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A Pre-Concert Tune-Up From One of the Three Irish Tenors

There is nothing that warms my sentimental heart more than hearing an Irish tenor sing “Danny Boy.” I know it’s old-fashioned and maybe syrupy enough to have diabetics reaching for their insulin, but I say this as someone who divided her teenage devotion between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, loved Judy Collins and Pink Floyd, and blames the perpetual ringing in her ears on a Grateful Dead concert and the Clancy Brothers’ tape that circled endlessly in her Walkman. Eclectic is my middle name. And hearing an Irish tenor (or even Sinead O’Connor) sing “Danny Boy” always makes me cry.

So when I recently talked to Ciaran Nagle, one of the “Three Irish Tenors,” who will be performing on July 17 at the Colonial Theatre in Phoenixville, I had to know what songs these three classically trained singers would be performing.

It’s in there. The Three Irish Tenors sing “Danny Boy” along with many old tunes such as John McCormack’s “Macushla” (a poignant song with such staying power that Rufus Wainright performs it in live performances); the fast-paced 19th century traveling song, “The Rocky Road to Dublin; “When Irish Eyes are Smiling;” “The Donkey Serenade”; and even some of homeboy Mario Lanza’s standards.

The Mario Lanza-John McCormack songs are part of a medley the Three Irish Tenors commissioned several years ago when they performed at a Fourth of July event with singer Neil Diamond in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. “We allowed him to come on and support us,” jokes Nagle, who is one of the founding members of this group which should not be confused with The Irish Tenors (its most famous member being Ronan Tynan).

“So,” I said, “this means there are actually six Irish tenors.”

“Six?” he retorted. “There are about 6 million Irish tenors. There are two, arguably three principal groups out of Ireland. Each has had great success in the States and Canada, all have had shows on PBS, all have survived and been successful at selling out houses, and we all know each other pretty well. There’s room for everybody. Fortunately.”

The Irish tenor biz is a small one, says Nagle, so when one tenor drops out, there’s always another to take his place. The Three Irish Tenors started in 2000 when a promoter called and asked if he’d be interested in doing “tenor gigs.”

“I’d come straight from performing in Riverdance and I was delighted with the idea,” says Nagle. “The original group were all friends of mine, people I’d sung with in the National Chamber [National Chamber Choir, Ireland’s only professional chorus] and Opera Ireland. Originally, we only had a handful of dates for particular occasions. The first was the opening of a new theater in Armagh. We thought there wasn’t going to be any future in it. The Irish Tenors already existed. We didn’t believe it was going to take off and, lo and behold, it did.”

At their first gig in Armagh, they got a standing ovation at intermission. “That was quite outstanding,” said Nagle. “We were having a great laugh up there, here we were doing this and it didn’t feel like work, we’d decided on the program the week before, so we were over the moon. Then it snowballed. We were touring the country for a period of time then six weeks after our incarnation we got a call from a U.S. producer who said, ‘We have a tour lined up. Do you want to perform in it.’ Well, what were we going to say: ‘The Guinness isn’t as good over in America and, unless it’s better, we’re not going?’”

They went and have been coming back once or twice a year ever since selling to packed houses.

The current incarnation of The Three Irish Tenors includes Kenneth O’Regan and Des Willoughby. “Kenneth has one of the biggest, most beautiful voices I’ve ever heard,” says Nagle. “I knew him from Riverdance and we would meet up more on a social basis. When an opening came up and I said, ‘Kenneth, would you be interested,’ he said, ‘Absolutely, it sounds like a lot of fun.’ We don’t do open auditions and then try to make the person fit. The personalities have to work. Des Willoughby has a gorgeous, gorgeous voice, and the chemistry between the three of us is smashing. “

And, as you can probably tell, despite their classical training, their performing style bears no relation to a concert hall recital. There are no white shirts and tails, and there’s plenty of onstage—and offstage—banter.

“The more clapping and shouting and jeering and comment, whatever, we welcome that,” says Nagle. “We interact with our audience. God help you if you’re sitting anywhere near the front, and I will say no more!”

And that, he says, is the key to the Three Irish Tenors’ success. “The audience will always say, ‘you guys look like you’re having an absolutely fantastic time up there, ‘ and we are. The day it becomes a job to me, the day I don’t enjoy it, that’s it, I’ll close the door, and it’s over.”

The Three Irish Tenors will be performing on July 17, at 8 p.m., at the Colonial Theater in Phoenixville. Tickets start at $29.95.

On Friday, July 18, starting at 6 p.m., the group will entertain at a benefit for the Drexel Neuman Academy and LaSalle Academy, both independent Catholic schools, at the home of Theresa and Paul Murtagh in Media. The $150 individual ticket price includes cocktails, dinner, and a concert. For more information about the benefit, contact irishconcert@yahoo.com or call (610) 496-7390.

July 4, 2008 by
People

From the FOP to the Irish Memorial

Bob Hurst

Bob Hurst

You might think being president of the Irish Memorial, Inc., is a tough job. After all, you’re heading a board that oversees the largest, most visible presence of the Irish in the city other than the crowd that comes downtown for the St. Patrick’s Day parade. The Irish Memorial is a 24-foot long bronze sculpture depicting the spirit of immigrants taking on the challenges of the new world, set in a 1.75-acre park at Penn’s Landing.

But former Philadelphia Police Sergeant Bob Hurst Sr. spent his childhood in an orphanage, was hospitalized 50 times in the line of duty, mugged 278 times, stabbed eight times (once in the neck, leaving him paralyzed for more than five hours), once walked the streets of the city dressed as a nun and—in what might have been the most harrowing adventure of his life—served as the president of the Philadelphia Fraternal Order of Police for four terms. In that last role, he had to deal on a daily basis with politicians. When he served in the police stakeout unit, he says, at least he “knew who the enemy was. With politicians, the bugger’s behind you.”

So, president of the Irish Memorial? Piece of cake.

Of course, that’s not really how the 70-year-old Hurst sees it. Despite his 16 years on the street, Hurst is far from cocky. If anything, he’s got the market cornered on humility. Hurst, says his friend Bob Gessler, who has been on the Memorial board since its inception, feels such a “personal connection to the Memorial” that he goes down a few times a month just to pick up the trash. “This St. Patrick’s Day, I saw Bob with a bag in his hand going through the site, picking up trash, cigarette butts and cans,” Gessler says. “I was impressed that he wanted to make the site look better for this very public event. I told Bob so and he indicated that he did this monthly. He would come down early Saturday mornings and take an hour or so just to clean the site. This is the sort of dedication that he brings to the board.”

