Irish Immigration Center screening last month and we’re way overdue for grandchildren.)
The project is off to a slow start, so consider organizing a community screening through your AOH, LAOH, county society, or other Irish club or group. You’ll be helping other families—and maybe your own—avoid going through the heartache of having a child afflicted with Tay-Sachs. Contact Amybeth at 484-636-4197 or irish@tay-sachs.org
And finally, from us to you, an old Irish Christmas blessing:
The light of the Christmas star to you
The warmth of home and hearth to you
The cheer and good will of friends to you
The hope of a childlike heart to you
The joy of a thousand angels to you
The love of the Son and
God’s peace to you.
