My first session - One Monday night, The Bridge House Inn, Thomastown, Co. Kilkenny -up stood a find strap of a farmer and to a hushed pub, through a pall of smoke he commands the audience with his thick Kilkenny brogue. Telling a familiar story that somehow revolved around a silk purse and a sow’s ear, he skilfully interwove the latest political antics and current affairs, he had us all in stitches. I love hearing yarns although these days they are spoken in quiet corners for the benefit of the musicians in the proximately only, after a night of playing tunes. I haven't seen or heard a story teller in a session in years.
Are there story tellers in your session? What kind of stories do they tell?
I miss them too, and the recitations... Sometimes, the story resolved around the music too, a tune... The old visiting houses, gathering in homes and small village halls, are much more conducive to greater variety in this regard, but I've been in a few pubs where it happened too, more so after the curtains were drawn and we retired to a back room...
Um....t'was a long time ago.. I remember the silk purse/sow's ear part but not how exactly the guy looked....or are you describing that guy that allegedly calls around 25th Dec?
Eddie Lenihan of Crusheen(?), Clare, is a pretty good story teller, as well as a collector. He laments the disappearance of the older people with the stories too. Has spent 30 years or more collecting stories from the oldest people he can speak to around Clare and has a huge archive of collected stories.
Published a great book "Meeting the Other Crowd" 2003. Interesting that many of these stories were collected in recent years even as late as 2000 or more from people who were in their 80s and 90s then. One of the best books I have read.
I really like the one "A Musician's Story" with the intro:
"They were famous for music. An' 'twas the pipes the most of 'em played. An' different people heard it."
Miltown Malbay, June 27, 1999!
Eddie's summary observation after the story:
"On the face of it, this story seems a little unusual, for there are many instances of wonderful music being brought back from the fairy world, such as "The Fairy Reel" or "Port na bPucai", etc. The vital differentiating factor would seem to be that if the music is given freely by the Good People to the human being (as a reward for a favor done, for instance) it will be brought across that divide between their world and ours. Otherwise, as in this case, its complexity defies even the best human musician's skill.
Not just to the luxuries of life, like music, does this apply, but to the very basics, like time itself. For a millennium and more, Irish people have listened spellbound to stories of The Land of Youth - Tir na nOg - with their message that to attempt to go beyond our natural sphere of space and time can end only in disappointment and ultimate disaster."
I literally couldn't put the book down until I'd finished it.
Mick Quinn, Martins uncle, is one of the best around. Regular visitor to Leitrim for week/weekends in Drumshanbo (Joe Mooney/Packie Duignan) and Drumkeerin (John McKenna).
I'm sure that every area has its share of good tellers of stories in the form of recitations, and there are many great recitations out there. Apart from playing music I specialize in reciting and made a CD of recitations which I set to music about four years ago, Although at the time I got air play on local radio the trouble with trying to get play on National Radio with something like that is the length of each recitation. Some can be up to six minutes long, and unlike a song it ruins it if it is shortened. A good reciter should be able to act out the story same as an actor, and without getting stuck for the words. Unless requested otherwise, you should try and avoid doing the same recitation every time you are called. Take a recitation like 'The Little Pub in London' It's been flogged to death by all and sundry. I'd try and avoid it like the plaque.
Toronto can boast of Jonathan Lynn (ex Killkenny), more of a cross between a recitationist and a storyteller but he's the best I've ever seen. He pops into our sessions cery regularly and can always be called on for a piece.
"avoid it like the plaque" ... Intentional or not, I love it Free Reed. A modern spin on an old expression, and bound to go down well with dentists and cardioligists everywhere.
I've never heard a story (other than gossip) or a recitation at a pub session, but we have a Dublin man here who sometimes interjects a few verses during a party-with-tunes, and it's great.
I recently ran across a book in a local bookstore about storytelling in Fermanagh. Looked interesting and comes with a companion CD of stories and songs.
I would imagine the lack of storytellers is down to the session mentality which prevails ,in my experience, at least in the North of Ireland, inasmuch as that not only story tellers but singers are avoided like the plague by those who wish only to batter out reels and jigs at two hundred miles an hour all night and day.I have seen such players get up and leave a session where singing or a local character telling a story has disturbed their diddley -dee monopoly and start up what they call a "musicians only ",session a short pub crawl away.I hope its not like that everywhere.
