We’ll be in the studio in Manchester, telling the story of the development of Chris’s songwriting and performing from the beginning, in my home studio where we incubated and evolved his unique work.  If you have some time to check it out, please tune in.  You may well be able to call in as well.   The broadcast should be archived and available online soon.

I’m looking forward to it.

Go Chris!

Well, this morning he did part of his annual media junket , appearing on WCAX-TV to promote the festival (click here to view).

I thought he did a fine job. He was handsome, witty, and well-spoken…

…not at all the brother I knew growing up. 

(Oh, relax. Giving him a hard time is part of the job. I mentioned we’re twins, didn’t I?)

Love ya, Rob, and proud of ya.

Double trouble: Rob and I at the old McMenemy's Pub in Portsmouth.

So if you find yourself in Vermont on Saturday, and you can’t drive to our gig in Portsmouth, head to Burlington for the festival! They’ll have fine music, kids activities and even a Hale that looks just like me to make you feel welcome.

]]> http://www.oranmor.net/2012/03/irish-pride-is-family-pride/feed/ 0 http://www.oranmor.net/2012/03/a-great-night-with-derek-warfield-and-the-young-wolfetones/ http://www.oranmor.net/2012/03/a-great-night-with-derek-warfield-and-the-young-wolfetones/#comments Wed, 07 Mar 2012 12:50:30 +0000 Dave Hallowell http://www.oranmor.net/?p=1894 Well it was one of those perfect nights…. beginning with good friends and the honor of opening for Derek Warfield and the Young Wolfetones…moving to the joy of hearing them perform.  It was my first chance to meet Derek and see the live performance and I really enjoyed the ‘musicality’ of the band, and the stories and history that Derek weaves in and around every song and tune.  They did a number of things from the new CD “Washington’s Irish…Songs, Music, and Story of the Irish fight for American Liberty”…rich indeed with nuggets of history and Irish-American valor.  By the end of the night they had the ‘whole bar’ up there swaying and dancing and they left us all with some great melodies and great memories still swirling. 

Again… one of those perfect nights…

Is it Sligo Mor, or Oran Road?

Next weekend, on Saturday, March 10,  I’ll be joining Terry and Sligo Road at a show at St. Brigid’s Church in Lexington, MA (located at 2001 Massachusetts Ave) for a bit of pre-St. Patrick’s Day fun…so if any of my MetroWest friends want to see me perform, now’s your chance…but you might want to call and see if there are any tickets left. The seating is limited and they are expecting a full house…

…but if I didn’t alert my family and friends that I’d be playing so close to home, I’d never hear the end of it.

The show will start between 6:30 and 7 p.m. – on the dot.

This highly anticipated community event is also the most important fundraiser for the John Ashford Link House, an organization that works with men and women of the North Shore who struggle with addiction. Since it’s founding, they’ve helped more than 5,000 people through their program.

We’re honored to be involved with such a worthy community event and ask that anyone looking to contribute to a charity consider this organization.

But we all know the big day is Saturday, March 17 — St. Patrick’s Day itself! After having their delicious traditional Irish breakfast, we’ll be playing at Ri Ra in Portsmouth starting at 11 a.m. and partying on until 4 in the afternoon. It’s sure to be a fun time…and the staff at Ri Ra will be sure to look out for you dropping in.

Ri Ra's staff is waiting for you to drop in!

Afterward, we’ll be off to play for a members’ event at Wentworth By The Sea Country Club in Rye, NH. (If your membership has lapsed, you might want to give ‘em a call.)

We hope to see you, but if you’ve got other plans, we hope you have a great time during the holiday season!

And our next one is gonna be right up among the best.

We’re proud to announce that we’ve been asked to open for a true legend of Irish music when Derek Warfield rolls into town next month with The Young Wolfe Tones. Derek, who was a founding member and long-time front man of The Wolfe Tones — a group whose music I heard a lot when growing up — has inspired many performers over the years and written countless songs that have become modern standards.

Our friend Tom Lanigan (L) with the legendary Derek Warfield (R). A couple of handsome Irish lads, eh.

We’re thrilled to get a chance to open for him and the group of stellar young Irish musicians that play with him. (Trust me, they all are superb performers in their own right.)

The show will be at Ri Ra in Portsmouth on Tuesday, March 6 at 6 p.m.

Our friends from The Tom Lanigan Band have opened for Derek and The Young Wolfe Tones a few times — and will be doing so again this year down in Rhode Island — and they’ve always spoken highly of the experience. The two bands have developed a nice rapport, and Young Wolfe Tones’ stellar banjo player, Damaris Woods, even played on Tom’s new CD Voice from the Tomb. Here’s hoping the circle of friendship continues.

Of course, we hope that you’ll all come out and see us open for this show. In the meantime, here’s a video of one of the classic songs Derek is known for: “Celtic Symphony!”

Click here to view the embedded video.

We all know there will be plenty of energy in Chris’s performance.

Then there will be new CDs and performances from Jordan Tirrell-Wysocki and the Tom Lanigan Band.  Pete is planning to be there – so you never know what combination of any of the above might be called to the stage for some fun collaboration.  That’s a big part of the good fortune and the fun we all share in this area – so much great music with so many great people.

This night will rock  — here’s hoping you can be there!

Well….we weren’t disappointed.   Nice cozy theater, great sound system, and all four voices and instruments blending and ringing out beautifully all evening.

Rory  (when he wasn’t playing guitar or bouzouki) played Tommy’s  old banjo – which brought a bit of history and nostalgia to the stage for me.  Connor does an excellent job with tasteful electric bass, and then adds a lot with concertina or whistle in some special songs or tunes.  Mick and Liam Spain bring their super-strong voices and tasty playing, and it all works as a whole with the ‘Makem’ part of the sound you just have to sit back and say, “Wow.”

They did indeed do some Christmas songs – including the new one.  That capped off the night with a holiday feel, which, now that Thanksgiving is over, we were ready to really enjoy.

If you haven’t seen them, or if it’s been awhile – I’d recommend you find a time to give a good listen.  In the mean time, their new CD, “Up the Stairs” is among their very best.

The boys and ghouls at Ri Ra will be no different. They’ll be getting into the spirit of things with costumes and specials all night, so Dave and I have decided (at the last minute) to perform tonight’s show in costume. Now to find something that won’t get in the way of playing or singing…

Of course, it only makes sense to celebrate Halloween in an Irish pub, since the holiday started as a Celtic pagan celebration! There is a really interesting description of the holiday at The Irish Genealogy Toolkit, which starts:

“To find the origin of Halloween, you have to look to the festival of Samhain in Ireland’s Celtic past. Samhain had three distinct elements. Firstly, it was an important fire festival, celebrated over the evening of 31 October and throughout the following day. The flames of old fires had to be extinguished and ceremonially re-lit by druids.

Happy Samhain, everyone!

It was also a festival not unlike the modern New Year’s Day in that it carried the notion of casting out the old and moving into the new. To our pagan ancestors it marked the end of the pastoral cycle – a time when all the crops would have been gathered and placed in storage for the long winter ahead and when livestock would be brought in from the fields and selected for slaughter or breeding.

But it was also, as the last day of the year, the time when the souls of the departed would return to their former homes and when potentially malevolent spirits were released from the Otherworld and were visible to mankind.”

Apparently, the holiday also marked the end of the apple harvest season, since it was believed that the puca – or evil fairies – would spit on any unharvested apples making them inedible.

Looks like I’ll be having a couple of Magners Ciders in celebration tonight.

Hope you’ll swing by…and watch out for any banshees!