Browsing Category

People

People

Traffic-Stopping Irish Dancers

The McDade Cara Dancers on YouTube.


Wanna know how to stop traffic?

Check out this video of dancers from the McDade Cara School of Irish Dance in Delaware County who danced in the middle of the street to One Direction’s song, “What Makes You Beautiful.”

Sisters Leanne and Laura McGrory choreographed the dance for their St. Patrick’s Day Show. They chose One Direction because, well, they’re the world’s cutest boy band and their shows are sold out for the year. Hey, boys, you can come with some backstage passes for the world’s cutest Irish dancers, can’t you?

April 6, 2012 by
News, People

2012 Philadelphia Rose of Tralee Chosen

Outgoing Rose of Tralee Beth Keely with 2012 Rose of Tralee Elizabeth Spellman.

A 27-year-old social worker from Havertown was crowned the 2012 Philadelphia Rose of Tralee at a gala on Sunday, April 1, at the Radnor Hotel in St. Davids.

Elizabeth Spellman, who works at St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children in Philadelphia, is a graduate of Merion Mercy Academy and The Catholic University of America. She joined a volunteer program called Amigos de Jesus, based in Malvern, PA, and after graduation spent two years teaching English and acting as social worker at an orphanage for boys in Honduras, where she learned Spanish. She traces her Irish roots to Mayo and Sligo.

Spellman will compete this summer at the International Rose of Tralee Festival in Tralee, County Kerry. The “Rose” is a popular competition, drawing young Irish women from around the world. It’s televised in Ireland. The Philadelphia Rose Centre celebrated its 10th birthday this year. Founded by Sarah and Karen Conaghan (Race), the center this year gave its Mary O’Connor Spirit Award, named for the original Rose of Tralee, to the center’s original Rose, Noreen Donahue-McAleer.

McAleer, who teaches third grade in the Abington School district, began Irish dancing at the age of three and competed worldwide, including at the Irish Dance World Competition in Galway when she was 17. She opened the Cummins School of Dance in 2001 when she earned her Irish dance degree (teagascoir Choimisiuin le Rinci Gaelacha, or TCRG).

The Glenside resident is married to Peter McAleer and they have one son, Pearse. Her nieces, Abigail Donohue and Saorla Meeagh were “Rosebuds” this year—the youngest group of girls that take part in the pageant.

The outgoing Rose, Beth Keely, gave a tearful farewell speech in which she recalled all the events of her year, including helping to grant the wish of a terminally ill teen in Ireland—to spend a day with the Rose of Tralee contestants.

CBS3 consumer reporter, Jim Donovan, reprised his emcee duties this year. Donovan, who appears at many local Irish events, greeted the crowd with his usual, “Hello, Irish people!”

We were there and took many, many pictures so you could pretend you were there too.

April 6, 2012 by
People

Father Joseph Kelley is the People’s Choice

Father Joseph Kelley

Father Joseph Kelley

Among the South Philly Review’s 2012 Readers’ Choice award winners:

Termini Brothers for cannolis, John’s on East Snyder Avenue for roast pork sandwiches, the South Philadelphia Tap Room for the best selection of craft beers, and Father Joseph J. Kelley of St. Monica’s at 17th and Ritner for top priest or minister.

Kelley’s name bubbled to the surface in the section of the Readers’ Choice award balloting devoted to the neighborhood’s favorite people, a short list that included the likes of civic leader Barbara Capozzi and local DJ Johnny Looch.

Kelley confesses he’s flattered, but he kiddingly suggests that with so many relatives scattered throughout South Philadelphia, he had an unfair advantage.

“I grew up with these people,” he laughs. “My life is an open book. There can’t be any surprises there.”

Kelley’s boyhood home was at 933 Pierce Street, on the other side of Broad Street from St. Monica’s, in St. Nicholas of Tolentine parish. The neighborhood is a well-known blend of nationalities, with Italians and Irish figuring prominently. Kelley’s family tree sprouts off in both directions. His father’s name was John, and the Kelley family roots go back to County Monaghan; his mother, Phillomena, was a Coppola. Consequently, Kelley grew up with both traditions.

Kelley’s parish likewise is a marriage of two great European Catholic communities. For most of its early history, St. Monica’s was stoutly Irish, with pastors named McManus, Timmins, Walsh and Farrell. Their portraits hang in the hallway of St. Monica’s rectory. Relics of the parish’s Irish past aren’t hard to find. There’s a monument in memory of Monsignor Aloysius F.X. Farrell along the 17th Street side of the church. Farrell led a hugely ambitious rebuilding project following a catastrophic fire in the 1970s. Just a few steps away stands a blue historical marker honoring light-heavyweight boxing champ Tommy Loughran, the “Philly Phantom,” who grew up nearby.