Grego ... Well spotted. I wish I had you instead of my 'spell check'. It can't tell the difference between 'Bio film on teeth' and ' Red spots on the face, vomiting blood, aching limbs, and terrible pains. 'and of course there is no second chance on here.
Sounds like another example of compartmentalisation of the genre (and a lot of other social activities) - music separated from the dancing, story-telling and singing separated from the sessions. Things taken from their original social context and set up as specialisations in themselves without the other components. It's going to happen, just the way of the world by the look of it.
We will need to buy separate CDs for jigs, reels, etc, etc, sean nos singing, sean nos dancing, ballad (non sean nos) singing...there'll be no end to it!!!
Until CDs become obsolete that is, and we all have to download off the net...then we can argue about bits, bytes, storage formats and operating systems and which combination of those makes the music sound better.
eddie came in to our 2 class room school when i was 8.he told us two stories and we begged and begged him to tell another against the restraints of our rather wicked bitch of a teacher...fair play to him he told us another one and then listened to our stories we learned from our grannies....he is a great guy....
des mulkere from clare is fecking mighty at telling the owl yarn...
a session needs the story and the song..for a session to breath at rest it needs to be a night of celebration.everyone in the venue and those in your head needs to be enjoying everything going on.....
if people start getting thick and talking amung them selves.then decide to set up down the road ....well let them off to feck.....when they have fecked off and brought there bullsh*t with them youll get different people calling in to your session........and better it will get...
it takes the whole pub to make a session the landlord is important too...youll always remember a bad one....but no 2 or 3 musicians can tell people not to sing or tell astory or a poem....
The late John Campbell from Mullachbán, South Armagh was probably the best - he didn't perform as a story teller, it was just the way he was and communicated. Mick Quinn, John's best friend also from Mullachbán is probably the best around today though he is in his 80's but as fit and young as ever. His song about the Newry man who shot and injured his dog for 'visiting' his pedgree is hilarous. Unfortunately Mick got 50 stitches the other week after his friends dog bit him We all wish him a speedy recovery - I predict another song in the making!!!
Yes indeed a great one written by Mick Quinn and part of my own repitore. May be the odd word different but we all put our own stamp on these great recitations. A Nuck incidentally is a Thief.
The Man who shot the dog
I was born a collie sheepdog, with a white ring round me neck
And for nine days me eyes were closed and I couldn’t see a speck
I had four lovely sisters me being the only boy
And for six weeks we played around, our mother’s pride and joy
Till a gentleman from Mullacban, to me a liken took
Held me in his arms, then me master’s hand he shook
He put me in his motor car, and we started for the road
And in less than twenty minutes I was in my new abode
Well the first thing my new family did was to look for me a name
And they called me this and they called me that, but it sounded all the same
Till my master he came round the house and this to me he said:
“Consider yourself now a dog, and sport you’re name is Ned.”
Well my one great distinction was, I had a bunty tail
And I wagged it for my master, as we walked o’er hill and dale
And we rounded sheep and cattle and sometimes a nanny goat
And me master often threatened that he’d cut my flaming throat.
Well the months went by, and I grew up and I learned to do me chores
And I growled at postmen and at soldiers, and likewise the man next door.
O he loved to see me working, he said I was a treat
And before I got into the car, I always washed my feet.
But sometimes dogs gets lonesome and I longed to have a pal
And I met a great big Labrador, and she said her name was Sal
And she said that she was lonesome too, that she had a pedigree
Well I says; “That aint a problem Sal, you just leave that to me”
When her master overheard the news and found out with her I’d slept
We didn’t use protection so out across the fence he leapt’
Saying; “Ya bunty tailed black so and so from beyond in Conway Park
I’ll stop your gallivanting around my house after dark
He put his gun up to his shoulder, a careful aim he took
The noise that came out of it, the valley round it shook
And I felt me hide a burning, as the bullets tore my head
And the woman says; “He shot that dog that belongs to Mick and Ned.
When me master he did hear the shots and it happened just be luck
He stepped up to the gunman and he says “ Ya Newry Nuck”
And he let him have the one two three up in the auld faceog
Saying “that’s the medicine I’ll dish out to any man who’d shoot me dog
Well he brought me to my kennel and now on the straw I lie
And I hear the neighbours asking ‘Will poor Ned live or die’
I’m getting great attention for me body’s full of lead
And for the first time in my life I get me breakfast here in bed
But me master’s all forlorn and he sits and strokes me head
And he searchs round me body for those little balls of lead
And he’s using awful language as he sits there on the log
And these are some of the things he says about the man that shot his dog
May his scabs like crabs grow up in slabs around everything he feels
And green snotters flow down to his toes and hacks come on his heels
May his hair fall out, may his woman pout, may his fart smell like a hog
And the divil’s luck fall on that Newry Nuck, the man that shot the dog.
