How to Be Irish in Philly

Shamrocks and Hibernians hurlers: They carry big sticks!

Time to start thinking about Gaelic sports. The Donegal Football Club is holding its annual banquet on Saturday night at the Irish Center. A late entry to our calendar: On Friday, April 24, the Shamrocks are sponsoring a beef and beer at the Irish Times in Queens Village.

It won’t be long till they’re out on the field (Donegal plays in the big leagues in New York—they’re that good). If you’ve never seen a live honest-to-goodness Irish football or hurling match, you’re missing a lot of great action. These guys and girls (yes, there are girls’ teams too) make American sports look like a literal romp in the park. You can check out the action this week (Tuesday and Thursday at 7:45 PM) at the Torresdale Boys Club where they Shamrocks hurling teams will be practicing. The Allentown Hibernians hurlers are practicing Sundays at Haines Mill Field in Allentown, and on Tuesdays and Thursdays at Klines Lane Field in Emmaus (check their website for updates).

Matt and Shannon Heaton will be performing at the Godfrey Daniels Coffee House in Bethlehem on Saturday night where they’ll be debuting their new repetoire of love songs.

On Thursday, order your Guinness from the celebrity bartenders at AOH Div. 87 (Tommy Healy, its president; Maria Gallagher, president of the LAOH Div. 87) to raise money for two organizations that support autism research. There will be music, appetizers, and happy hour specials.

Ring in the month of May at another benefit on Friday night at Canstatters in Northeast Philadelphia, this one for Jack Twist of AOH 88 and retired firefighter Tom Meehan, sponsored by the Philadelphia Police and Fire Pipes and Drums.

Check out our calendar for all the details.

And remember to eat, drink, and buy Irish!

Members of the Tyrone Society accept a proclamation acknowledging their 100th anniversary from Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter.

If you see the Tyrone Society around, wish it a happy 100th birthday. You might want to do it in person on Saturday night at their anniversary ball featuring Ireland’s “Queen of Country,” Philomena Begley. It’s being held at the Irish Center where you can enjoy cocktails, dinner, and all kinds of entertainment. And we have to say, Tyrone looks great for 100. Happy Birthday!

A fundraiser benefiting Project Children, which brings children from Northern Ireland to the US in the summer, is scheduled for Saturday night at the AOH Div. 1 Hall in National Park, NJ. Music will be provided by some of Philly’s best Irish musicians, including The Shanty’s , Birmingham Six, the Bogside Rogues, the Broken Shilellaghs and more. There will be beef, beer, raffles and prizes—and all for a worthwhile cause.

On Thursday, US National Scottish fiddle champ Hanneke Cassel will be joined Celtic cellist Natalie Haas at the Blue Barn, Alapocas Run State Park in Wilmington. And in Phoenixville, Enter the Haggis will be playing at The Colonial Theater. This Celtic rock group has a big local following.

On Friday, get ready to laugh while doing a good deed at the same time. The Dennis Kelly AOH Div. 1 of Havertown is holding its annual comedy night to benefit the Heroes Homecoming Fund, the division’s own charity which provides funds to injured returning veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan theaters and their families. It’s being held at the Palombaro Club in Ardmore.

We have all of the juicy details on our calendar.

Don’t forget to buy Irish!

Scenes from a recent Rambling House.

It’s a slowish week, Celtically speaking, but that’s good because it gives us a chance to tell you a little more about a monthly evening of entertainment at the Irish Center called the Rambling House, which happens this coming Thursday night.

A “rambling house” is truly a piece of old Ireland. A rural County Kerry tradition, it was an informal evening of music, stories, jokes, and recitations usually held in the home of a local farmer. The performers weren’t professionals—just neighbors and friends who presented their “party piece,” acted as the seanchai (storyteller), fiddled, sang, or danced. Yes, it was Irish amateur hour, but it’s also the place where the traditions were passed along, the stories came alive, and a sense of community and closeness were forged.

