A major part of the tradition is the way the music passes down from generation to generation. Those of you who saw the TG4 awards recently would have witnessed musician of the year Noel Hill playing with his daughter Aisling.
The way Irish music passes through families is a big part of the new Steeple Sessions series at the Unitarian church. For instance this Tuesday the great piping family the McKeowns, Gay, Seán and Conor are perfomring in a double concert with brother and sister Saileog Ní Cheannabháin and Eoghan Ó Cheannabháin.
Future family based concerts at the Steeple Sessions include The Diamond family, Deremy, Tara, Danny and Helen and the O'Brien family Mick, Cormac and Ciara.
So what's the question you may ask?
Well, what do you all think about the idea of concerts featuring family members? Do you enjoy the idea of seeing the how the music is passed on in concert or do you view it as a form of nepotism? Are there too many family connections in trad or is it just a beautiful part of the tradition?
I think it is a great concept for a concert series and it shows how the musicians in the family interact with one another and how the younger learn from the older. And the family that plays together stays together. It's a runner from my perspective.
What about Comhaltas , they are passing on aversion of tradtional music, but bringing a cpmpetitve attitude to the music, they are homeogeonising and encouraging a certain style through their marking system.
Comhaltas mothers are a phenemonen, sometimes pushing their children to play, I dont think that is a beautiful part of the tradition.
It depends on how good the offspring are.
And don't forget that 'tradition' works in both directions. It doesn't matter how old or which generation, we learn from -- trade with -- each other.
"Nepotism" doesn't come into it. One of the things I've always liked about this music is that you can sit and play the same music with an 80-year old concertina player on one side of you, and a 12-year old fiddler on the other. That's happened to me many times in Ireland.
Kenny nailed it...One of the many beauties of this music...In how many other genres does this happen, where age, gender and status etc. are rendered largely irrelevant?. Lovely.
I don't think Kenny's description of mixed ages excludes nepotism. And while I am not saying there's a lot of that, I am regularly in the company of people who, as I described it to a friends once, have been playing together for three generations. There is a corner that is full of shared experiences, shared memories and unspoken understandings that is not accessible to people who have not grown up in the same circle. There's a bit of nepotism out there too and you encounter it sometimes, not too often though.
"Kenny nailed it...One of the many beauties of this music...In how many other genres does this happen, where age, gender and status etc. are rendered largely irrelevant?"
Aye, those things are irrelevant, but then other things are which can make trad music as much of a morass of politics as anything else.
I think it is great to involve families--my son has no interest, but my granddaughter has expressed an interest in both whistle and fiddle, and we are just waiting for her to get a little older to get her started, as she just turned six, and her hands are still a bit small.
Well, the McPeakes were playing concerts sixty years ago, so this is by no means something new.
For much of its lifetime, I guess, Ireland's traditional music has been centred around the home turf (whether it was a family's own home, a neighbour's kitchen or somewhere else close at hand in the townland).
Families have been major features in the music of the last hundred years. Think of the Begleys, the Keanes (x 2 or 3), the O'Briens, the Rowsomes, the McNamaras and Mac Namaras, the McDonaghs, the Blacks, the Russells, the Hernons, the McCarthys, the Shannons, the McSherrys, the Cartys, and, currently, the Wards of Drumshanbo. The list is almost endless.
Like many other things, however, the family heritage has been diluted by the easy accessibility of CDs, MP3s and YouTube videos, but there's still a sense in which, as the old Spirit album called it, the family which plays together stays together.
I especially enjoyed this parapraxis 'What about Comhaltas , they are passing on aversion of tradtional music.'
"Music tends to run in families the same way that speaking French does." -- Daniel Leviton.
As far as the competitions go, I don't have any opinion on that wrt Irish trad. But in Highland piping it's the norm, and there seems to be a bit of good that comes from it. One thing that you can definitely say about competition is it causes change -- if there are 10 people in a contest, then one of them is the winner, and the other 9 go home and figure out what they're going to do differently next time.
Some people like to think of "the tradition" as some kind of holy institution, but how long have formal concerts been part of the tradition. Or pub sessions. :shrugs:
"As far as the competitions go, I don't have any opinion on that wrt Irish trad. But in Highland piping it's the norm, and there seems to be a bit of good that comes from it. One thing that you can definitely say about competition is it causes change -- if there are 10 people in a contest, then one of them is the winner, and the other 9 go home and figure out what they're going to do differently next time."
The problem with that is, that as you say, the competitors go home , figure out what they think the judge likes, they come back the next year and play in a way that they think will win them the competition.
What they should be doing is playing in a style that they like.they should not be playing in a style just because they think it might win them a competition.
Passing down the tradition
Passing down the tradition
A major part of the tradition is the way the music passes down from generation to generation. Those of you who saw the TG4 awards recently would have witnessed musician of the year Noel Hill playing with his daughter Aisling.
The way Irish music passes through families is a big part of the new Steeple Sessions series at the Unitarian church. For instance this Tuesday the great piping family the McKeowns, Gay, Seán and Conor are perfomring in a double concert with brother and sister Saileog Ní Cheannabháin and Eoghan Ó Cheannabháin.