May piles surround his big back side like strawberries on their stalks
And every time that he lifts his gun that his stomach it may bark
And as he goes a hunting o’er heather, hills or bog
May the diarrhoea skite with all it’s might from the man that shot me dog
Well to conclude and finish, I am on all fours once more
And I feel an urge coming over me that did one day before
And I’ll slip out some dark evening in the mist or the thick fog
And I’ll leave another half a dozen pups with the man that shot the dog.
Heard Mick Quinn was in the audience at a Martin Hayes Denis Cahill Gig recently in Market Place Theatre Armagh last week,on spotting him they invited him up on stage and he entertained a full house!
There's a Frenchman named Jean (I don't know his surname) living in East Clare (Broadford?) who tells stories and does recitations at sessions at Peppers and Shortt's (and perhaps other sessions in the area).
Where are the story tellers gone?
Where are the story tellers gone?
My first session - One Monday night, The Bridge House Inn, Thomastown, Co. Kilkenny -up stood a find strap of a farmer and to a hushed pub, through a pall of smoke he commands the audience with his thick Kilkenny brogue. Telling a familiar story that somehow revolved around a silk purse and a sow’s ear, he skilfully interwove the latest political antics and current affairs, he had us all in stitches. I love hearing yarns although these days they are spoken in quiet corners for the benefit of the musicians in the proximately only, after a night of playing tunes. I haven't seen or heard a story teller in a session in years.
Are there story tellers in your session? What kind of stories do they tell?
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by gtag
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
I miss them too, and the recitations... Sometimes, the story resolved around the music too, a tune... The old visiting houses, gathering in homes and small village halls, are much more conducive to greater variety in this regard, but I've been in a few pubs where it happened too, more so after the curtains were drawn and we retired to a back room...
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by ceolachan
Maybe I should have qualified that better ~ "were much more conducive" ~
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by ceolachan
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Was this guy a tall man with white grey hair and a white beard. Probably had a stange hat on his head too.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by session savage
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Um....t'was a long time ago.. I remember the silk purse/sow's ear part but not how exactly the guy looked....or are you describing that guy that allegedly calls around 25th Dec?
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by gtag
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
ha ha no its not him. No this guy is a storyteller I have heard a few times. He is brilliant but i cant think of his name.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by session savage
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Eddie Lenihan of Crusheen(?), Clare, is a pretty good story teller, as well as a collector. He laments the disappearance of the older people with the stories too. Has spent 30 years or more collecting stories from the oldest people he can speak to around Clare and has a huge archive of collected stories.
Published a great book "Meeting the Other Crowd" 2003. Interesting that many of these stories were collected in recent years even as late as 2000 or more from people who were in their 80s and 90s then. One of the best books I have read.
I really like the one "A Musician's Story" with the intro:
"They were famous for music. An' 'twas the pipes the most of 'em played. An' different people heard it."
Miltown Malbay, June 27, 1999!
Eddie's summary observation after the story:
"On the face of it, this story seems a little unusual, for there are many instances of wonderful music being brought back from the fairy world, such as "The Fairy Reel" or "Port na bPucai", etc. The vital differentiating factor would seem to be that if the music is given freely by the Good People to the human being (as a reward for a favor done, for instance) it will be brought across that divide between their world and ours. Otherwise, as in this case, its complexity defies even the best human musician's skill.
Not just to the luxuries of life, like music, does this apply, but to the very basics, like time itself. For a millennium and more, Irish people have listened spellbound to stories of The Land of Youth - Tir na nOg - with their message that to attempt to go beyond our natural sphere of space and time can end only in disappointment and ultimate disaster."
I literally couldn't put the book down until I'd finished it.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Duijera Dubh
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Mick Quinn, Martins uncle, is one of the best around. Regular visitor to Leitrim for week/weekends in Drumshanbo (Joe Mooney/Packie Duignan) and Drumkeerin (John McKenna).
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by the blue eyed rascal
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Max Bygraves was the king. "I wanna tell you a story".