But Gessler left something out. “I might also chase a few bums off,” concedes Hurst. Though he’s been retired from the Philadelphia police department since 1987, Hurst is still in touch with his inner cop. That’s understandable. For a decade, Hurst was a member of the force’s so-called “Granny squad,” whose members dressed up as the mugging target group du jour, whether it was insurance salesmen or grandmothers or even nuns. “I did pose as a nun but we got out of that business real fast because we got letter from Cardinal,” recalls Hurst, barely stifling his rich, infectious laugh. “He took umbrage with the idea of using a shotgun from underneath the habit to blow people through windows. We were not the little sisters of mercy.” That last quip was almost smothered by laughter—his and mine.

Hurst has that essential quality—a great sense of humor—that allowed him to survive not only life on the street, but his early tragedies and the tough world of city politics. His mother, a native of Swinford, County Mayo, who had nine children, died at the age of 37 of breast cancer. Hurst’s father, a PTC motorman who was born in County Sligo, wasn’t able to care for his entire brood. He kept five and the other four, including Hurst, were sent to the now closed St. John’s Orphanage at 49th and Wyalusing Avenue, which was run by the Sisters of St. Joseph. His father and siblings visited every Sunday. Later, he attended St. Francis Vocational School in Eddington where he spent half the day on academics and half in woodworking shop, making church pews.

But don’t expect Hurst to moan about his tough childhood. He has only good memories of his time at both institutions. “The nuns—those women did a tremendous job under the circumstances,” he says. “They really raised us. At St. Francis we were taught by Christian Brothers and I take my hat off to them. It was a good experience. For guy who had to leave home and go to an orphanage, it could have been a lot worse.”

After graduation, Hurst went into the service, returning to start a career in insurance. He had never considered joining the police force. Didn’t even know a cop until, one night, when he ran afoul of the law. While having dinner with an old school friend who had become a doctor, the two got into an altercation with another man who, as Hurst recalls, was smart-mouthing them to impress a girl.

“Well, one thing led to another,” recalls Hurst. “I got up, slipped, fell flat on my back, but he was coming at me so I put my feet on his belly and right over he went, right through the plate window, $638 worth. I thought, well this is a fine how do you do. So I take off one way, doc takes off the other way. I must have run for two blocks, and came out to Germantown Avenue near the library, and when I did, who’s standing in front of me but a cop, Tony Kane. I looked at him and asked, ‘My only question is how did you know I was coming out here?’ He said, ‘Just a hunch.’”

Kane and his partner, Michael Chitwood (now police chief of Upper Darby), decided not to arrest the two men, but made them split the cost of the window they’d broken. About a month later, Hurst ran into the two in their unmarked car and started chatting. “They asked if I’d ever thought about becoming a cop and I said no,” Hurst says. “But I started to think about it and where it could take me.” So he enrolled in the police academy. (He credits his decision to Kane, who is now dead, and Chitwood, both of whom he still speaks of with admiration. “They could find a criminal in heaven,” he says.)

His first beat was in Roxborough, where he made the acquaintance of a young bank teller named Kathy Durning. “I always had my eyeball on her, but I couldn’t bring myself to talk to her,” he says. “You know that old saying about the Irish wedding proposal: ‘How would you like to be buried with my people?’ Well, I just didn’t have the brass to ask her out.”

One Friday night, when she was working late, she asked him to stick another dime in the meter where she’d parked her car so she wouldn’t get a ticket. “I took the dime from her and walked out to her car thinking, ‘Why the hell did I take that dime?’ and when I got to the meter, there I’d written the darn ticket already. I’d seen her car thousands of times but I didn’t recognize it. So I took the ticket and put it in my pocket and went home and wrote a $3 check and sent it in.”

So, was that how they started dating? No. “I didn’t tell her about it till we were married,” says Hurst, the infectious laugh starting to bubble up. They didn’t actually become a couple until the evening he ran into her in a bar where she was sitting with friends, there to comfort her on the breakup of her engagement. “I asked if I could sit with them, we had a very nice time, and from then on, that was it,” Hurst says.

This year. Bob and Kathy Hurst, parents of four grown children and grandparents of 12, will be celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary on a 16-day tour of Europe, though not to Ireland. “We’ve been there many times,” says Hurst, who has headed so many local Irish organizations—the Mayo Association, the Delaware Valley Irish Hall of Fame, the Danny Brown Division of the AOH—as well as serving on the boards of the Irish Center and the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, that the top job at the Irish Memorial might be the only gavel-banging job he hasn’t had.

You have to ask others why Bob Hurst has been tapped so often to chair boards. “Bob always has his feet planted firmly on the ground, he’s always positive and optimistic,” says Kathy McGee Burns, who succeeded Hurst as president of the Delaware Valley Hall of Fame and now serves with him on the Irish Memorial board. “Whenever I have a problem, it’s Bob I go to for guidance, and he always gives it.”

If you ask Bob Hurst, the answer is much different. “A lot of people don’t know how to run a meeting with parliamentary rules,” he says by way of explanation. “When I was president of the FOP, we had a parliamentarian come in and give us some schooling on it. When you have 300 people a week at a union meeting, I found that a good chair has one blind eye and one deaf ear. I think people just think, he can run a strict, decent meeting, let’s put him in there. People think I know a lot, but I don’t know any more than the man in the moon. I just know how to run a meeting.”

But his love for the Irish community is palpable as is his deep humility, and it’s likely that that’s what people see when they’re casting around for someone to run their meetings. Roberts Rules of Order may help motions get passed smoothly, but respect for someone who isn’t above picking up trash—without wanting thanks or a pat on the back—is what makes Hurst a sought-after leader.

He’s a doer who admires other doers. When he returned from the service, Hurst started going to the newly built Irish Center where he met so many people he felt a special kinship with. Later, he became part of the core group dedicated to rebuilding it when it fell into disrepair. “Guys like Vince Gallagher, Barney Boyce, Mike Burns, Sean McMenamin, Tom Farley—these aren’t just guys you belly up to the bar with. They are people who want to do something, and I like that,” says Hurst.

