I learned my music in Ireland and Im proud of that to some degree, I also play other types of music as well but not for a living. I have always respected players from other countries who play the music of Ireland, I really don't think Irish music has any boundaries at all. I learned first the tunes when I was young by my music teacher (Mary Finn) and family and friends, then when I was older with less pimples I started listening to what was popular at the time and then I probably adjusted my music to what I liked.
I always find it interesting to learn how other people learned. I find it very funny (interesting) that somebody could learn from a pressed vinyl disc or radio. To me this shows the real power of the music. I remember a trip to Moscow some years ago with the band, we were brought there by the "Russian- Celtic Club" which comprised of working class Russians who went around to every bussiness to get the funds for our wages, the shear love for the music and culture is what stunned me. I talked Irish to one of them, he had learned it on the internet!
I have played session all over the world but mostly in England and mostly in London and mostly in NW10, and I meet people from all over who play with great skill and feeling and have never been to the mother country. I find this truly amazing, yet their knowledge is excellent about what they play .
So how the hell do ye do it! What makes ye do it?
Plucked if I know!
I can tell you that I fell in love with the music when I was about 14 years old (which was a little less than 20 years ago), thanks to the Folklife Festival at Expo '74 and, later, to the Irish Rovers. I bought a tin whistle at a music store and never looked back. The interest in the music has led me to starting to learn Gaeilge as well (been studying for about a year).
I think everyone has a particular genre of music that just grabs 'hold of them and doesn't ever let go. For me, and for a lot of the others here, I suspect, that music was Irish trad.
Mac, Your a bit of a Celtic nutter... with your tin whistle and your morris dancing. In the hot heat of the orange county!
Paddy is something! Up ya boy oh!
ITM found me... in a way. I was a semi professional Medieval and Renaissance musician at the time when I stumbled on Irish music listening to the radio one day. I didn’t realize right away what it was I happened on, but I thought it was the best Renaissance music I ever heard. It was the Chieftains 5th recording as it turned out, and when I found out what it really was I dashed to the shop and bought everything Irish. (Planxty, Bothy Band, De Dannan, etc.) The music started showing up in my playing of Early Music without my intentions to do so. Instead of fighting it – I gave in.
To answer your question; living in San Francisco has provided me the opportunity to meet many great concertina and flute players over the years that pass through on tour. I learned by taking private lessons and attending workshops wherever possible.
I was born into folk music and culture, quite unusual in my country, where folklore is scoffed and trodden upon, and everythin "folk" was regarded as anticultural, reactive and primitive. My mother is musically talented and, due to her background, I could sing Hungarian and Polish folk songs before I actually understood them (well, I do not understand Hungarian even today, but I know some juicy verses - a great Hungarian party icebreaker, hehe). My adventure with Ukrainian, Slovakian, Czech, Hungarian, Romanian, Russian etc. etc., and especially all forms of Polish folk culture continues until very now, and will hopefully continue as long as I live. But, as I was playing piano and guitar only, and didn't have much time for another, real trad instrument (like clarinet), I do only dancing and singing. My music was confined to classical and Latin American.
Irish Traditional Music - I first discovered it when I was about 15. I liked it very much, even though these were just strange variations as performed by Polish bands. And I wasn't much of a musician at that time, so I mainly listened. Then, when I was 22, I spent a year in Galway, there I learnt:
1. You CAN play trad on a guitar, despite what some hardcore American fiddlers say (my roommate)
2. You CAN tune your guitar differently than classical, and it's fun,
3. You CAN play music with other people for sheer fun, without planning to go professional.
And I met some really great musicians, who showed me the way.
After over a decade of "motivationally challenged" classical flute playing and a series of different musical crazes during the teen years a chain of rather peculiar coincidences brought me to Irish traditional music.
The sessions at O'Malley's Irish Bar, Helsinki have prevented this craze from wearing off and provided a group of actual, quite skilled people to learn the music from and eventually play it with. So there is an active group of players in Finland, which is a very important factor and of which I am very grateful.
The internet and CDs have naturally been a great source for learning. Not to mention the fact that eventually the desire to learn the music brought me to the Emerald Isle too in summer 2003 and will bring me back over and over again (I hope), the next time being in February.
