òran mór

Barry Finn singing on board the Pride of Baltimore in 2007, with Tom Hall watching the crew.

I got back into town today and learned of some terrible news…our friend Barry Finn unexpectedly passed away this weekend. For those of you who didn’t know Barry, he was a fine singer who had a tremendous collection of songs. Sea shanties, Irish songs, prison work songs, cowboy ballads…he knew more than I’ll ever hope to forget.

More importantly, he was a wonderful man with a kind soul who always encouraged those coming up in the tradition. Plus, he had a very quick wit that he would employ with the widest of grins.

Barry was a regular at The Press Room sessions on Fridays in Portsmouth, where his booming voice could be heard clear onto Daniel Street, and a featured performer at the Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival.  He introduced me to many songs and reminded me of many that I’d heard in my youth. I still can’t believe he won’t be there.

Farwell, Barry. We’ll see you someday on Fiddler’s Green.

As Pete previewed in an earlier post, he and I plugged into our maritime group, Mudhook, for this year’s Tenth Annual Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival. To help make this year special, we were lucky enough to get Robbie O’Connell to take part.

Robbie was the very special finale to concert on Saturday night, and he appeared with us on Sunday afternoon, sharing songs back and forth at RiRa pub in Market Square.

Robbie was most gracious throughout the weekend, often acknowledging how impressed he was with the songs and singing he heard from all the other festival participants. We are very lucky to have the critical mass of local talent,  that helps attract others from around the world on a weekend like this.

I’ll admit to a certain ‘dream’ quality that went with being in the songs with Robbie.  After years of listening to him and admiring what he does, I did have to pinch myself a time or two to be sure it was for real.  Truly a memorable day.

Mudhook, for the record, is Alan Eaton, Pete Hale, Mike Jeanneau, and myself.  We came together to perform for this festival a few years ago – but we may extend our reach to other maritime events throughout the year… and do watch for the CD!

Fall is in the air, football has returned to Foxborough, and leaves are starting to change color…and both Dave and I start refreshing all the maritime music in our repetoire because this is the time of year when we regroup with our friends Mike Jeanneau and Alan Eaton to form Mudhook.

Mudhook

What is Mudhook? Originally, it was nautical slang for an anchor. But we’re a quartet that formed three years ago to play the the Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival. As ‘hookers, we mix traditional shanties with instrumentals and contemporary songs of the sea…and the PMFF is a great venue for us. We have loads of fun during the festival (always the last weekend of September), and it’s a great opportunity for us to create a unique combination of maritime, Celtic and contemporary music. We also get to hear and play with some fantastic performers from around the world. This year, for example, we have a 45 minute performance scheduled with acclaimed Irish singer Robbie O’Connell…should be great fun.

If you’re in the area and want to catch a performance, you might try hitting the historic Moffat-Ladd House in Portsmouth on Saturday from 12:30 – 2 PM. We’ll be doing a set there along with our friends from Great Bay Sailor. Hope to see you there!

It’s September 17, and that means there’s just six short months before it’s time to get your green on!

As I mentioned last month, McMenemy’s in Portsmouth holds “St. Practice Day” on the 17th of each month with food and drink specials and more…and we’ll be there tonight playing tunes and singing songs as we do every Thursday and Saturday. Guinness is sponsoring tonight’s festivities as well, so we’ll be looking for free swag and $3 pints. YAY!

I know…not the most high-brow post we’ve ever done, but I’m at work now and really looking forward to some music tonight.

Terry Weir

So a couple of weeks ago, our friend Terry Weir (from Co. Wakefield) asked if Dave and I could would be interested in playing a gig with him in Newburyport at The Port Tavern. It would be a slightly different set-up than usual – normally we play his session at Harringtons or he joins us in Portsmouth — but this collaboration would be more song-focused and a gig instead of a session. We figured it’d be great craic, however, so off we went to Newburyport to play under the name Sligo Road, which is the band name he uses on occasion.

The Port Tavern

As always, it was great fun to play with Terry. His mandolin added a great deal to the songs we do, and we had a blast keeping up with him on his songs. He definitely attacks the songs in a unique way, flavoring the Irish music he loves with hints of bluegrass from his musical past.

If you missed that show, however, and want to see what the collaboration was like, we’ll be doing another Sligo Road gig at The Port Tavern on Sunday, August 30 starting at 5:30 pm. If the weather cooperates, they’ll be throwing the front windows open for a blast of summer fun. Hope to see you there!