“There’s an old saying that I’ve always subscribed to,” he says. “‘You can do whatever you want if you don’t care who gets the credit,’ and that’s the kind of people they are. I love being around the Irish. I love being at the Irish Center. You feel like you come as a stranger and you leave as a friend.”

A lot like you feel when you’ve spent a little time with Bob Hurst.

July 1, 2008 by
People

A Remarkable Year for the 2007 Rose of Tralee

Colleen Gallagher and her Irish souvenir, Derek Reilly.

Colleen Gallagher and her Irish souvenir, Derek Reilly.

It’s been an amazing 12 months for Colleen Gallagher.

It started with a tragedy—the loss of her best friend in a drowning accident. And for this 23-year actor and singer—and the 2007 Rose of Tralee—it’s ironically coming to a close with many new beginnings.

“This year has been life-altering,” says Colleen, the eldest of seven girls, who turned over her crown on July 20 to another Colleen, Colleen Tully of Downingtown. “So many doors have opened for me.”

I sat down with Colleen Gallagher at the Rose event at the Hyatt Regency on Friday night and she talked about the year she’ll never forget.

She entered the Rose of Tralee competition last June still deep in mourning for her friend, Alex, who died on May 6. “We were best friends since we were six,” she says. “His death left me in a really tough place. My Dad always said that Alex and I were soulmates. Not in a boyfriend-girlfriend way, but meant to be best friends. I missed him so much. But I knew he was with me all the way.”

When she arrived in Ireland last August for the International Rose of Tralee Festival, it was storming and one of their hosts assured her that it was “just a gentle breeze.” Colleen’s heart did a flip.

“That was how his mother described Alex—he was a breath of fresh air, a gentle breeze,” she says, smiling. “That’s how I knew he was there with me.”

And then there was that nice young man who started chatting with her as she got off the bus at Bunratty Castle. Derek Reilly, a Remax realtor from County Mayo, was one of the escorts who traditionally accompany the Roses during the weeklong festival. “They were pairing up with each girl as she got off the bus. I was sitting in the wrong seat so I wound up with Derek,” recalls Colleen. “He found out I was an actor from Philadelphia and he started talking about the Vince Papale movie (“Invincible”). And we just kept talking.”

Even though he was eventually assigned to the Rose from Dubai, Derek and Colleen grabbed every chance to talk. “After the Tuesday night crowning, we went back to the hotel and talked for six hours straight,” Colleen recalls. Since then, the two have traveled back and forth several times. She’s met his family; Derek has spent Thanksgiving with hers. He was with her at Friday night’s event. “He’s around talking to people—he says he’s networking,” she laughs, looking around for Derek, who, at 28, is the youngest Chamber of Commerce president in Ireland. Not a prince, per se, though Colleen says her friends all kid her that she “met him at a castle.”

When she returned from Ireland, she took an acting role in the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival, traveling with a troupe that performed the Scottish play (“Macbeth”) at schools around the state, many of them in the inner city. “Here we were telling these children that the play had some dark elements, murder, betrayal, and so on, and many of them lived with these same things,” she says. That got her thinking. “I love acting, I love being on stage,” she says. “But that’s a very self-serving thing: Look at me up here. I became interested in dramatherapy, which is a way to use what I’ve learned (she has a degree in acting and directing from DeSales University) to help someone else.”

Dramatherapy combines theater techniques with elements of psychotherapy to help people in crisis learn to work through their problems and live happier lives. She’s about to pursue her master’s degree. “I’ve been shortlisted for a spot at the National College of Ireland in Maynooth,” says Colleen. “I have a guaranteed spot in 2010. I’ve looked at NYU and UCLA and a school in England, but they’re all very heavily feared toward psychology, whole school in Maynooth is more focused on drama with psychology courses added.”

Though she had to hand over her crown this week, Colleen didn’t see it as a loss. “Over this past year I’ve gained so much self-confidence. I’ve learned not to take no for an answer. I’ve learned that life will take you where it wants you to go,” she said. “I’m never going to lose when I learned about myself. I’ll always be grateful for that.”

June 27, 2008 by
People

Five Questions for Caitlin Finley

Caitlin Finley, at last year's St. Malachy fund-raiser with Mick Moloney.

Caitlin Finley, at last year's St. Malachy fund-raiser with Mick Moloney.

Caitlin Finley is getting set for another trip to the Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann—otherwise known as the world championships of Irish music—in Tullamore, County Offaly, in late August.

Those who have heard Caitlin play usually are surprised at the level of skill in one so young. What’s more surprising, aside from her musical virtuosity, is her level of maturity. She’s a junior in high school, but, like so many of the kids who play in local traditional Irish music session, she seems more comfortable than most in the company of adults. 

Part of that is just Caitlin. But let’s also give credit to session musicians. Adult session musicians are generally welcoming to anyone with talent and interest, but they seem especially nurturing when it comes to kids. After all, it’s not a tradition if it isn’t handed down, and they seem to know that.

We recently posed five questions for Caitlin, who did exceptionally well for herself at the Mid-Atlantic Fleadh Cheoil in Pearl River, N.Y. Here’s what she had to say.

Q. You took third in fiddle and first in banjo. You’re in a trio that also took first place, and the Pearl River Ceili Band, which you’re also in, won the 15-18 competition. Tell me a bit about competing in so many categories. It doesn’t seem to have hurt you any, although I suppose that the third in fiddle means you wouldn’t be eligible to compete on that instrument at the Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann in Tullamore in August.

Does competing in so many categories make you an overall sharper competitor, do you think, and maybe increase your competitive edge in all instruments? Or do you think there’s the possibility that maybe you consciously or unconsciously focus on one instrument over another?

A. Well, competing in so many competitions was certainly a challenge, especially because we had to arrange practices for the ceili band and trio, and the other kids all live in New York. I didn’t have much time to prepare because I’m a junior in high school, and AP Physics has taken over my life.

I think that because you have to concentrate on solely three tunes in preparation for the fleadh, competing on more than one instrument and in more than one category gives you a break sometimes.  For example, if I was practicing banjo and got tired of practicing my solo tunes, I’d just move on to the ceili band or trio tunes to play something different. And even though I wasn’t practicing my solo tunes, it was still preparing me for the solo competition just because I was constantly playing. 