The parish is mostly Italian now, though there are still plenty of Irish in the mix.

Kelley, resplendent in his flowing cassock, is tall, with dark, curly hair. His features seem to favor the Coppola side of the family. On the day we meet, he’s looking forward to an annual get-together with siblings, nieces and nephews in which they will spend hours baking Easter ham pies, some of which will be shipped overnight to South Philly exiles now living in Florida.

Kelley has been a priest for nearly 25 years, and for 21 of those years he has been posted in Philadelphia. “That’s very uncommon,” he says. Early assignments included Sacred Heart at 3rd and Reed, and St. Edmonds at 21st and Snyder. In 1999, he was named principal of Archbishop Wood High School in Warminster.

He was thrilled when, in 2003, Cardinal Bevilaqua assigned him to be pastor of St. Monica’s. “It was just after Ash Wednesday, and I got a call that the cardinal wanted to see me,” he says. Kelley surmised that a new assignment was in the offing, but he had no inkling what was to come next. A friend and fellow priest guessed Kelley was going to be sent to St. Monica’s, but he didn’t believe it. Then, when the cardinal offered him the pastorship of this vibrant South Philadelphia faith community, he recalls, “My jaw hit the floor; I was absolutely stunned.”

Although Kelley enjoyed his time in the Bucks county ‘burbs, he’s grateful to be back in his old stomping grounds.

“I’m a city kid,” he says. “I’m green. I never use a car. I take the subway, or I walk.”

It’s not hard to see how Kelley was the people’s choice. He seems to know everyone. As he stands on the stone steps in front of the church, he sees a young man walking down Ritner from 17th. “Hey, how’s your mom?” Kelley calls out. “You’re coming for Palm Sunday, aren’t you?” A warm and friendly conversation ensues.

The Readers’ Choice award took Kelley completely by surprise, he says, and left him with a feeling of deep gratitude.

“I grew up with these people. I’m related to these people. When you love a place so much, and you love a people so much, it’s good to know you’re loved back.”

April 6, 2012 by
People

Five Questions With Martin Hayes

Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill

Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill

There’s Irish music with trombones, Irish music with Bruce Springsteen lyrics, and then there’s Irish music played on traditional instruments and not all that different from what you might have heard by the fireside anywhere in County Clare a hundred years ago.

The old stuff is as pure as the wind rustling across the Burren, as raw as peat smoke. Fiddler Martin Hayes, himself from Maghera, East Clare, knows this territory all too well. He easily and lightly treads the well-worn path. He’s equally familiar with some of the more experimental applications of the tradition, to be sure. With his frequent collaborator guitarist Dennis Cahill, he formed the band Midnight Court in the 1980s, a melding of rock and jazz. But it’s the pure drop, as the old-style music is sometimes called, that Martin Hayes plans to celebrate as he, together with six talented colleagues, appear April 15 at the Annenberg Center in the “Masters of Tradition” concert.

If you’re going, you’ll hear some of the finest musicians Ireland has to offer. In addition to Hayes: David Power on uilleann pipes; singer Iarla Ó Lionáird; Cathal Hayden, fiddle; accordionist Máirtín O’Connor; and Seamie O’Dowd and Dennis Cahill on guitar.

The “Masters of Tradition” concept has its roots in a long-running annual festival of traditional Irish music in Bantry, County Cork, in conjunction with West Cork Music, a classical music organization. Hayes is the artistic director of the Masters program. In 2009, Hayes was invited to bring the “masters” to Australia for concerts in the iconic Sydney Opera House. Still, the concept has never had an airing in the United States—until this year.

We interviewed Hayes by phone recently. He took the call in a parking lot in Galway; you could hear the breeze blowing. Here’s what he had to say about the concert tour and the music he loves so well.

Q. Tell me about the Masters of Tradition Festival, the one that happens in Bantry in late June-early July. I know it began in 2003. How did it get started, and what was your role?

A. It started in West Cork. In Bantry, each year there is this highly regarded chamber music festival. We were invited to play in the festival. They had been talking about doing something with traditional Irish music. It was an opportunity to play traditional music in an almost chamber music-like environment, in Bantry House. It’s one of Ireland’s big, old aristocratic gentry homes, a very, very large home, with wonderful acoustics and great warmth. A lot of the concerts take place there. We also play in the Church of Ireland in Bantry.

There’s a tradition of Irish music being played in the big old homes of Ireland, in the gentry houses, but in recent years we had never played in that context. The idea was to present the music in Bantry House with a lot of attention to detail, and nuanced.