This probably shed some light on my behalf on the original question "How the hell do ye do it?" The trickier one is "What makes ye do it?" I really have no proper answer. I think it was the magic that lies within the sound of the instruments and the melodies as well as pleasant experiences with certain people. To sum it up in rather a cliche-ish way I could use the single word 'craic'.
I have always liked traditional music having initially heard it in my Dad's music collection when I was younger (although my collection now is far greater than his ). It was not until I went on a DADGAD guitar course with Ross Martin at Sabhal Mor Ostaig in the summer of 2002 that I really started trying to learn it (or the accompaniment anyway), having just assumed that it was far too complicated for me.
For the past year I have been learning the Whistle with Marc Duff in Glasgow Fiddle Workshop and am also trying to play the bouzouki too (after watching Capercaillie one too many times - if that is possible). Unfortunately there are no classes in bouzouki - yet - so that is all self taught.
It is probably fair to say that music has now consumed my life, as opposed to when I was a child when classical guitar and flute lessons did not inspire me at all. I really should try to play that flute again. Hmmmm........
I learnt my first trad song in 1961, never played an instrument until 1970 when I had the fortunate (or unfortunate) experience of sharing a house with 11 musicians (including Seamus Creagh) and 1 other singer, Brian mullen, (Derryman and producer of Radio Programmes in Ulster). It was a case of 'If you can't beat them, join them.' because with a limited number of rooms, (everyone of them taken up with practice or the learning of new tunes), it was impossible for either Brian or myself to learn songs. So He bought himself a Bodhran and I found an old Mandolin and we joined THEM, never looked back,What a wonderful world.......
Well, I grew up around the music (proper small New England town upbringing with lots of Celtic, Scot, and British family history), but I never paid it much mind as I went to conservatory to study jazz.
Eight years, a BA in Philosophy, and a job in Norway with no social outlets found me looking for a way to start playing music again with people. One day I stumbled onto the Dubliner in Oslo, and into a friendship with a fiddler there. He has since taen on the daunting task of getting all of those nasty conservatory habits out of me, and getting me more and more into a music I already knew, just kind of took for granted.
What makes me do it? Damned if I know. Weirdly, I'm not the only Chinese American woman who plays this stuff -- Tina Lech comes to mind, and there's several others. I came to it by way of the stepdancing. That's even weirder.
Whup, gotta go -- houseguests gotta get to the airport.
My parent had a Banish Misfortune album that we used to listen to alot. But we listened to the Beatles more. Then we had a tape that came fromt the Thistle and Shamrock with "songs of Robert Burns" that had Pentangle and Dougie McLean(sp?). But those were only two in a sea of rock 'n roll and classical orchestra music. I still don't know why I like it.
I grew up in Ireland, but not in a place where trad. music flourished. So, I guess I started picking up tunes from the radio, or from records and later on from tapes. but I listened to pop music as well, and then rock and other music. I still believe that trad. music is where I'm at home, but I still like to ramble a bit from time to time.
How: At first with great difficulty -- always loved all types of folk music, learned to sing harmony with my mother and sister in the kitchen. But never heard Irish music except in bits strictly by chance. Finally found people who know about such things when I was brought to a Contra Dance -- not strictly traditional, but a darn sight closer than I'd ever been! Still don't know enough about origins, regional styles, etc. but then that's part of the journey, isn't it?
Why: There is nothing that, for me, equals the feeling of making music with other people. So I guess I'm selfish -- I want that feeling. And, it provides a means of expressing a part of myself that I don't have other ways to express, if that makes any sense to others.
Thanks for asking -- I think it's good to do a little introspection on our motives at times.
Expo '74... Jeez, that was where I went totally nuts over Gordon Lightfoot. Missed the Folklife part of it somehow (not sure how, I lived less than a mile from the site and visited it daily for the duration).
*mouse emerges from Memory Lane and shakes self*
The music. I managed to more or less miss it completely until about five or six years ago. I started playing some on my psaltery and then on my harp, but frankly I didnt get it at all. In the meantime I gradually acquired some Welsh music to listen to, and stumbled across Silly Wizard and The Tannahill Weavers. A coworker walking past my desk one day when the Wizard (IIRC) was playing said "If you like that try Irish music". I picked up the Green Linnet 25-year anniversary CD collection and that was it; I was hooked. Hearing it performed, and well performed might I add, made all the difference in the world.