At the same time, I had twelve tunes to really work up instead of only three.

As for switching back and forth between fiddle and banjo, I don’t know if it either benefited or hurt me. Although the technique for each instrument is completely different, I think that they complement each other. I don’t know if I focus on one more than the other.

I know that the fiddle is really my primary instrument and my favorite to play, but I still probably focused on each equally because when you’re tired and don’t feel like practicing, it’s possible to play the banjo on the sofa without much movement, whereas the fiddle’s a little more physically demanding. Oh, and for fiddle, even though I got 3rd, there’s a pretty good chance that I’ll still get to compete in Tullamore because the 2nd placer probably can’t make it, in which case I’ll be able to take his place.
 
Q. What tunes did you play in your competitions? And did you pick them yourself this time, or did you have a bit of help?

A. For the fiddle competition, I played the slip jig Gusty’s Frolics, a hornpipe called the Lass on the Strand, and a reel that I call Tom Steele’s (it’s also known as Hand Me Down the Tackle).  On banjo, I played a jig that I don’t know the name of, but I got from a recording of traditional Donegal style fiddling.  I also played a version of the Blackbird that actually doesn’t sound very much like the more common version that everyone knows, and a reel called Andy Davy’s, which is currently my favorite banjo tune.  I had some help from my fiddle teacher, Brian Conway, in deciding on the tunes for the fiddle competition, but he actually doesn’t play the jig or the hornpipe, which probably made it a little harder for him to help me out with variations.

For banjo, I picked the tunes myself, although I learned the hornpipe and the reel from my banjo teacher, Eamon O’Leary, and I had some help the night before the competition from my friend Dylan Foley with picking them out.

Q. I take it you’re planning to compete at the Fleadh Cheoil. You’ve done that before, so you know that this is not a trip to the beach. There are expenses and some crazy planning to do. How are you and your fellow musicians from the trio (Blaithin Loughran and Dylan Foley, it looks like) and the ceili band planning to get there? I know it’s early days yet, but are you thinking about fund-raising?

A. We actually are in the beginnings of starting to plan fundraisers. There’s going to be a big one up at Rory Dolan’s in Yonkers sometime during the summer, which is an annual fundraiser.  All the students of Rose Flanagan, Margie Mulvihill, Patty Furlong, and others who are competing at the Fleadh Cheoil will perform, as well as the teachers. Other folks from all over will donate their time to help us raise some money (last year Eileen Ivers and Jerry O’Sullivan performed).  Rory Dolan’s provides food and drinks and lets us keep the gate.  Also, each of the kids make a basket to be raffled off.

This year we’re also going to try a fundraiser in Philadelphia.  My parents and I will be organizing this. Currently it is scheduled for June 20th.  We’re going to try to bring down as many members of the ceili band as we can to play a ceili at the Irish Center and some of the parents, like Rose Flanagan and Margie Mulvihill, will play as well. It should be a lot of fun. I’ll keep everyone updated on both fundraisers.

Q. You’re in the 15-18 age group, which means that, by the standards of a lot of our local musicians, you have not been playing all that long. When did you start, and why? What inspired you? Why fiddle and banjo?

A. I’ve been playing for somewhere around eight and a half years.  I started playing the fiddle when I was eight.  I don’t really remember asking to learn the fiddle or my first lessons, but I’ve been told that I really wanted to play because I was an Irish dancer and saw a lot of fiddlers at feisanna.  There’s also the fact that all of us (my siblings and I) have to play some musical instrument, at least in a school program, until we graduate from high school.  I don’t think I’ll be quitting after high school, though.  I also went to every one of the Mick Moloney concerts at the IHouse at UPenn from the time I was born, my parents played old records of Irish music around the house, and I danced constantly, so I had music in my head. I originally started out playing classical but then moved to Irish almost immediately, both with my first fiddle teacher, Chris Brennan Hagy. 

I got my first banjo about two and a half years ago.  My fiddle teacher at the time, Brendan Callahan, encouraged me to get one because he said it would help with some of the technique involved with playing the fiddle, mainly being able to press down the strings all the way with my left hand.  Brendan actually gave me my first banjo lesson.  I’ve never stopped playing it since; it’s a pretty addicting instrument, actually.

I always enjoyed playing music, but practicing was like a chore and I didn’t like going to sessions. I remember the time, though, that I finally fell in love with the music. The summer before I went into 9th grade, my parents and I spent three weeks in Ireland.

We visited family and traveled around, and then we went to Willie Clancy Week in Miltown Malbay, County Clare (where local musician Fintan Malone is from).

I took fiddle classes for a week with Jesse Smith, who is one of my favorite fiddle players, and I met a bunch of kids from all over who played Irish music as well, including two from Italy, one of whom, almost three years later, is still my best friend. It was complete immersion in the music for a straight week.  After I came home, I went to as many sessions as I could. I’ve never slowed down and I love it more than ever.

Q. I imagine there are not all that many students in your school who would know one end of the Irish fiddle from the other. How does this interest of yours go over? Is it something you talk about? What’s the reception?

A. Irish musicians are definitely a rarity at my school.  My school’s probably around 70 percent Jewish, so most of my friends have never heard Irish music or, if they have, it’s only because they’ve seen Riverdance or Celtic Woman or something along those lines.  At school, I’m the Irish girl. 

Being Irish is so much a part of my identity, that I end up talking about it a lot, everything from history to music. At this point, most kids know I play Irish music; it’s a subject that comes up every time I’m asked what I did over the weekend. 

I think that in 9th grade, a lot of my friends thought it was really weird and just tolerated it, but at this point, most kids think it’s really cool.  I have kids asking me to burn them CDs of Irish music, my closer friends all know what a session and a fleadh are, and have seen numerous Comhaltas Live videos, and earlier this year in English class, when my teacher announced that we would be reading “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift, everyone turned around and looked at me. Just last week, I brought in my banjo to English class to play, to celebrate both a unit we had just finished on cultural identity, and one of my teachers favorite lines from The Great Gatsby: “the stiff, tinny drip of the banjos.” 

I’m glad that at this point in school people look at the fact that I play Irish music as something that makes me unique, but doesn’t change my personality.  It’s just a part of who I am and everyone seems to recognize and understand that.