Q. It seems to me that when you use the word “tradition,” you mean something very specific. First of all, how do you define that, and second, why is sticking to the tradition so important to you?

A. To define is not so easy. As somebody said, nobody can tell you what good traditional music is; they can only tell you what isn’t. I’m not looking for the rock and roll fusion, but I’m not opposed. There are few things I haven’t tried myself. Sometimes, with a musical form like this, you can experiment and experiment and experiment. But every once in a while, it’s good to retrench, to re-examine what you have, and start the cycle all over again.

Q. Is there room for everyone in the Irish music tent? What do you think when musicians take liberties?

A. I kind of don’t care, and one reason I don’t care is that, in the late ‘80s, there was I. I was trying to fuse Dixie Dregs into Irish music. I was playing with a fusion drummer at that time. Everybody ought to have the freedom to try everything they want.

Q. How and why did you decide to take the show on tour?

A. It was accidental. A number of years ago, when I was in Australia, I mentioned the festival to my agent. I didn’t say I wanted to do anything, but he mentioned the Sydney festival and the Sydney Opera House. They (the organizers) said, “Why don’t they come out and play at the festival?” I said “OK.” This opportunity doesn’t often come up. We ended up doing two nights, and it was a great success. Everybody said, “I want to do more of this.” So here we are doing a little more of it.

Q. What do you hope that audiences will get out of the Masters tour that they might not get from other Irish music performances or concerts? What would make you feel like you’d accomplished what you set out to do?

A. It’s kind of like an invitation back to the music again. It’s pressing the “reset” button, and we’ll go back and re-introduce you to the music. It’s not an intellectual exercise, but one in which you can experience the richness of the music in the raw form in which it has come. You get a very wide and comprehensive sense of what the music is all about.

April 5, 2012 by
News, People

Close Shave

Drew Smart

Drew Smart

Drew Smart leaned back in a folding metal chair on a temporary stage at the Second Street Irish Society and patiently nursed a cup of beer while hair stylist Kathleen Fagley did what stylists usually don’t do: shave every last follicle from Smart’s head.

Smart’s unruly mop started out roughly shoulder length, but he happily surrendered it all for a good cause—to help the St. Baldrick’s Foundation raise money for research into childhood cancers. He prepares for the event by growing as much hair as he can. “I let it grow every year,” Smart said as Fagley put the finishing touches on his shining scalp. “My last haircut was in November.” He and his buddies, working as a team, have taken part for four years, raising roughly $35,000.

The St. Baldrick’s Foundation is reputed to be world’s largest volunteer-driven fundraising program for pediatric oncology research, raising $21 million in 2012 alone. “Shavees,” as the prospective baldies are called, solicit sponsorship dollars from friends, coworkers and family members. St. Baldrick’s started in 1999 when three New York reinsurance executives turned a St. Patrick’s Party into a locks-losing fundraiser. The project just took off, and now is nationwide.

The Second Streeters have been hosting their version of St. Baldrick’s for five years. Last Saturday’s event raked in a record $31,000. Club President Michael Remshard, who was scheduled to surrender his thick curls later in the afternoon, served as MC. The place was packed, and it seemed like every other head at the bar was as bare as a baby bird.

“We’ve raised $95,000 in the five years we’ve done it,” Remshard said. “The event’s grown a lot. Last year, we had 22 shavees. Last year was the best year, moneywise. we raised $20,000.”

This year, the number of shavees was closer to 30, including one young woman, Heather Withers. She started out with thick, dark, shoulder-length hair. In the end, Withers was left with nothing but a kind of 5 o’clock shadow. It was all worth it, though, she laughed, as her daughter Brittany ran her hand across mom’s smooth scalp. Withers raised $500.

“It’s my way of saying thanksgiving for being blessed recently,” she said. I’d been hoping for a new job, and it’s something cancer-related. This (St. Baldrick’s) came up, and I said, this is the perfect way to be thankful for my new job.”

Any regrets?

“It takes some getting used to,” she smiled, “but no.”

March 30, 2012 by
News, People

Judge Jimmy Lynn’s Annual St. Patrick’s Day Breakfast

Here comes the judge.

Here comes the judge.

Anybody who’s anybody shows up at the Plough and Stars on St. Patrick’s Day, Irish or not. Members of city council, row office holders, journalists, broadcasters, cops, St. Patrick’s Day parade officials … they’re all there.

Maybe it’s because Judge James “Jimmy” Lynn of the Court of Common Pleas is always the affable host. Which he is, of course. Or maybe it’s the combination of Irish music, dance, the full Irish breakfast, and a pint of Guiness at 8:30 in the morning.