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by bodhran bliss
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
I'm sure that every area has its share of good tellers of stories in the form of recitations, and there are many great recitations out there. Apart from playing music I specialize in reciting and made a CD of recitations which I set to music about four years ago, Although at the time I got air play on local radio the trouble with trying to get play on National Radio with something like that is the length of each recitation. Some can be up to six minutes long, and unlike a song it ruins it if it is shortened. A good reciter should be able to act out the story same as an actor, and without getting stuck for the words. Unless requested otherwise, you should try and avoid doing the same recitation every time you are called. Take a recitation like 'The Little Pub in London' It's been flogged to death by all and sundry. I'd try and avoid it like the plaque.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Free Reed
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Oh I want to hear a storyteller at a session now!!!!
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by An Kammneves
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Toronto can boast of Jonathan Lynn (ex Killkenny), more of a cross between a recitationist and a storyteller but he's the best I've ever seen. He pops into our sessions cery regularly and can always be called on for a piece.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Patkiwi
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
"avoid it like the plaque"
... Intentional or not, I love it Free Reed. A modern spin on an old expression, and bound to go down well with dentists and cardioligists everywhere.
I've never heard a story (other than gossip) or a recitation at a pub session, but we have a Dublin man here who sometimes interjects a few verses during a party-with-tunes, and it's great.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by grego
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
I recently ran across a book in a local bookstore about storytelling in Fermanagh. Looked interesting and comes with a companion CD of stories and songs.
http://www.iupress.indiana.edu/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=22863
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by jasonb
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
I'm delighted there are some wise people out there collecting the stories and thank goodness the Eddie Lenihan's book is still available at a quick Google.
http://www.amazon.com/Meeting-Other-Crowd-Eddie-Lenihan/dp/1585422061
Are there other story tellers in sessions out there? Why are there so few now?
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by gtag
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
I would imagine the lack of storytellers is down to the session mentality which prevails ,in my experience, at least in the North of Ireland, inasmuch as that not only story tellers but singers are avoided like the plague by those who wish only to batter out reels and jigs at two hundred miles an hour all night and day.I have seen such players get up and leave a session where singing or a local character telling a story has disturbed their diddley -dee monopoly and start up what they call a "musicians only ",session a short pub crawl away.I hope its not like that everywhere.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by cos
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Grego ... Well spotted. I wish I had you instead of my 'spell check'. It can't tell the difference between 'Bio film on teeth' and ' Red spots on the face, vomiting blood, aching limbs, and terrible pains. 'and of course there is no second chance on here.
# Posted on July 30th 2008 by Free Reed
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Sounds like another example of compartmentalisation of the genre (and a lot of other social activities) - music separated from the dancing, story-telling and singing separated from the sessions. Things taken from their original social context and set up as specialisations in themselves without the other components. It's going to happen, just the way of the world by the look of it.
We will need to buy separate CDs for jigs, reels, etc, etc, sean nos singing, sean nos dancing, ballad (non sean nos) singing...there'll be no end to it!!!
Until CDs become obsolete that is, and we all have to download off the net...then we can argue about bits, bytes, storage formats and operating systems and which combination of those makes the music sound better.
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by Duijera Dubh
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
eddie came in to our 2 class room school when i was 8.he told us two stories and we begged and begged him to tell another against the restraints of our rather wicked bitch of a teacher...fair play to him he told us another one and then listened to our stories we learned from our grannies....he is a great guy....
des mulkere from clare is fecking mighty at telling the owl yarn...
a session needs the story and the song..for a session to breath at rest it needs to be a night of celebration.everyone in the venue and those in your head needs to be enjoying everything going on.....
if people start getting thick and talking amung them selves.then decide to set up down the road ....well let them off to feck.....when they have fecked off and brought there bullsh*t with them youll get different people calling in to your session........and better it will get...
it takes the whole pub to make a session the landlord is important too...youll always remember a bad one....but no 2 or 3 musicians can tell people not to sing or tell astory or a poem....
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by bud an asal
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
That's one way round it, bud an asal, for sure.
What was the story about that Eddie was telling?
It's amazing that you can still hear the daoine maith stories even today still, at least in Clare, I believe.