I went to the first Rambling House, produced and hosted by WTMR 800-FM radio host, Marianne MacDonald, and got that same feeling of “home” I experienced when I was in Ireland. I like to attribute the sensation to some mystical form of ethnic memory, though I suspect it had more to do with the realization I had while sitting in my cousin’s kitchen in Ballyharry, County Donegal: What I thought of as my family’s own personal customs—sitting at the kitchen table for hours, talking and laughing and telling stories—were actually part of some larger set of traditions whose source I discovered at this other table, while sipping tea and talking to people I’d just met but with whom I share a few grandparents.

Even if you’ve never had this kind of experience, you’re sure to feel a closeness to your roots at the Irish Center’s Rambling House, which is scheduled for April 16 at 8 PM. As the old song goes: “Boul in, boul in and take a chair, Admission here is free, You’re welcome to the rambling house, to hear the seanchai.”

Check out our calendar for the loads of sessions on tap this week.

Pat O'Connor and Eoghan O'Sullivan will be at the Irish Center and Coatesville over the weekend.

Bring on the dancing girls. . .and boys. About 6,000 of them are in Philly this coming week for the 39th annual World Irish Dance Championships being held at the Kimmel and the Downtown Marriott. It’s the first time this international competition has been held on US soil and it’s quite a feather in the city’s cap, especially in the current economic climate. Mayor Michael Nutter will be part of the opening ceremonies on Sunday at 5 PM at the Kimmel, on Broad Street. If you love Irish dancing, this is the place to be this week. And “Riverdance” is playing through Sunday just next door at the Academy, so step lively.

Speaking of economics, this is also the time to remember those less fortunate. The Hibernian Hunger Project is holding a “cook-in” on Saturday at Aid For Friends in Northeast Philadelphia, preparing meals for shut-ins to carry the agency through the summer. Although it’s an AOH charity, you don’t have to be a member to help out. Note to high schoolers: This is one way to satisfy a community service requirement, and many teens do volunteer.

Also on Saturday, our friends at AOH Notre Dame Div. 1 in Swedeburg are sponsoring Police Appreciation Day to benefit the Philadelphia Police Survivors Fund, which aids families of slain officers. Entertainment is being donated by Paddy’s Well, Tom McHugh and Company, Dan Rooney and Olive McElhone and there will be music all day.

On Saturday evening, Pat O’Connor and Eoghan O’Sullivan will marry the music from County Clare to the tunes of County Cork at the Commodore Barry Club (that’s the Irish Center when it’s at home). O’Connor—he’s the Clare man—is a fiddle player from that lonesome Clare tradition and O’Sullivan performs on flute and accordian, though not at the same time. This is a concert for trad purists and those who’d like to be. This kind of concert never disappoints. If you miss it on Saturday night, the duo will be appearing at the Coatesville Cultural Society on Sunday night.

Start your Sunday morning with a traditional Irish breakfast at Smoke Eaters Pub in Philadelphia, cooked for you by AOH 22, which is raising money for its charities.

Sunday at 2 PM you can attend the annual family ceili and set dance benefit for the Sister Peg Hynes Memorial Scholarship Fund at the Stardust Ballroom in Bellmawr, NJ. Sister Peg was a longtime teacher and community activist in Camden. She was killed in a car accident in 2002 when the vehicle in which she was riding was struck by another being driven by a man who admitted he was high on cocaine.

At 5 PM Sunday, join Blackthorn for the First Annual Liberty USO “Rock the Troops” Benefit at PJ Whelihan’s Pub in Cherry Hill, NJ, a fundraiser supporting the work of the USO.

Next Friday, a very unusual Irish group comes to town. Guggenheim Grotto (you can tell they’re Irish from the name—wha?) blends classical instruments such as the viola, glockenspiel, the Wurlitzer and Hammond organs with modern guitars, basses and pianos to create a unique sound one critic called “spine tingling.” Sounds intriguing. And where else are you going to be able to hear some good glockenspiel tunes? This concert is at the World Café Live.

See the McDade Dancers on Sunday, March 22.

We know what you’re thinking. After St. Patrick’s Day “do I have to be Irish this week?” No, you don’t, but if you want to, there’s plenty of ways. Let us count them:

Up in Lehigh County, they’re celebrating St. Paddy’s Day for the first time. On Saturday you can attend the “Best Legs in a Kilt” contest at Jack Callahan’s Pub in Allentown, take a pub crawl , then on Sunday attend the Allentown St. Patrick’s Day Parade.