Whatever the reason, the joint was jumping again on what turned out to be one of the most picture-perfect St. Patrick’s Days anyone could remember.

We have the photos!

March 23, 2012 by
News, People

The Last St. Patrick’s Day at The Shanachie

Gerry Timlin and Tom Kane at the Shanachie on St. Patrick's Day

Marybeth, Karen and Sean O’Connor were doing what they do every St. Patrick’s Day, celebrating Sean’s birthday at The Shanachie Irish Pub and Restaurant in Ambler.

On stage in the dining room, the pub’s co-owner, Gerry Timlin and his musical partner of more than 30 years, Tom Kane, sang the Stan Roger’s folk favorite “The Mary Ellen Carter,” about the efforts to raise a sunken ship. Standing in the sea of revelers in bar, the O’Connors and their friends sang along, fist-pumping through its rousing chorus:

“Rise again, rise again—though your heart it be broken
Or life about to end.
No matter what you’ve lost, be it a home, a love, a friend,
Like the Mary Ellen Carter, rise again.”

Quietly, Timlin’s Shanachie partner, Ed Egan, slipped out of the crowd. When he reappeared later, he confessed that the song had choked him up. “I had to go upstairs and gather myself,” said Egan, an attorney, who, with Timlin, opened the popular Ambler spot about eight years ago.

This was the last St. Patrick’s Day celebration at the Shanachie, which will close its doors for good on Saturday, March 31, and Egan wasn’t the only one who was choked up.

“I’m very sad,” said Linda McGarry of North Wales, who had to nearly shout to be heard over the din of the crowd. “I love Gerry and I love it here. I’m going to miss it so much.”

“We’re devastated,” said another woman, there with her whole family. “This is where we come for birthdays, all our celebrations. It makes me sad.”

All night, Timlin said in a phone conversation later in the week, “I just kept trucking. It was tough, very emotional, so I just kept working and kept myself busy but is was, at the end of the night, tough to say the least. This was my dream. It was always something I wanted to do.”

A native of County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, Timlin came to the US in 1972 as a skilled carpenter, but started working at bars and restaurants—McGurk’s in Wyndmoor, Toner’s in Fort Washington, Brittingham’s in Lafayette Hill—which suited his gregarious personality better than creating perfect mitered corners.

He’s been singing with Tom Kane almost since he arrived in the US from the tiny town of Coalisland. He came to know Ed Egan when the two met after a performance in Washington, DC, where Egan then worked. They shared the vision of an Irish pub where they would serve both traditional and new Irish cuisine and there would be music, Irish folk and traditional music, the kind Timlin grew up with and they both loved.

“I’d always wanted to be in the restaurant business as an owner,” said Timlin. “I had no visions of grandeur, that this was going to make me rich. I liked the concept of the Irish pub and wanted to do it better than others and to some degree I think we did.”

He said he thought restaurant owners should always have a physical presence, so either he or Egan were almost always there, not waiting on tables but strolling by, talking to patrons. And if he knew you even a little bit, there was always a chance that Gerry Timlin would pull up a seat and regale you with stories of Coalisland, his family, or life on the road as a musician or on the links as a golfer. Or that Ed Egan might get up a sing a song.

The Shanachie has always had a well-attended Tuesday night session, which occasionally draws well-known Irish musicians (like Angelina Carberry and Martin Quinn who came in the week they were playing at the Irish Center). There’s music every weekend, frequent fundraisers, and the occasional concert. “We had Mick Moloney, Robbie O’Connell, Jimmy Crowley, Finbar Furey,” said Timlin, ticking off some of the other big names—people he knows from his years in the music business—who played on the pub’s stage.

And, of course, Timlin and Kane. After the appearance of The John Byrne Band on March 24, it’s Timlin and Kane the next night and till the end. “Paraic Keane is joining us on the 30th,” says Timlin. Keane is a Dublin-born fiddler, now living in Philadelphia. Timlin and Kane will close the Shanachie on March 31.

After that a new restaurant will be moving in. Timlin won’t reveal the name. “We were able to make the announcement ourselves when we moved in, so they should have the same opportunity,” he says.

He also won’t say why the Shanachie is closing, though he admitted that it’s been stressful for some time. “It’s bittersweet. I’m going to miss it terribly. But there are some things I’m not going to miss,” he said.

Both Egan and Timlin have kept their hands in their other chosen occupations. Timlin still travels around the country performing. Egan practices law with Timoney Knox in Fort Washington and is director of the pre-law program at his alma mater, Mount St. Mary’s University in Emmitsburg, MD.