Why do I do this, playing the music? For the best possible reason --- because I can't not. (Kind of like breathing --- I can hold my breath, sure, but only for so long.)
The Folklife Festival was near the rear of the fair site, right by the Lilac Gate. It was where the big steam engine was, just behind the logging exhibition. I was a 13-year-old volunteer there, and it was a total blast...every week we'd have food, music, dance, art and crafts from a different culture. If you still live in Spokane, it was where the Farmer's Market is now held.
Started playing whistle and drums in a marching band while still at primary school but then discovered girls, cigarettes and the beer which seemed far more important at the time. Following a chance visit to a pub in london about eight years ago and hearing Lam Farrell and Joe Wheelan playing i went out and bought a banjo and the rest is history.
I have lived in the Gold Rush country of California for many years. My first musical interest was old time, American music of that era. When I traced song origins, I found many had come from Ireland and Scotland. Having a Dutch Irish father and an Irish Irish Mother, I developed a keen interest in the music, the CDs and the many Celtic festivals and fairs here. The Sebastopol Celtic Fair, the Calaveras Celtic Fair, and the Nevada City Celtic Festival are three of the biggest events here (all have websites). Happy New Year!
For me it all started with the Dropkick Murphys then Flogging Molly then I bought a whistle a few months later decided to take up the GHBs and bought a practice chanter then I heard the Pogues then Gaelic Storm and ITM/STM sort of took over mostly with bands like Danu and Old Blind Dogs I still listen to Punk and Ska but not nearly as much as I did say a year ago. Then I started to get into trad from other places and right now my favorite is probably Galician. I think I found my calling on Pipes (just GHB but I am saving up for other types which would be Border, Northumbrian Smalls, and Galician) because they are my favorite instrument to play and have taken over my life second is probably whistle.
That's a lovely, open, attitude to have there, compaqjohn. I also like your observation about the power of the music to transcend vinyl, radio waves, etc and get in people's blood.
I often wonder why I play this music, and what attracted me. I just seem to need to. and I've been doing it so long now that it really is a part of me.
I don't know when exactly I started with this music..must have meen when I was 13/14 (not too long ago)
my dad had some old discs and I always loved to listen to them (alltrough not allowed)
from him I also learned my first tune
I'm happy that I've found this page because there's no session or something like that around the place
..only a concert every year in january
first bands/ players I got to know are Matt Moloy,Bothy Band,Tamlin,Christy Moore,Planxty..
curious isn't it?
lea
I started off listening to my dad's tapes of Runrig, Capercaillie, Silly Wizard and Battlefield Band. When I started learning violin at 7 I didn't really like playing classical so my teacher got me some fiddle books (just as well really because otherwise I'm sure I wouldn't still be playing!) I didn't start really playing fiddle music and playing in sessions til I went to uni but I'd been singing Gaelic songs through high school. Although I really love traditional stuff I like a whole bunch of types of music. I think it's brilliant when musicians mix their own influences in with the music.
for me, its just been a lot of years of learning off of sheet music and playing wrong, and struggling to play it right. learning that its ok to play *slow* and that ornamentation shouldnt be put in until you CAN put it in.
its all been from the help of wonderful people, like my grandma and my uncle, who endured years of me playing way too fast, while nicely trying to help me slow down. my classical flute teacher taught me (and still does) how to slow down, and count rhyhtms, and how to practice. if it werent for him teaching me how to break down tunes and master them, i would still be making the same mistakes.
sean ryan, for telling me "stop playing, and think about what you just did wrong". something no one said in those exact words, and it clicked. i finger tunes in my head when i am working on hard parts (especially weird classical chromatics in the third octave), and visualize me playing the flute, but i only did it if i couldnt teach myself a passage otherwise. i still dont do it as much as i should, but i now at least stop playing when i do something wrong and try to get it right before moving on and saying, "i'll get it next repeat". just that one thing he said to me has improved my playing 10 fold.
the week of irish fest summer school camp taught me how to learn by ear, and by the end i could do it. then, bugging my grandma for a cd of tunes for her to record so i could learn more by ear, i taught myself how to learn by ear off of recordings instead of people. and now i'm moving up to doing it off albums. i'm still not too good at it, but i can do it if i try really hard.
so thats all it takes, i guess. a lot of doing things wrong and people helping you and supporting you along the way, even if its only one thing they say, or seeing them 3 times a year. you just have to keep insisting and practicing, always trying to get better, taking any help you can get, any tune you can get, and listen whenever anyone has anything to say.