They’re also having their parade in Gilbertsville, Schuykill County, this weekend.

The hot Irish group The Saw Doctors will be performing at the TLA on South Street on Saturday night. See our story on their New York gig.

On Sunday, there’s music and dancing on tap. The McDade Irish dancers will be performing two shows at Archbishop Prendergast which will be your opportunity to see the kids who will be competing at the World Irish Dance Championships in Philadelphia in April. There’s a St. Patrick’s Ceili-Set Dance in New Castle, DE, and Coyote Run will be on stage at the Sellersville Theatre.

If you missed Tony Kenny’s Celtic Nights, which appeared at various venues this season, you can catch the show at the Upper Darby Performing Arts Center in Drexel Hill on Tuesday night.

We’re gearing up for the Scottish girl group, GiveWay, which is coming to the Irish Center next weekend. We’re hoping to see a lot of you there. Come up and introduce yourself.

Don’t forget the Frank McCourt play which is heading into the home stretch at The Kimmel, and the farewell performance of “Riverdance,” with several of the original dancers, coming in a week. (They’re offering a 15% discount so you have to go!)

Oh come on, if you don’t know how to be Irish this week, you need to join a new ethnic group. The Philadelphia St. Patrick’s Day Parade steps off the curb at noon on Sunday, but don’t stake out your usual spot on Broad Street. It won’t be marching down that avenue, but starting out around 16th and JFK—a course correction to save some money. It’s the biggest parade ever, with bands from as far away as Ireland, Connecticut, and Maryland. A Mass will be celebrated before the parade at 9 AM by Cardinal Justin Rigali at St. Patrick’s Church at 20th and Locust.

You can watch the parade on CBS3. But it’s a good time, even in bad weather (\we know, we froze our Irish off last year), so come on out. Bring a nonperishable food donation with you. The Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News–new parade sponsors this year–will have volunteers along the parade route to collect them for the needy.

There are after-parade parties all over, but we’ll probably wind up at the Irish Center where there will be great food and wonderful music.

But let’s not skip over Saturday:

There are at least seven parades on Saturday: Levittown, York, Conshohocken, Trenton, Wilmington, New Castle, and Springfield, Delaware County (look for us in Springfield this year, a first for us!). In the morning, take the kids to Willow Creek Orchards in Collegeville where they’re holding a shamrock cookie decorating workshop (you need to pre-register).

On Saturday afternoon, the Erin Express—the drink fest you can really enjoy because the bars provide buses—is happening in Center City Philadelphia (see our calendar for the participating pubs).

At Archbishop Prendergast, there’s a freebie Saturday—St. Malachy’s College Music Tour from Belfast is there thanks to the Dennis Kelly AOH, Division #1, Havertown and the new Junior AOH Division #1 at Monsignor Bonner High School.

Also Saturday night: Burning Bridget Cleary will be heating it up at the Tin Angel, The Broken Shillelaghs are repairing to The Blue Martini at Bally’s in Atlantic City, The Morrigan (a trad group) is bringing some civilization to the Scots at Braveheart Pub in Hellertown, and The Boys of County Bucks will be entertaining the wine drinkers at Crossing Vineyard and Winery in Washington Crossing.

The Boys will also be performing on Sunday. Also on tap for Sunday: Singer Tommy Sands will be doing two shows at Longwood Gardens, and Paddy Moloney and The Chieftains will be making their annual pilgrimage to the Kimmel.

And it’s not over yet. It’s not even St. Patrick’s Day! On Monday, the Marple Sports Arena is holding a Family-Friendly St. Patty’s Sports Night with skating to Irish music.

Then, Tuesday dawns. Here’s a rundown of just some of the things you can do on the 2009 St. Paddy’s Day:

Have a big Irish breakfast at Fado Pub in Philadelphia to benefit the Patrick Kerr Memorial Scholarship at Roman Catholic High School.

You suburbanites: Head to Brittinghams in Lafayette Hill or The Shanachie Pub in Ambler to hear music all day. Don’t play favorites—go back and forth between the two.