Other local Pearl River winners include:

Harp

Jacqueline Hartley from Egg Harbor Township
1st
Under 15

Kathy DeAngelo student Reanna Barakat
3rd
15-18 age group.

Katherine Highet, another DeAngelo student
1st
Senior

Men’s Singing

Karl Jones
1st
Senior men’s singing in Irish as well as first in English

Josh Ely
1st
English singing ages 15-18 

Josh’s dad Jim Ely
3rd
Singing in English

Josh’s uncle Mike McElligott
2nd
Singing in English

June 6, 2008 by
Arts

Answered Prayers

Philadelphia documentary maker John Foley and Fergus O'Farrell.

Philadelphia documentary maker John Foley and Fergus O'Farrell.

Philadelphia film maker John Foley met Fergus O’Farrell in 2000, when the musician was working at the reception desk at the Hotel Eldon, which his father owned.

Foley had just cashed out of his dotcom business and was fulfilling a dream: to show his four children the places in Western Europe he had discovered on his business travels “and to go seek our Irish roots.”

I asked John about his friendship with Fergus and this is what he wrote:

My 4 children, Lauren, Sean, Ali, and Julian and I flew into Dublin, rented a van, and made our way from town to town, staying in B&B’s in most places to get to know the towns and the people better. We visited Limerick, Bunratty, The Burren, The Cliffs of Moher, Bantry, Kenmare, Cork City, Baltimore, Cobh, and some other towns as well.. Of course we spent a few days in Dingle and drove the Ring of Kerry.

We were interested in the story of Michael Collins, (ok, I was interested) and so we stayed at the Eldon Hotel in Skibbereen, where Collins had his last meal before his assassination.

This was in the third week of July 2000, and on the 17th, my youngest Julian turned 8. I wanted to get a little birthday cake and a gift for him but didn’t want to leave him alone. I asked the hotel proprietor, a cheerful man in a wheelchair named Fergus O’Farrell, if he wouldn’t mind looking after Julian while I ran an errand.

He and his wife Li were only too happy to help and so off I went to get a cake and a gift.

When I returned, Julian had fallen asleep in the lobby of the Eldon on a couch in the front room.

As we were leaving the hotel on the 18th of July, Fergus gave me two CD’s, and said “I’m a musician, here are some of my records, I hope you like them”. As we drove the road from Skibbereen to Cork City, I popped the CD in and the opening string parts of “Cain and Abel” played through the speakers. I almost drove off the road. I was a professional musician in the 70’s, and I still play when I can. I am a great fan of music and stay as active as I can to hear and learn the best music. This was some of the most beautiful, soulful, mature, and highly competent music I had heard in my life. I had no idea, but we were the guests of a musical genius – someone that the music intelligentsia of Ireland had known for some time – but sadly the international record labels had been keeping a secret.

Over the years I stayed in touch with Fergus, writing by e-mail frequently, speaking on the phone occasionally. I so much wanted to hear Ferg with his band Interference perform, but a throat condition and Ferg’s advancing MD were keeping him from singing and travelling.

Over the years I learned more about Interference – how they were actually a cult legend in Ireland, influencing top artists like the Frames and Hothouse Flowers. I also learned that they were sort of a super-group, as top musicians from Ireland and other parts of Europe would drift into and out of Interference to make records and perform very occasionally.

In about 2002 Fergus was feeling much better and interference began performing again. But their gigs always seemed to spring up very spontaneously and so getting to see them proved impossible. But all the while we continued to correspond and our friendship grew as we schemed to somehow get Interference noticed in America.

I fantasized about interference playing in America – that if I couldn’t get Mohammed to the mountain, maybe I could bring the mountain to Mohammed. The likelihood seemed slim.

By 2006 Ferg and Interference were playing more regularly and he was working on a new record. He sent me “sketches” of songs he was working on – essentially music tracks, maybe just chords, some a little more developed. He may have a verse or a chorus of lyrics, or in many cases he would scat the vocal melody so the lyrics could be developed later. His lyric collaborator, Malcom Mac Clancy, would frequently work that way. I sent Ferg lyrics for one track called “the na na song” (because he scatted the words na na na na na na for the melody), but he wrote back saying he didn’t feel they fit. I later spoke with Malcom about the sketches, and he said “You know, I love that na na song. I submitted two sets of lyrics to Ferg for it and he passed on both. I want to NAIL that song, I love it.” So apparently, the song is important to Ferg and I felt better about not having my lyrics picked.

In 2007, interference were (and in Ireland, that’s how they say it – “Interference are a band….”) scheduled to perform in the Czech Republic, and I tried to work it out to see them there, but I just could not make the arrangement work. Foiled again.

Instead, I decided to schedule a trip to visit Ferg in his home town of Schull in West Cork. There was an International Guitar Festival in Clonakilty in September, and I figured if I could not see Interference, I could hear good music and hang with Ferg and his wife Li.

After I made the arrangements, I happened to go see a little indie film called once at the little art house cinema in Bala Cynwyd. I had seen the trailers, and I knew that Glen Hansard was a wonderful musician and a friend of Fergus’, so I decided to go. About halfway through the movie, there is a scene in Glen’s kitchen where his friends gather for a round of Noble Calls – each person taking a turn singing a song. And there was Fergus and Interference singing one of my favorite songs, “Gold”! I jumped up from my seat and yelled out “atta boy Ferg!” Then I quickly sat down a little embarrassed, but the people around me were nice about it. He had never bothered to mention that he was in a film that would play in America.

The mountain had not come to Mohammed, but a film of the mountain had come.

The trip to Ferg’s along the Irish sea coast was stunning. I passed through the sea coast town of Bonmahon, where my great grandmother and her family had lived. According to civil records, her father was an “ore dresser” in the local copper mines. Being in this part of the world was so moving I had to divide my time between taking photos and videos, quiet reflection, and overwhelming emotion.

The time with Fergus in Schulll, a little sea coast town in West Cork, was wonderful. Sadly, Li was in China – her mother was not well and her amazing intuition told her to get to China right away. Her mother passed away while she was there.

We travelled to the Clonakilty International Guitar festival – and everywhere we went Ferg was treated as royalty. It was great fun getting the collateral royal treatment. Clonakilty is the birthplace of Michael Collins, and it was stirring to walk around town and see portraits and statues of him everywhere.