Timlin says he’s already received a few “very nice offers” that he acknowledges have surprised him. “I think, why me? I’m incredibly humbled by it and I’m not the easiest person in the world to humble,” he says with a laugh.

Wherever he lands, though, he’ll find familiar faces. The O’Connor family haven’t even thought about where they’ll spend next St. Patrick’s Day and Sean O’Connor’s birthday. But, says Marybeth O’Connor, “My parents have been following Timlin and Kane for 30 years, following them wherever they played. We’ll find Gerry wherever he goes.”

View our photo essay.

March 23, 2012 by
News, People, Sports

Getting Ready for the “Donnybrook”

That has to hurt.

When the US faces off against Ireland in the Donnybrook Cup rugby league match on St. Patrick’s Day in Chester, the new head coach of the USA Tomahawks will be bringing his experience as a player to bear.

Marcus Vassilakopoulous has gone up against Ireland before. Vassilakopoulous, who was born in England and now lives in Aston, PA, was playing for the Sheffield Eagles in the UK when he was tapped by David Niu (short for Niumataiwalu), a former player, coach, and one of the founders of rugby league in the US, to play in a game against the Irish Wolfhounds at Glen Mills School on St. Patrick’s Day in 2000. Niu, who lives in Philadelphia, is a teacher there.

Vassilakopoulous qualified to play with the American team because his grandfather was actually born in Wisconsin.

On the freezing cold night in Glen Mills, the US was victorious. Vassilakopoulous met up with the Irish team again on another St. Patrick’s Day in 2004, this time in Atlanta, where, although the humidity was a killer, the Tomahawks won again. His last meet-up was in Moscow, where injuries to the American team forced them to scare up Russian-based American players (one of whom, Vassilakopoulous was sure was CIA, KGB, or both). That time, they lost to the Irish.

Last year, the Wolfhounds ran away with the Donnybrook Cup at the post-St. Patrick’s Day game played at Northeast High School. This year, this classic match-up is at Quick Stadium at Widener University in West Chester, and past experience has taught Vassilakopoulous that the Irish are tough.

“It’s going to tough again like last year,” he said, when reached by phone earlier this week. “I’m going to try to build a bit on our performance last year. We were good in the attacking part of the game, but the defense we’ll have to tweak a little bit. We need to play pretty physical like the Irish do.”

Rugby, like aging, is not for sissies. Blood is often spilled in this centuries-old game that makes American football look like a tea party in comparison. Rugby players hit, slam, tackle, and may well eat their dead, as the t-shirts proclaim. “It’s bone on bone, meat on meat. It’s a brutal sport that’s not for everybody, but I love it,” says Vassilakopoulous. And, he notes, the Irish are as fierce as they come.

“They’re very passionate about playing for their country,” he said. “They put their heart and soul into it and so we expect the same again.”

The coach, who now works at the Glen Mills School, had some of his team out last Sunday for practice. Since the Tomahawks are a national team, its members come from all over—Hawaii, Georgia, Texas, Florida, New York, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania. Team captain, Apple Pope, heads the Jacksonville Axmen in Florida. “I got some of the players from Pennsylvania, New York and Connecticut here, but all the players have the playbook so we’re all on the same page.”

Vassilakopoulous has taken some time off from coaching the Delaware County Bulls to focus on the Tomahawks. He expects to be headed to Hawaii, France or Italy, and possibly Canada this year.

“We’ll see after this fame,” he said cautiously. “I might not get asked back. I need to make sure the boys perform.”

Although women also play rugby, Vassilakopoulous says, it’s mainly a guy thing. And that’s the way it’s going to stay at his house. Vassilakopoulous and his wife have three young daughters. “Girls do play rugby but my girls won’t be playing rugby,” he said. “Too brutal.”

The Donnybrook Cup kickoff is at 1 PM at Quick Stadium, Widener University, 17th Street and Melrose Avenue in Chester. The day starts, however, with matches starting at 10 AM between the Hibernians RUFC and the North East Irish RUFC, then Msgr. Bonner vs St. Augustine Prep High School at 11:15. The pre-match ceremony starts at 12:45 and features John and Michael Boyce of Blackthorn singing the National Anthem, while their sister, Karen Boyce McCollum, sings the Irish national anthem. The Ryan Kilcoyne Irish Dancers with Bagpiper John Collins of the Philadelphia Emerald Society Pipe Band starts at 12:40. Judge Jimmy Lynn will do the coin toss.

After the match, Blackthorn will be performing at the Grandstand Deck at Harrah’s Chester. For more information, go to the Donnybrook Cup website.

March 15, 2012 by