Plan on having a ham and cabbage dinner with the New Castle County Irish Society, or with musicians Mike and Kitty Kelly-Albrecht at the Spring Mill Café in Conshohocken, or with Shades of Green at Crossing vineyards and Winery in Washington Crossing.

Then, if you have any energy left (and you’ll need it), those crazy boys from DC, Scythian, will be holding “the Big Jig” at The Trocadero on Arch Street in Philly.

In Sellersville, Bill Monaghan and Celtic Pride are appearing at The Sellersville Theatre, and you can have your St. Paddy’s Day meal next door at The Washington House.

The amazing Solas is appearing at World Café Live.

Sir James Galway is performing with the York Symphony Orchestra in York.

The Broken Shillelaghs are appearing at Oh! Hara’s Pub in Gloucester City, NJ.

Frank McCourt’s “The Irish and How They Got That Way” is on the bill at the Kimmel Center till the end of the month.

The remarkable Irish trad group, Slide, is appearing at the baby grand @ The Grand in Wilmongton on Thursday. Check out our story, photos and six videos from their recent show at The Irish Center. Wow.

Then, on Friday, the inimitable Karan Casey will appear at the World Café Live. We saw her in December during the Teada Christmas tour at the Irish Center, and she blew us away.

There are more parades coming up, including Allentown’s and Girardsville’s, and plenty more Celtic events this month, including our own: GiveWay, a quartet of young talented sisters from Scotland who play and sing traditional music with a jazzy style. And they are way cute. That’s coming up on March 28. Hope to see you there!

Well, you know it’s St. Paddy’s month now. The “Erin Express”—Philly’s 30-year-old pub crawl—leaves for the first time this year on Saturday at noon. Ten buses will take revelers to some of the city’s best Irish pubs and you don’t need a reservation or a ticket. Check our calendar for participating establishments, and drink responsibly.

The first of the region’s parades steps off the curb on Saturday—Mount Holly, NJ’s march is expected to be the biggest ever.

And here’s the rest of the lineup for Saturday:

•Conshohocken will hold its parade grand marshal’s ball in Jeffersonville.
•Queen of Peace Parish in Ardsley has scheduled its annual Irish night fundraiser.
•Sean nos singer Terry Kane and her partner John Beatty will be performing at Porter’s Pub in Easton, part of the Celtic Cultural Alliance’s Celtic music nights.
•Incredible harper Grainne Hambley and her musical partner William Jackson will perform at Calvary Church in Philadelphia.
•Solas is appearing at the Appel Farm Arts and Music Center in Elmer, NJ
•Gloucester County Div. 1 AOH is holding its St. Patrick’s Day party at Richard Rossiter in National Park, NJ.
•Danu is appearing at the Annenberg Center.
• Frank McCourt’s “The Irish and How They Got That Way” is in the beginning of a four-week run at The Kimmel Center.

Then, on Sunday:
Head over to the Springfield Country Club to hear Blackthorn—they’re playing a fundraiser for the Philly St. Paddy’s Day Parade, which came up $40,000 short in the city’s budget crunch.
Before you go, fortify yourself with a full Irish breakfast spread laid out by AOH Div. 22 at Smoke Eater’s Pub—it too is a fundraiser for the parade and other AOH charities.

The rest of the week:

• Scottish group Malinky will appear at the Bethlehem BrewWorks, a fundraiser for the Celtic Cultural Alliance, on Tuesday night.
• Folklorist and musician Mick Moloney will give a musical talk on Jewish and Irish collaborations in Vaudeville and early Tin Pan Alley at the Falvey Library Lounge at Villanova on Tuesday night. The following night, Gerald Dawe, Heimbold professor of Irish studies, will give a talk and reading.
• On Thursday morning, the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick will hold its annual wreath laying ceremony at City Hall, and Mayor Michael Nutter will read a proclamation marking St. Patrick’s Day in the city. A luncheon follows, and Ring of Honor winners, including Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey and District Attorney Lynne Abraham and families of slain Philadelphia police officers will be honored.
• In York, Barleyjuice will be performing on Thursday night, and in Borders in Springfield, golf writer Tom Coyne, author of “A Course Called Ireland,” about his own personal golf tour and genealogy trip to Ireland, will do a book signing.
• AOH Div. 1 in Swedesburg has its annual Irish Coffee Contest on the schedule for Thursday night—it’s always a lot of fun, and there’s a two-time winner that’s facing some steep challenges this year.
• Also on Thursday, Black 47 will raise the roof at the World Café Live, the second “Rambling House” evening of entertainment will be happening at the Irish Center, and Cathie Ryan will be performing at the Montgomery County Community College in a benefit for victims of domestic violence served by the Women’s Center of Montgomery County.
• Friday’s lineup: Bell X1 at the World Café Live, the coronation of the King and Queen of the Allentown Parade, Flogging Molly in Atlantic City, a benefit party sponsored by the American Ireland Fund’s Young Leaders of Philadelphia, and Burning Bridget Cleary burning it up in Spinnerstown.