Ferg and I posed for a picture in front of General Collins in a local hotel where we had dinner.

We drove Ferg’s friend David Bickley home into the nether regions west of Clonakilty in the pouring rain, with me doing my best to drive Ferg’s wheelchair-capable van up winding country lanes with little paving and no light whatsoever. Add to that, the steering wheel was on the wrong side, it was a manual transmission, and the bushes on either side of the road scraped the sides of the van on the narrow rural lanes.

We dropped off David at his home and used the glow of the distant highway and dead reckoning to find our way back to the road to Schull. Somehow we wound up in front of Michael Collin’s homestead, the one that the Black and Tans had burned to the ground. I like to think the Lord was navigating that night.

The trip ended and it was back to America and reality, and Ferg and I continued to talk via email and telephone. In January, Ferg called excited beyond words that Swell Season were playing somewhere in New York, and that Interference had been invited to play – the entire 10 piece band!

I looked at the road schedule for Swell Season and saw that New York’s Radio City Music Hall was slated for May 19th, and Philadelphia’s Tower Theater was set for May 20th. The begging and pleading to get Interference to Philadelphia began immediately.

Word finally came sometime in March that indeed interference would open two shows for Swell Season – at Radio City and in Philadelphia. After eight years of hoping and waiting, the mountain was coming to Mohammed!

The rest of the story you know. Thanks so much for helping to bring out Ferg’s story – I love the guy – the music is a wonderful bonus.

May 30, 2008 by
Music

The Best Unknown Band In Ireland

Fergus O'Farrell sings with passion during his Tower Theater performance.

Fergus O'Farrell sings with passion during his Tower Theater performance.

Opening acts don’t get much respect. Audiences who paid good money for the main course tend to linger in the lobby, taking advantage of the hour to suck back a few more Michelob Lites or house Chardonnays till the unknowns clear the stage and the “real” show begins.

All the lobby lizards who missed the band that opened for Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova (stars of the little Irish jewel of a film, “Once,” performing as The Swell Season) on May 20 at Upper Darby’s Tower Theater will be adding that lapse to their “woulda coulda shoulda” list somewhere down the line.

The people who stayed were captivated, rapt, glued to their seats for the hour that Interference, one of Ireland’s most influential bands for the last two decades (say the musicians, like Hansard, whom they’ve influenced), commanded the stage. When I would occasionally glance down my row, I saw the ultimate compliment an audience can pay a performer. Not applause. Not a standing ovation. Smiles. A brightening of the eye. Body language that echoed the performers’—what experts call “kinesic communication.” Connection. These were the people who were out in the lobby at intermission, lined up at the Interference CD table like the band was selling $2-a-gallon gas.

Interference is that kind of band. In 1988, after they opened for The Hothouse Flowers, a reviewer at the Cork Tribune wrote, “The support act was so powerful you almost forgot who you were there for. . . .Interference positively bewitched the audience.”

At the center of the magic is Fergus O’Farrell, the 41-year-old singer-songwriter with a mesmerizing voice who founded the band with his schoolmate, James O’Leary, when they were at Clongowes College, a Jesuit boarding school in Kildare, from 1983 to 1986 (“James is a ludicrously tall guitar player with unfeasibly thick glasses so instead of sports we did music”). O’Farrell and O’Leary continue to be the mainstays of the band, though an astounding array of musicians cycle in and out. For example, these days on keyboard is Maurice Royscroft—known as Seezer—a Golden Globe-nominated arranger who has collaborated with Gavin Friday on scores for films such as Jim Sheridan’s “The Boxer,” starring Daniel Day-Lewis, and “In America.” Singing backup are Camilla Griehsel Vearncombe, a Swede trained in opera, her husband, Colin Vearncombe whose song, “Wonderful Life,” written when he was performing with the band, Black, was an international hit, and guitarist Paul Tiernan. Hansard, whom O’Farrell has known since their early hand-to-mouth days on the Dublin music scene, has recorded with the band, as have Maria Doyle Kennedy (of “The Commitments”) and her husband Keiran, a guitarist, songwriter, and producer, as well as many others.

If you were a statistician, you might be thinking that probability theory ought to be kicking in right about now. With all that talent, shouldn’t this band be better known? Better yet, shouldn’t they be, as they say in the music business, signed? They’re not. In fact, they’ve taken over the “best unsigned band in Ireland” award from The Hothouse Flowers, whose thunder they stole back in 1988.

Why this is, is complicated, which I discovered when I spent some time with Fergus O’Farrell. If you saw the movie, “Once,” you already know O’Farrell: He’s the dark-haired, bearded man with sky-blue eyes in the party scene, singing his haunting ballad, “Gold” with Hansard. What you really can’t see is that O’Farrell is in a wheelchair. He has a rare form of muscular dystrophy called Emery-Dreifuss, diagnosed when he was almost nine. Most people with MD are dead by the time they’re in their early 20s. O’Farrell’s condition is progressive. He’s been gradually losing the use of his body for 32 years.

Back in the 90s when the band was at the height of its cult popularity in Ireland, several record companies were interested, O’Farrell said. But the wheelchair was like water on a fire. “When they think you’re going to be dead in your 20s, record companies—they’re like venture capital banks. What venture capital bank is going to invest in a company with dodgy foundations?” he said. One friend reported that an enthusiastic executive, once he heard that O’Farrell was in a wheelchair, said, “Blindness works, a wheelchair don’t.”

“Another one told a friend of mine who signed a big deal was told they wouldn’t touch me with a 20-foot barge pole,” O’Farrell said. “Frankly, I think the wheelchair is my USP. My unique selling point. I’m the singing cripple.” He laughs—and it’s not bitterly. O’Farrell is, by his own description, “a half full” kind of guy. And the truth is, it wasn’t just the wheelchair.

“Anyone who has heard our stuff is blown away,” he said. “The problem is we don’t stick to one style. We do jazz, rock, classical. I do what I want to do. Having a limited range doesn’t make sense to me. The record companies want every song to sound similar.”

On the business side of music, eclectic apparently doesn’t work, no matter how great you sound and how slavishly devoted your little clique of fans is. Talent is good, but it’s size that matters. So O’Farrell was left with only a few choices. One was to set up his own recording studio, which he did. With money he got from his father, he created Interference Studio at his home in Schull in West Cork, where he lives with his wife, Li, a practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine.

