òran mór

okay, okay…we know…

Yes, we’ve been dreadfully negligent about  keeping up our posts on the website.  Somehow, that danged ‘real life’ stuff has distracted us during the last couple of months. But we are still playing every Monday night at RiRa in Portsmouth NH from 7 – 10pm…so if you need your fix…

We call him Seamus

Actually, if you haven’t stopped in for a while, you should know that we continue to be joined by many of our musical friends on a regular basis. We’ve had a good stretch of being joined by Jim Prendergast — formerly of Nashville’s “Boys of County Nashville” and now proprietor of Mill Pond Music Studio in Portsmouth, NH. He’s a great guitar player and even better guy, so we love it when he stops in.

Of course, with the St. Patrick’s Day holiday approaching, we have several gigs lined up that we will be telling you about.

In the meantime, however, if you want to get your Irish on, we’d love to see you on a Monday night.

For as long as I can remember, “The Irish Hit Parade” has been airing on WROL-AM in Boston…a programming block that had everything Irish music — folk singers, show bands, ceili bands and Irish tenors. Hal Roach would even get airtime to tell his unique brand of humor (“Write it down. Write that one down…it’s a good one.”)  

Growing up, my grandparents would have the  radio tuned in from 10 am to 7 pm on Saturdays. As a teen, it wasn’t my cup of tea…which makes me chuckle when they air a promotion they have that says “This is the station your father used to MAKE you listen to…” ‘cuz now it’s one of the programs I’ll tune-in when I’m driving around on a Saturday.

Anyway, 40-something years and the Irish Hit Parade is still going strong…and Dave and I will be dropping in this Saturday during the 5 o’clock hour to visit The Bailey Ceili. I know host Bill Bailey from some of the sessions in Boston, and he asked if we wanted to stop by and play a few songs…so why not.  We’ll go on the air and sing a few songs, maybe do a tune, and have a laugh with Bill.

If you get a chance to tune in, it’s 950 AM. But the signal can be weak once you get outside of the 95 beltway. The good news is you can listen online here!

Tis himself and the lasses

Feile Restaurant and Pub in Wells, ME got a nice write-up in the paper, and they needed some authentic photos of some of their performers. Looky who they chose!

http://www.seacoastonline.com/articles/20100916-ENTERTAIN-9160334

Thanks to Beth Therriault, who actually took the photo used with the article. We had requested proper photo credit, but somehow it was lost in the shuffle. (We’ve asked for them to correct it on the online article.)

As I mentioned in previous posts, Dave and I are part of a quartet called MUDHOOK, which performs maritime music. Every fall, we get together with our friends Mike Jeanneau (of Boghat) and Alan Eaton to sing shanties, fo’c'sle ballads and contemporary songs of the sea at the Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival.

Mudhooking in Market Square

The festival was this past weekend and, as always, we had an absolute blast playing our sets and catching some of the great music from some of the best performers currently on the maritime scene: Ken Sweeney, Bobb Webb, David Coffin, Ken Schatz, Liam Robinson, and others.

This year, we were able to release a special festival edition of our upcoming CD entitled “First Home.” In talking about the CD, however, a couple of people have asked what the album name means.  Actually, the name works on several levels, which is why we liked it so much.

The first connection is to a specific song on the album. ”The honor of ‘first home’” is the folly of the hero in Honor & Praise, a song Mike learned from the singing of Fairport Convention. The hero pushes his ship and his crew in order to be the first merchant vessel back to the home port, which — in part — is how he loses his vessel.

But “First Home” is also how we think of Portsmouth and the Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival particularly. We all met singing and playing at the traditional music sessions in Portsmouth and Mudhook was originally formed four years ago specifically to perform at the PMFF…so the festival is our first home. Since we’re releasing this special edition of our CD at the festival, the name just made sense.

If you were able to make the festival and were kind enough to pick up a copy of this limited release — great. But if you weren’t able to make it and would still like a copy of this special edition, we have a few left and we’d be happy to get one to you. And we’ll have copies at our gigs as long as they last.

Mudhook's first CD - a special edition for the 2010 PMFF

You’ve probably noticed that we haven’t be typing too much this summer…and we apologize to those loyal readers of our humble blog…but it’s been a busy summer with both music and non-music commitments alike:

• I bought a house that needed some work,
• Dave’s been taking a guitar building course (where he’s building a bouzouki — clearly off the curriculum),
• we both are maintaining excellence in our respective day jobs (hi boss),
• and we’ve had a few gigs that we’ve tried to keep you informed about, (and where we’ve been happy to see many of you.)

Great session at Rory O'Connor's, with the Coyne Bros and Tony Giblin, proprietor.

The summer music definitely has been fun. I’ve been enjoying the Sunday session’s at Rory O’Connors, the new pub in Georgetown, MA that’s owned by our friend and fellow troubador Tony Giblin. He and Eamon Coyne host a nice session there on Sunday’s from 6-9 p.m., which was just featured in the local paper. Good food, a nice pint, and music with friends…is there any better way to get mentally prepared for the torture of the week ahead? (hi boss.)

Other highlights from the summer included:

• playing some tunes with Terry Coyne (Eamon’s brother) who was visiting from Liverpool…a fantastic flute and whistle player who has a fair number of songs up his sleeve,
• my getting a chance to meet and sing with THE Johnny McEvoy (I’ll write more on that later),
• Dave headed out to see on the Lannon Irish Music Cruise around Gloucester,
• making some serious headway on our first CD, as well as a CD for Mudhook (the maritime group we’re part of),
• and gearing up with some new songs for the 11th Annual Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival (more on that to come as well).

Dave at the mike, laying down tracks

All in all, it’s been a great summer. We’re wrapping up the summer with a gig up in Wells, ME this Wednesday, Sept. 1…the last show before Labor Day!

Mike Jeanneau -- our Mudhook cohort -- and Jim Prendergast, friend and sound engineer extraordinaire