John Finn-that's who sparked the interest in the music of my roots.
It was the early evening on a damp Sunday in the early 1970's in the fiddler Con Curtin's pub-the Balloon in west London. It was quiet and we were chatting, then he pulled these flute sections from his pocket and just started to play!
I later recognised him in the Comhaltas magazine Treoir when he won the All-Britain Fleadh for Senior flute.
An unassuming yet outstanding ambassador for his country and its music.
Regards
Peter
(London)
I'm curious...
I'm curious...
I learned my music in Ireland and Im proud of that to some degree, I also play other types of music as well but not for a living. I have always respected players from other countries who play the music of Ireland, I really don't think Irish music has any boundaries at all. I learned first the tunes when I was young by my music teacher (Mary Finn) and family and friends, then when I was older with less pimples I started listening to what was popular at the time and then I probably adjusted my music to what I liked.
I always find it interesting to learn how other people learned. I find it very funny (interesting) that somebody could learn from a pressed vinyl disc or radio. To me this shows the real power of the music. I remember a trip to Moscow some years ago with the band, we were brought there by the "Russian- Celtic Club" which comprised of working class Russians who went around to every bussiness to get the funds for our wages, the shear love for the music and culture is what stunned me. I talked Irish to one of them, he had learned it on the internet!
I have played session all over the world but mostly in England and mostly in London and mostly in NW10, and I meet people from all over who play with great skill and feeling and have never been to the mother country. I find this truly amazing, yet their knowledge is excellent about what they play .
So how the hell do ye do it! What makes ye do it?
Plucked if I know!
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by compaqjohn
Re: I'm curious...
I can tell you that I fell in love with the music when I was about 14 years old (which was a little less than 20 years ago), thanks to the Folklife Festival at Expo '74 and, later, to the Irish Rovers. I bought a tin whistle at a music store and never looked back. The interest in the music has led me to starting to learn Gaeilge as well (been studying for about a year).
I think everyone has a particular genre of music that just grabs 'hold of them and doesn't ever let go. For me, and for a lot of the others here, I suspect, that music was Irish trad.
Redwolf
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by MacTireRua
Re: I'm curious...
Mac, Your a bit of a Celtic nutter... with your tin whistle and your morris dancing. In the hot heat of the orange county!
Paddy is something! Up ya boy oh!
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by compaqjohn
Re: I'm curious...
ITM found me... in a way. I was a semi professional Medieval and Renaissance musician at the time when I stumbled on Irish music listening to the radio one day. I didn’t realize right away what it was I happened on, but I thought it was the best Renaissance music I ever heard. It was the Chieftains 5th recording as it turned out, and when I found out what it really was I dashed to the shop and bought everything Irish. (Planxty, Bothy Band, De Dannan, etc.) The music started showing up in my playing of Early Music without my intentions to do so. Instead of fighting it – I gave in.
To answer your question; living in San Francisco has provided me the opportunity to meet many great concertina and flute players over the years that pass through on tour. I learned by taking private lessons and attending workshops wherever possible.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Phantom Button
Re: I'm curious...
I was born into folk music and culture, quite unusual in my country, where folklore is scoffed and trodden upon, and everythin "folk" was regarded as anticultural, reactive and primitive. My mother is musically talented and, due to her background, I could sing Hungarian and Polish folk songs before I actually understood them (well, I do not understand Hungarian even today, but I know some juicy verses - a great Hungarian party icebreaker, hehe). My adventure with Ukrainian, Slovakian, Czech, Hungarian, Romanian, Russian etc. etc., and especially all forms of Polish folk culture continues until very now, and will hopefully continue as long as I live. But, as I was playing piano and guitar only, and didn't have much time for another, real trad instrument (like clarinet), I do only dancing and singing. My music was confined to classical and Latin American.