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by Duijera Dubh
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
The late John Campbell from Mullachbán, South Armagh was probably the best - he didn't perform as a story teller, it was just the way he was and communicated. Mick Quinn, John's best friend also from Mullachbán is probably the best around today though he is in his 80's but as fit and young as ever. His song about the Newry man who shot and injured his dog for 'visiting' his pedgree is hilarous. Unfortunately Mick got 50 stitches the other week after his friends dog bit him We all wish him a speedy recovery - I predict another song in the making!!!
# Posted on July 31st 2008 by iwerzon
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Yes indeed a great one written by Mick Quinn and part of my own repitore. May be the odd word different but we all put our own stamp on these great recitations. A Nuck incidentally is a Thief.
The Man who shot the dog
I was born a collie sheepdog, with a white ring round me neck
And for nine days me eyes were closed and I couldn’t see a speck
I had four lovely sisters me being the only boy
And for six weeks we played around, our mother’s pride and joy
Till a gentleman from Mullacban, to me a liken took
Held me in his arms, then me master’s hand he shook
He put me in his motor car, and we started for the road
And in less than twenty minutes I was in my new abode
Well the first thing my new family did was to look for me a name
And they called me this and they called me that, but it sounded all the same
Till my master he came round the house and this to me he said:
“Consider yourself now a dog, and sport you’re name is Ned.”
Well my one great distinction was, I had a bunty tail
And I wagged it for my master, as we walked o’er hill and dale
And we rounded sheep and cattle and sometimes a nanny goat
And me master often threatened that he’d cut my flaming throat.
Well the months went by, and I grew up and I learned to do me chores
And I growled at postmen and at soldiers, and likewise the man next door.
O he loved to see me working, he said I was a treat
And before I got into the car, I always washed my feet.
But sometimes dogs gets lonesome and I longed to have a pal
And I met a great big Labrador, and she said her name was Sal
And she said that she was lonesome too, that she had a pedigree
Well I says; “That aint a problem Sal, you just leave that to me”
When her master overheard the news and found out with her I’d slept
We didn’t use protection so out across the fence he leapt’
Saying; “Ya bunty tailed black so and so from beyond in Conway Park
I’ll stop your gallivanting around my house after dark
He put his gun up to his shoulder, a careful aim he took
The noise that came out of it, the valley round it shook
And I felt me hide a burning, as the bullets tore my head
And the woman says; “He shot that dog that belongs to Mick and Ned.
When me master he did hear the shots and it happened just be luck
He stepped up to the gunman and he says “ Ya Newry Nuck”
And he let him have the one two three up in the auld faceog
Saying “that’s the medicine I’ll dish out to any man who’d shoot me dog
Well he brought me to my kennel and now on the straw I lie
And I hear the neighbours asking ‘Will poor Ned live or die’
I’m getting great attention for me body’s full of lead
And for the first time in my life I get me breakfast here in bed
But me master’s all forlorn and he sits and strokes me head
And he searchs round me body for those little balls of lead
And he’s using awful language as he sits there on the log
And these are some of the things he says about the man that shot his dog
May his scabs like crabs grow up in slabs around everything he feels
And green snotters flow down to his toes and hacks come on his heels
May his hair fall out, may his woman pout, may his fart smell like a hog
And the divil’s luck fall on that Newry Nuck, the man that shot the dog.
May piles surround his big back side like strawberries on their stalks
And every time that he lifts his gun that his stomach it may bark
And as he goes a hunting o’er heather, hills or bog
May the diarrhoea skite with all it’s might from the man that shot me dog
Well to conclude and finish, I am on all fours once more
And I feel an urge coming over me that did one day before
And I’ll slip out some dark evening in the mist or the thick fog
And I’ll leave another half a dozen pups with the man that shot the dog.
# Posted on August 1st 2008 by Free Reed
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Of course the word is 'Repertoire' you clown. There are times I wish I paid more attention at school.
# Posted on August 1st 2008 by Free Reed
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Great! Wouldn't mind a few more recitation or stories. Any more Free Reed or anyone else?
# Posted on August 2nd 2008 by gtag
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
Heard Mick Quinn was in the audience at a Martin Hayes Denis Cahill Gig recently in Market Place Theatre Armagh last week,on spotting him they invited him up on stage and he entertained a full house!
# Posted on August 7th 2008 by dílis
Re: Where are the story tellers gone?
There's a Frenchman named Jean (I don't know his surname) living in East Clare (Broadford?) who tells stories and does recitations at sessions at Peppers and Shortt's (and perhaps other sessions in the area).
# Posted on August 7th 2008 by GaryAMartin