It was there, in 1994, where Interference recorded its eponymous CD, which was produced and engineered by DanDan Fitzgerald (who does the same for Mary Black). The ten songs included “Gold” and a song he co-wrote with Hansard, “Vinegar Girl.” Critically well-received, it sold well locally. But by 1996, the band had broken up and O’Farrell, while still writing music, took a job at the reception desk of The Eldon Hotel in Skibbereen, which his father owned and was the place where Michael Collins had his last meal before his assassination.

It was O’Farrell’s seven-year dark night of the soul. He had taken a couple of bad hits over the years. Vocal nodules kept him from touring as much as he feels he should have. “When we were first doing gigs in Dublin, I got vocal nodules in both cords and told I couldn’t sing for at least a year and the doctor told me he couldn’t even guarantee I could sing after that,” he explained. “I was really afraid of destroying my voice so I didn’t gig regularly. I would do seven gigs a year. Glen would be doing 200 gigs that same year.”

The same week he was diagnosed with nodules, his MD specialist told him it was time to buy a wheelchair. “He said once you get in it you’ll never get out of it.” Up till then, O’Farrell had been able to walk; he even played football and biked as a child, rode a moped till he was 16, played trumpet, tin whistle, and guitar, until one by one, he had to put them down as he became too weak to play. “It was,” he admitted, “the worst week of my life.”

But by the mid-90s, the MD had also started robbing him of his breath. “My singing style required more air. I sang from my chest with a lot of vibrato, but because of the MD I was getting weaker. I lost confidence,” he said. “Then, oddly enough, something happened at a party at my father’s house.” Someone he met at the party was doing a little beer-soaked singing at 3 AM “and he would break into falsetto when he was going for the high notes he couldn’t reach. And it was lovely. Neil Young sings the same way, so I started developing that and it worked great.”

But he credits Hansard and his Interference band mates with helping him get back into music fulltime again. “They never let me forget I was great,” he said, even when he allowed himself an occasional wallow over how little money there is in greatness. An Interference reunion in Schull led to an invitation for the band to appear on the RTE TV series, “Other Voices,” featuring lesser known Irish talents, and hosted at a deconsecrated church in Dingle by Hansard. Then came the phone call from Hansard. “He usually texts me, so when he calls I know it’s something wonderful,” said O’Farrell. It was about that unforgettable love song that O’Farrell wrote called “Gold.” Hansard’s old bandmate, John Carney, was making a movie about an Irish busker (Hansard) who meets a young woman from the Czech Republic (Marketa Irglova) on Grafton Street and the ambiguous relationship they develop. Could O’Farrell perform “Gold” in the movie? It was one of Hansard’s favorites.

O’Farrell could. He was over the moon. Though it was a low budget film (they did it for about the price of a down payment on a McMansion) and no one was prophesying that it would win a Grammy and an Oscar (which it did), and O’Farrell wasn’t going to make any money from it, “Jesus thank Christ I said I’d do it,” he said. “For that scene we went to Glen’s house, had dinner then a sing-song and they filmed it, pure drop.”

The rest isn’t history. There’s really no telling what it will all mean to Interference and O’Farrell. The music business is a strange thing. People with little talent and lots of marketing can make millions (and get their own regular segment on Access Hollywood); others with enviable ability can slog along for years making so little they need a day job.

Hansard and Irglova brought the band to the US to open for them at sold-out shows at Radio City Music Hall and at the Tower. It was the first time the band has performed in the US. “Imagine, my debut was at Radio City,” O’Farrell marveled. In July, they’ll return to participate in a presentation of “Peter and the Wolf,” updated by Maurice Royscroft at Bard College in New York’s Hudson River Valley. O’Farrell will record the narration and Interference will perform. There’s talk of a gig at World Café. Another CD is in the works.

But there’s something about Interference you need to know. The band doesn’t rehearse. Not really. At one gig, O’Farrell told me, “I just told them what key it was in and they improvised. “

So whatever happens, O’Farrell will probably improvise. It would be a shame if the group didn’t gain a wider audience. Not so much for O’Farrell—he’d get by—but for the millions who are being robbed of the experience of hearing the kind of music you can’t get out of your mind because it takes a foothold in your soul. There are already a few hundred people I know of who were glad they weren’t out in the lobby waiting for the main event. They wisely knew that it had already started.

May 30, 2008 by
Music

Inside the Heart of a Dreamer

I would fly from the woods’ low rustle
And the meadows’ kindly page.
Let me dream as of old by the river,
And be loved for the dream alway;
For a dreamer lives forever,
And a toiler dies in a day.

—John Boyle O’Reilly

Sean Tyrrell, the singer-songwriter from the West of Ireland, has performed in Philadelphia twice—including a memorable set with fiddler Tommy Peoples at the 2001 Philadelphia Ceili Group Festival. (You can hear it on the group’s commemorative festival CD, “Toss the Fiddles.”)

I’ve missed his local appearances, but I ran into him a few years ago on a trip to Ballyvaughan, County Clare. He was playing his regular weekly session at Green’s, a pub roughly the size of a confessional booth in the center of town.

After a strong set of the traditional stuff, Sean started noodling around on the guitar, getting set to play something soft and slow. It took me a few notes before I recognized the tune: “South of the Border (Down Mexico Way),” the peppy 1939 standard written by Jimmy Kennedy and Michael Carr, and a big hit for singers as diverse as Gene Autry and Frank Sinatra.

Tyrrell’s version was a different tune altogether. Gone was the hokey Latin syncopation. And that mental image of Dorothy Lamour with a bowl of fruit on her head? Forget that. This was a far more wistful treatment than ever I’d ever heard.

Tyrell’s great gift lies in his ability to interpret songs—even those, and perhaps especially those, that have otherwise been done until you’re sick of hearing them.

“I have often said that I don’t regard myself as having the greatest voice,” Tyrrell said in a phone interview from Seattle, “but that (his interpretive skill) is something that I do have. There aren’t that many bad songs, really, but there are a lot of bad singers. What I mean by that is, people who just don’t care about the lyric. You can take a song like “The Black Velvet Band” or “The Wild Rover,” and if you really read those lyrics, you’ll find that they’re great songs, but they’ve just been done to death.”