Irish Traditional Music - I first discovered it when I was about 15. I liked it very much, even though these were just strange variations as performed by Polish bands. And I wasn't much of a musician at that time, so I mainly listened. Then, when I was 22, I spent a year in Galway, there I learnt:
1. You CAN play trad on a guitar, despite what some hardcore American fiddlers say (my roommate)
2. You CAN tune your guitar differently than classical, and it's fun,
3. You CAN play music with other people for sheer fun, without planning to go professional.
And I met some really great musicians, who showed me the way.
And that I liked.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Janek
Re: I'm curious...
After over a decade of "motivationally challenged" classical flute playing and a series of different musical crazes during the teen years a chain of rather peculiar coincidences brought me to Irish traditional music.
The sessions at O'Malley's Irish Bar, Helsinki have prevented this craze from wearing off and provided a group of actual, quite skilled people to learn the music from and eventually play it with. So there is an active group of players in Finland, which is a very important factor and of which I am very grateful.
The internet and CDs have naturally been a great source for learning. Not to mention the fact that eventually the desire to learn the music brought me to the Emerald Isle too in summer 2003 and will bring me back over and over again (I hope), the next time being in February.
This probably shed some light on my behalf on the original question "How the hell do ye do it?" The trickier one is "What makes ye do it?" I really have no proper answer. I think it was the magic that lies within the sound of the instruments and the melodies as well as pleasant experiences with certain people. To sum it up in rather a cliche-ish way I could use the single word 'craic'.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Markus
Re: I'm curious...
I have always liked traditional music having initially heard it in my Dad's music collection when I was younger (although my collection now is far greater than his
). It was not until I went on a DADGAD guitar course with Ross Martin at Sabhal Mor Ostaig in the summer of 2002 that I really started trying to learn it (or the accompaniment anyway), having just assumed that it was far too complicated for me.
For the past year I have been learning the Whistle with Marc Duff in Glasgow Fiddle Workshop and am also trying to play the bouzouki too (after watching Capercaillie one too many times - if that is possible). Unfortunately there are no classes in bouzouki - yet - so that is all self taught.
It is probably fair to say that music has now consumed my life, as opposed to when I was a child when classical guitar and flute lessons did not inspire me at all. I really should try to play that flute again. Hmmmm........
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by No Cause For Alarm
Re: I'm curious...
I learnt my first trad song in 1961, never played an instrument until 1970 when I had the fortunate (or unfortunate) experience of sharing a house with 11 musicians (including Seamus Creagh) and 1 other singer, Brian mullen, (Derryman and producer of Radio Programmes in Ulster). It was a case of 'If you can't beat them, join them.' because with a limited number of rooms, (everyone of them taken up with practice or the learning of new tunes), it was impossible for either Brian or myself to learn songs. So He bought himself a Bodhran and I found an old Mandolin and we joined THEM, never looked back,What a wonderful world.......
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Ian Stevenson
Re: I'm curious...
Well, I grew up around the music (proper small New England town upbringing with lots of Celtic, Scot, and British family history), but I never paid it much mind as I went to conservatory to study jazz.
Eight years, a BA in Philosophy, and a job in Norway with no social outlets found me looking for a way to start playing music again with people. One day I stumbled onto the Dubliner in Oslo, and into a friendship with a fiddler there. He has since taen on the daunting task of getting all of those nasty conservatory habits out of me, and getting me more and more into a music I already knew, just kind of took for granted.
That's my story for what it is worth...
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by pelsor
Re: I'm curious...
What makes me do it? Damned if I know. Weirdly, I'm not the only Chinese American woman who plays this stuff -- Tina Lech comes to mind, and there's several others. I came to it by way of the stepdancing. That's even weirder.
Whup, gotta go -- houseguests gotta get to the airport.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Zina Lee
Re: I'm curious...
My parent had a Banish Misfortune album that we used to listen to alot. But we listened to the Beatles more. Then we had a tape that came fromt the Thistle and Shamrock with "songs of Robert Burns" that had Pentangle and Dougie McLean(sp?). But those were only two in a sea of rock 'n roll and classical orchestra music. I still don't know why I like it.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Emily Horne
Re: I'm curious...