Next weekend it’s the big Philadelphia St. Paddy’s Day Parade, and much, much more.

The acclaimed Irish group, Slide, is coming to town.

“They can sing, they can write, they can dance across fingerboards and piano keys, buttons and bows, and by crikey can they play.” Wish we’d written that, but it was reviewer Alex Monahan on the 2003 Slide release, Harmonic Motion. The five young Irishmen (who are waaaaay cuter than the Jonas Brothers) will be appearing on Saturday night at 8 PM at the Philadelphia Irish Center. In Ireland, they’ve been called “the next big thing” in traditional music. Listen for yourself.

Slide will be ringing in the month of March. Take your vitamins and get plenty of sleep, sweeties. There’s going to be plenty of ways to be Irish this month. (In fact, you can sneak a peek at our special 2009 St. Patrick’s Celebration calendar to make your plans now.)

The AOH Division 22 is holding a Celtic tea on Sunday at the Firefighters Union Hall in Philadelphia. We don’t expect lace napkins, but we could be surprised.

Derek Warfield and the Young Wolfe Tones will be bringing their great sound to the Springfield Country Club late Sunday afternoon too.

You can support the Philadelphia St. Patrick’s Day Parade on Sunday by attending a fundraiser at Finnigan’s Wake on Third and Spring Garden in the city. Philly’s budget deficit is infectious—it’s left parade organizers about $40,000 short for this year’s abbreviated event (another cost-cutting measure). Philadelphia Newspapers CEO Brian Tierney has vowed to match dollar-for-dollar the first $20,000 raised for the parade. Paddy’s Well provides the entertainment. Next week, Blackthorn raises the roof and some money for the parade at the Springfield Country Club.

And, on the same night (get used to this), the Three Irish Tenors will be performing at the Colonial Theater in Phoenixville. Lovely voices, nice lads.

Mid-week, Irish singer Tony Kenny, star of Jury’s Irish Cabaret in Dublin for years, brings his show to the Sellersville Theatre (it includes Irish comic Joe Cuddy, fiddler Sarah Rogers, and some great Irish dancers).

Thursday, the Celtic Tenors are coming to the Keswick, and Kildare’s in Manayunk is beginning the first of four weeks of Theology on Tap, an evening with guest speakers on many aspects of religion, with a free buffet.

If you missed the legendary Finbar Furey when he appeared at The Shanachie Pub and Restaurant in Ambler on October, you have your chance to see him on Thursday, when he makes a return visit with The Boatmen. It was an amazing night, not to be missed—don’t make the same mistake twice.

And Friday marks the return of the hit Broadway show, “The Irish and How They Got That Way” at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia. The Frank McCourt (“Angela’s Ashes”) play is an irreverent but affectionate history of the Irish in America told in song and story. We’ll have a review in the next couple of weeks.

Also, next Friday, Shanachie owner and entertainer Gerry Timlin will play your favorite Irish tunes and keep you in stitches at a special concert to benefit the Courage to Create Capital Campaign for the Montgomery County Community College’s Fine Arts Center in Blue Bell.

The first of the many parades is next weekend (Mt. Holly kicks the marching season off) and the activities start to ramp up and they don’t stop even at the end of March. Check our calendar and start making your plans now. Pace yourselves!

And remember to buy Irish!