One example is Tyrrell’s take on the standard “Coast of Malabar.” It could be a cheesy or sentimental tune, he admits. It has certainly been performed in that way. But, he said, “If you really look at the lyrics, it’s about a man who has fallen in love with a woman who’s a different color. And he can’t bring her back to England, because she’s the wrong color. I just wanted to get that across.”

Tyrrell’s other great passion, for some time, has been poetry, including the works of the well-known—Oscar Wilde, for example—as well as some other poets who are not as well known, such as Louis MacNeice.

The poet with whom Tyrrell is most closely identified is John Boyle O’Reilly. O’Reilly was a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, captured and jailed, and subsequently transported to Australia. He escaped to Boston, where he became editor of the Irish newspaper, The Pilot.

Tyrrell’s interest in setting poetry to music stems from a chance encounter in New York City with a book called “100 Years of Irish Poetry,” edited by Kathleen Hoagland. “It’s still available, actually,” he said. “About 50 percent of my repertoire for years has been from poems from that book that I set to music. One of the poems was was John Boyle O’Reilly, ‘Cry of a Dreamer.’ I recorded it on my first album, and gave it (the album) that title.”

Tyrrell now performs five of O’Reilly’s poems set to music in a one-man show, also entitled “Cry of a Dreamer.” The show also includes music and poetry from a number of other diverse sources, including Wilde, as well as Bob Dylan and John Lennon. The show is meant to document O’Boyle’s life.

“He was an amazing human being,” said Tyrrell. “The magnitude of his soul just amazes me.”

You’ll get a chance to see the show here in Philadelphia on Saturday, May 17, at 8 p.m. at the Philadelphia Irish Center. The show is sponsored by the Philadelphia Ceili Group. The show has earned standing ovations in just about every city on the current tour where Tyrrell has performed it.

May 9, 2008 by
Music

Local Singer Releases New CD

Growing up as the youngest of 11 kids in rural upstate New York, Terry Kane recalls bumping along in the family’s station wagon, her mother at the wheel, she, her mom, and siblings all singing at the top of their lungs.

“We sang in 10-part harmony which we made up, back when cars didn’t have child seats,” she says with a laugh. “I didn’t actually sit on a seat till I was about 12. No, I’m kidding, but I sat on people’s laps for a long time.”

The Kane family “loved music and dancing,” she recalls. “It was a part of our lives. My Mom is the one that pretty much taught us to sing, and her mom taught her to sing. Her Dad was a big dancer and his father was as well. My great-great grandfather bought a farm out there in the middle of nowhere, near the Finger Lakes, and he built a stage in the woods where they could do their Irish dancing. Apparently his second wife didn’t like when they danced in the house so they danced outside.”

So it’s no surprise that for the last decade, Kane, who lives with her husband Todd Daniel in a converted cigar warehouse near Quakertown, has been performing Irish music in the Delaware Valley, New York, and Washington, DC, sometimes solo, often with singer John Beatty as Kane & Beatty. She also anchors the monthly sessions at Granny McCarthy’s in Bethlehem and McCoole’s in Quakertown. But on Saturday, April 19, she’s launching her second CD as part of the group, Trad Linn, with New Yorkers Will Collins and Doug Lammer who play whistle and uillean pipes.

“Will is from a traditional family. His mother is from County Clare. His aunt, Kathleen Collins, is a traditional fiddle player. His father is a well-known accordion player,” says Kane. “I’ve played with Will and Doug at the East Durham Irish Festival in the summer. I don’t get a chance to play with them that often. But they stopped into the studio when I was recording and put down some tracks for me.” Also featured on the CD, called “The Roads of Clare,” are George Fairchild on bodhrán and his daughter Audrey Fairchild on cello.

And anyone who knows Terry Kane will expect to hear some of her unaccompanied sean nos singing, and she doesn’t disappoint. Kane has been studying this traditional form of Irish singing for more than 10 years. As a classically trained singer, it’s been quite a education. Sean nos (meaning “old style”) has many interpreters, but it is largely the antithesis of classical music with its emphasis on fluidity, sweetness, and vibrato. Sean nos can be fierce, almost unmelodic. “It’s also very nasal,” says Kane, who doesn’t think she’s yet achieved the sound.

“I don’t really truly sing in sean nos, though I’m getting very close to it now,” she says. “I have a masters degree in musical education so I sing in a more traditionally classic way. But I’ve been spending a lot of time with singers from Connemara. I’ve been taking workshops with Aine Meenaghan, a well-known sean nos singer who now lives in Chicago. I’ve taken classes with others too, including singers from the Aran islands. Any time I go to Ireland I’m always listening and picking up songs.”

She first became interested in Irish music when one of her older brothers came back from studying in Europe with a raft of recordings from Ireland. “He came back singing all kinds of rover and rebel songs,”” she laughed. “My brother, Pat, also got into the traditional stuff, so we found trad music again.”

Actually, it was for the first time. Though her mother came from a musical family, Kane says, her early ancestors tried to erase most vestiges of their culture, including their music—a familiar story in many families who arrived in America when the Irish were still the victims of strong and sometimes violent prejudice. “My mother’s mother used to sing sean nos type songs, but her husband didn’t like it. He wanted her to sing American,” Kane explains. “So that was the end of the sean nos stuff. My grandmother did teach her to sing the songs of the day. In fact, they used to sing while they were working. On a farm, there’s a lot of manual labor, so they would sing together while they worked. I know it sounds like a musical, but that’s the way it was.”

Today, she and her brother, Pat, who is also a professional musician, carry on the ancient and yet newfound family tradition. “Now,” she says, “this is not just my job but my passion.”

A CD release party is being held on Saturday, April 19, from 5:30 to 11 PM at McCoole’s Arts and Events Place, 10 S. Main Street, Quakertown. Tickets are $25 and come with a free CD. You can meet Terry and the band before the concert, and enjoy food and drink. The concert, which also features John Beatty, George and Audrey Fairchild, will start at 7 PM with a post-concert session at 8:30 PM.

You can contact Terry at 215-541-0282 or email tkane@netcarrier.com for tickets or purchase them at the door.

To listen to the CD, click here.

April 18, 2008 by