I grew up in Ireland, but not in a place where trad. music flourished. So, I guess I started picking up tunes from the radio, or from records and later on from tapes. but I listened to pop music as well, and then rock and other music. I still believe that trad. music is where I'm at home, but I still like to ramble a bit from time to time.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Backer
Re: I'm curious...
Golly, that makes me think...
How: At first with great difficulty -- always loved all types of folk music, learned to sing harmony with my mother and sister in the kitchen. But never heard Irish music except in bits strictly by chance. Finally found people who know about such things when I was brought to a Contra Dance -- not strictly traditional, but a darn sight closer than I'd ever been! Still don't know enough about origins, regional styles, etc. but then that's part of the journey, isn't it?
Why: There is nothing that, for me, equals the feeling of making music with other people. So I guess I'm selfish -- I want that feeling. And, it provides a means of expressing a part of myself that I don't have other ways to express, if that makes any sense to others.
Thanks for asking -- I think it's good to do a little introspection on our motives at times.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Char B
Re: I'm curious...
Oops -- can't leave with out mentioning the absolutely pivotal event that set the hook: Altan concert about the time that Harvest Storm was released.
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by Char B
Re: I'm curious...
Expo '74... Jeez, that was where I went totally nuts over Gordon Lightfoot. Missed the Folklife part of it somehow (not sure how, I lived less than a mile from the site and visited it daily for the duration).
*mouse emerges from Memory Lane and shakes self*
The music. I managed to more or less miss it completely until about five or six years ago. I started playing some on my psaltery and then on my harp, but frankly I didnt get it at all. In the meantime I gradually acquired some Welsh music to listen to, and stumbled across Silly Wizard and The Tannahill Weavers. A coworker walking past my desk one day when the Wizard (IIRC) was playing said "If you like that try Irish music". I picked up the Green Linnet 25-year anniversary CD collection and that was it; I was hooked. Hearing it performed, and well performed might I add, made all the difference in the world.
Why do I do this, playing the music? For the best possible reason --- because I can't not. (Kind of like breathing --- I can hold my breath, sure, but only for so long.)
# Posted on December 31st 2004 by sara g
Re: I'm curious...
The Folklife Festival was near the rear of the fair site, right by the Lilac Gate. It was where the big steam engine was, just behind the logging exhibition. I was a 13-year-old volunteer there, and it was a total blast...every week we'd have food, music, dance, art and crafts from a different culture. If you still live in Spokane, it was where the Farmer's Market is now held.
Redwolf
# Posted on January 1st 2005 by MacTireRua
Re: I'm curious...
Started playing whistle and drums in a marching band while still at primary school but then discovered girls, cigarettes and the beer which seemed far more important at the time. Following a chance visit to a pub in london about eight years ago and hearing Lam Farrell and Joe Wheelan playing i went out and bought a banjo and the rest is history.
# Posted on January 1st 2005 by Four string
Re: I'm curious...
I have lived in the Gold Rush country of California for many years. My first musical interest was old time, American music of that era. When I traced song origins, I found many had come from Ireland and Scotland. Having a Dutch Irish father and an Irish Irish Mother, I developed a keen interest in the music, the CDs and the many Celtic festivals and fairs here. The Sebastopol Celtic Fair, the Calaveras Celtic Fair, and the Nevada City Celtic Festival are three of the biggest events here (all have websites). Happy New Year!
# Posted on January 1st 2005 by CeolCairdeas
Re: I'm curious...
For me it all started with the Dropkick Murphys then Flogging Molly then I bought a whistle a few months later decided to take up the GHBs and bought a practice chanter then I heard the Pogues then Gaelic Storm and ITM/STM sort of took over mostly with bands like Danu and Old Blind Dogs I still listen to Punk and Ska but not nearly as much as I did say a year ago. Then I started to get into trad from other places and right now my favorite is probably Galician. I think I found my calling on Pipes (just GHB but I am saving up for other types which would be Border, Northumbrian Smalls, and Galician) because they are my favorite instrument to play and have taken over my life second is probably whistle.
