òran mór

Joe Madden by Vincent Crotty

My wife Sue and I affectionately call it “Irish Camp”, and it usually comprises our main annual vacation.  This year was no exception, but the good times were exceptional.  Catskills Irish Arts Week, held each year during the second full week in July, and now in its 15th year, is just the opportunity to become blissfully saturated in tunes, songs, dancing, and arts and crafts for a full week in East Durham, NY (the “Irish Alps”).

Workshops and lectures during the day, seisiúns before dinner, concerts after dinner, céilís ’til midnight, then multiple seisiúns ’til whenever will cure all sorts of ills!  Sleep deprivation is a given; there’s simply too much to do virtually 24 hours a day.  But, when all is said and done, withdrawal symptoms are reported by many attendees.

This year’s events were capped off by the Friday night concert which was dedicated to the memory of Joe Madden (may God be good to him), father of Joanie Madden of Cherish The Ladies, who passed away suddenly earlier this year.  Joe, from East Galway, was a senior All-Ireland champion on the button accordion, and a huge inspiration to my box playing.  The grand finale of the evening was a presentation to the Madden family of a painting (pictured) of Joe created by Vincent Crotty, artist and teacher for the painting workshop during the week.  Most of the teaching and performing musicians then came up on stage for a few final tunes including The Galway Rambler.

The intersection of heaven and earth for box players came when box legends Martin Mulhaire, James Keane, Billy McComiskey and John Nolan were seated side by side on the stage for a once-in-a-lifetime mighty moment where they were playing tunes together at the same place at the same time.  Joe was certainly right there with them in spirit, and I’m sure he loved it.  Now THAT’s “box players’ heaven”!

What is that doing here?

If you’ve been walking near the intersection of State and Penhallow in Portsmouth on a Thursday or Saturday night, you may have heard a familiar song or a set of tunes floating on the breeze. Nothing too blaring, mind you…but just something loud enough to catch your ear.

Like Dylan at Newport, we’ve gone electric! This propably isn’t huge news to most people, but to the session purist, it may come as a shock.

Our thinking is that since the windows are open for the summer and people are out walking, it’d be nice to broadcast a bit to make sure passers-by know that there’s good food, drink and music waiting for them upstairs at McMenemy’s. So during the last few weeks we’ve worked with a couple of mikes and speakers…and things seem to be going pretty well. We’re doing our best to ensure guest players at the session are getting picked-up by the gear, and the reports so far is that the mix sounds terrific both in the pub and on the street.

Of course, there’s nothing like honest input from our trusted friends…let us know how you think the experiment is going!

This past Sunday, I had a chance to help out our friends from the band Celtic Tribe since their regular rhythm player wasn’t available for a gig. We were playing at the fest for the Murray Irish Dance Academy in Stratham, NH. What a fantastic afternoon! The dancing was great, featuring absolute beginners (around 4 and 5 years old) to incredible displays by some of the students who will be competing at the World Competitions in a few weeks! I even got to see Sue Dunlavey — wife of bandmate Bob — as she was part of the set dancing group.

Of course, playing with Celtic Tribe was a hoot. As another Portsmouth-based group, we get to play with them at sessions regularly and they frequently join us at McMenemy’s. Their approach to the music is high-energy and driving, so I was working hard to keep up. I also had never played with a full drum kit behind me (particularly one with a superb jazz drummer at the wheel), so I got the chance to play around with a few new strums. It was a great time playing music with friends!

The Tribe was also joined by Patrick Bowling for this special appearance…a fantastic flute, bodhran and pipes player. Perhaps the best bit, however, was when Paddy got out from behind the mike and started step dancing to a set of reels we did. A former competitive step dancer, he was LAUNCHING himself off that stage. Good on you, Paddy!

As we’ve mentioned before, one of the sessions we like to haunt, er, play at is the one Terry Weir runs at Harrington’s in Wakefield, MA. During the last year or so, we’d get a visit once in a while from a mandolin player from Tuscon, AZ. He’d pop-in with his mando when he was in town on business. I didn’t know his name for the longest time, so I just referred to him as Tucson Dave, as in: “When’s Tucson Dave coming back?” “Has anyone heard from Tucson Dave?”…etc. He’s always friendly, jovial guy, and a fantastic mando player to boot.

Round the House

Turns out that Tucson Dave is actually Dave Firestine, a member of Round the House. Last Friday (6/12) I had the opportunity to see him and his bandmates play live – they had schlepped cross-country to play a gig at The Blue Mermaid in Portsmouth to kick-off an East Coast tour. How convenient!

And as an added bonus, our friend Jeff Baker (the very talented flute player from NH) performed with them…apparently they’d met at a festival in Texas and Jeff convinced them to come East. 

For the record, they were a lot of fun. Great tune sets. Fine song selections. Engaging stage presence. For part of the night, I just sat back and watched the guitar player so I could pick-up some tricks (always the thief).

The only downside to the whole experience is that I missed Dave at the Harrington’s session, and they’re headed back to Arizona at the end of this week…

…so I’m left to go back and ask “When’s the next visit from Tucson Dave?”

They left Pete in charge?!?

Well, well, well … Dave and Bob have each packed up and gone away this week. Dave is traipsing around the west coast of Ireland (recorder in hand) and Bob is in Maryland visiting friends (wife Sue in hand), leaving me all alone at McMenemy’s. Whatever will I do?

It's Mike to the rescue!

Never fear, my friends! I’m not tackling this on my own. I’ve enlisted the help of our good friend (and Mudhook bandmate) Mike Jeanneau to help anchor Thursday and Saturday night. We’ve also invited a few special guests — not all the usual crowd — to stop by to join us.

So there may be no ‘Clockwinder’ this week, but we’re planning to tear it up with a different mix of tunes and songs. I’m expecting the craic to be grand!