# Posted on January 1st 2005 by Why Bother?
Re: I'm curious...
That's a lovely, open, attitude to have there, compaqjohn. I also like your observation about the power of the music to transcend vinyl, radio waves, etc and get in people's blood.
I often wonder why I play this music, and what attracted me. I just seem to need to. and I've been doing it so long now that it really is a part of me.
Happy New Year
# Posted on January 1st 2005 by kris
Re: I'm curious...
i'm blessed (? or cursed) with it in my blood from birth already
_my mum's side of the family are the non-players, but drinkers, party-heads and love the music ''big time'', and . . .
_my dad's side are the players (him on the 'box' mainly), sister a nun, quiter, non-drinkers, deeper heads and love the music ''big time'' . . .
so where is my refuge?
answer: there is none, and to be perfectly honest, i wouldn't have it any other way
. . . despite what's happened, a safe new year to everyone as well
# Posted on January 1st 2005 by lisaniska
Re: I'm curious...
I don't know when exactly I started with this music..must have meen when I was 13/14 (not too long ago)
my dad had some old discs and I always loved to listen to them (alltrough not allowed)
from him I also learned my first tune
I'm happy that I've found this page because there's no session or something like that around the place
..only a concert every year in january
first bands/ players I got to know are Matt Moloy,Bothy Band,Tamlin,Christy Moore,Planxty..
curious isn't it?
lea
# Posted on January 2nd 2005 by lea h
Re: I'm curious...
I started off listening to my dad's tapes of Runrig, Capercaillie, Silly Wizard and Battlefield Band. When I started learning violin at 7 I didn't really like playing classical so my teacher got me some fiddle books (just as well really because otherwise I'm sure I wouldn't still be playing!) I didn't start really playing fiddle music and playing in sessions til I went to uni but I'd been singing Gaelic songs through high school. Although I really love traditional stuff I like a whole bunch of types of music. I think it's brilliant when musicians mix their own influences in with the music.
# Posted on January 3rd 2005 by Claremac
Re: I'm curious...
for me, its just been a lot of years of learning off of sheet music and playing wrong, and struggling to play it right. learning that its ok to play *slow* and that ornamentation shouldnt be put in until you CAN put it in.
its all been from the help of wonderful people, like my grandma and my uncle, who endured years of me playing way too fast, while nicely trying to help me slow down. my classical flute teacher taught me (and still does) how to slow down, and count rhyhtms, and how to practice. if it werent for him teaching me how to break down tunes and master them, i would still be making the same mistakes.
sean ryan, for telling me "stop playing, and think about what you just did wrong". something no one said in those exact words, and it clicked. i finger tunes in my head when i am working on hard parts (especially weird classical chromatics in the third octave), and visualize me playing the flute, but i only did it if i couldnt teach myself a passage otherwise. i still dont do it as much as i should, but i now at least stop playing when i do something wrong and try to get it right before moving on and saying, "i'll get it next repeat". just that one thing he said to me has improved my playing 10 fold.
the week of irish fest summer school camp taught me how to learn by ear, and by the end i could do it. then, bugging my grandma for a cd of tunes for her to record so i could learn more by ear, i taught myself how to learn by ear off of recordings instead of people. and now i'm moving up to doing it off albums. i'm still not too good at it, but i can do it if i try really hard.
so thats all it takes, i guess. a lot of doing things wrong and people helping you and supporting you along the way, even if its only one thing they say, or seeing them 3 times a year. you just have to keep insisting and practicing, always trying to get better, taking any help you can get, any tune you can get, and listen whenever anyone has anything to say.
# Posted on January 4th 2005 by daiv
Re: I'm curious...
John Finn-that's who sparked the interest in the music of my roots.
It was the early evening on a damp Sunday in the early 1970's in the fiddler Con Curtin's pub-the Balloon in west London. It was quiet and we were chatting, then he pulled these flute sections from his pocket and just started to play!
I later recognised him in the Comhaltas magazine Treoir when he won the All-Britain Fleadh for Senior flute.
An unassuming yet outstanding ambassador for his country and its music.
Regards
Peter
(London)
# Posted on January 16th 2005 by sheepdip