Future family based concerts at the Steeple Sessions include The Diamond family, Deremy, Tara, Danny and Helen and the O'Brien family Mick, Cormac and Ciara.
So what's the question you may ask?
Well, what do you all think about the idea of concerts featuring family members? Do you enjoy the idea of seeing the how the music is passed on in concert or do you view it as a form of nepotism? Are there too many family connections in trad or is it just a beautiful part of the tradition?
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by steeplesessions
Re: Passing down the tradition
I think it is a great concept for a concert series and it shows how the musicians in the family interact with one another and how the younger learn from the older. And the family that plays together stays together. It's a runner from my perspective.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by clareman
Re: Passing down the tradition
What about Comhaltas , they are passing on aversion of tradtional music, but bringing a cpmpetitve attitude to the music, they are homeogeonising and encouraging a certain style through their marking system.
Comhaltas mothers are a phenemonen, sometimes pushing their children to play, I dont think that is a beautiful part of the tradition.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by Nicholas Jelinek
Re: Passing down the tradition
It depends on how good the offspring are.
And don't forget that 'tradition' works in both directions. It doesn't matter how old or which generation, we learn from -- trade with -- each other.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by gam
Re: Passing down the tradition
I think your list and examples like the Mulcahy family make your argument.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by stoneboy2
Re: Passing down the tradition
Nepotism? They're hardly being shepherded into the corridors of power now are they?
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by Dragut Reis
Re: Passing down the tradition
"Nepotism" doesn't come into it. One of the things I've always liked about this music is that you can sit and play the same music with an 80-year old concertina player on one side of you, and a 12-year old fiddler on the other. That's happened to me many times in Ireland.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by Kenny
Re: Passing down the tradition
"There was always music in our house" - how jealous I am when I hear someone say that!
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by RockyRoader
Re: Passing down the tradition
Kenny nailed it...One of the many beauties of this music...In how many other genres does this happen, where age, gender and status etc. are rendered largely irrelevant?. Lovely.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by laguacamaya
Re: Passing down the tradition
I don't think Kenny's description of mixed ages excludes nepotism. And while I am not saying there's a lot of that, I am regularly in the company of people who, as I described it to a friends once, have been playing together for three generations. There is a corner that is full of shared experiences, shared memories and unspoken understandings that is not accessible to people who have not grown up in the same circle. There's a bit of nepotism out there too and you encounter it sometimes, not too often though.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by Prof. Prlwytzkofski
Re: Passing down the tradition
"Kenny nailed it...One of the many beauties of this music...In how many other genres does this happen, where age, gender and status etc. are rendered largely irrelevant?"
Aye, those things are irrelevant, but then other things are which can make trad music as much of a morass of politics as anything else.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by DrSilverSpear
Re: Passing down the tradition
I think it is great to involve families--my son has no interest, but my granddaughter has expressed an interest in both whistle and fiddle, and we are just waiting for her to get a little older to get her started, as she just turned six, and her hands are still a bit small.
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by AlBrown
Re: Passing down the tradition
Well, the McPeakes were playing concerts sixty years ago, so this is by no means something new.
For much of its lifetime, I guess, Ireland's traditional music has been centred around the home turf (whether it was a family's own home, a neighbour's kitchen or somewhere else close at hand in the townland).
Families have been major features in the music of the last hundred years. Think of the Begleys, the Keanes (x 2 or 3), the O'Briens, the Rowsomes, the McNamaras and Mac Namaras, the McDonaghs, the Blacks, the Russells, the Hernons, the McCarthys, the Shannons, the McSherrys, the Cartys, and, currently, the Wards of Drumshanbo. The list is almost endless.
Like many other things, however, the family heritage has been diluted by the easy accessibility of CDs, MP3s and YouTube videos, but there's still a sense in which, as the old Spirit album called it, the family which plays together stays together.
I especially enjoyed this parapraxis 'What about Comhaltas , they are passing on aversion of tradtional music.'
# Posted on May 14th 2011 by MacCruiskeen
Re: Passing down the tradition
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ga4qocQkH0A
# Posted on May 15th 2011 by ...
Re: Passing down the tradition
"Music tends to run in families the same way that speaking French does." -- Daniel Leviton.
As far as the competitions go, I don't have any opinion on that wrt Irish trad. But in Highland piping it's the norm, and there seems to be a bit of good that comes from it. One thing that you can definitely say about competition is it causes change -- if there are 10 people in a contest, then one of them is the winner, and the other 9 go home and figure out what they're going to do differently next time.
Some people like to think of "the tradition" as some kind of holy institution, but how long have formal concerts been part of the tradition. Or pub sessions. :shrugs:
# Posted on May 15th 2011 by green whistler
Re: Passing down the tradition
"As far as the competitions go, I don't have any opinion on that wrt Irish trad. But in Highland piping it's the norm, and there seems to be a bit of good that comes from it. One thing that you can definitely say about competition is it causes change -- if there are 10 people in a contest, then one of them is the winner, and the other 9 go home and figure out what they're going to do differently next time."
The problem with that is, that as you say, the competitors go home , figure out what they think the judge likes, they come back the next year and play in a way that they think will win them the competition.
What they should be doing is playing in a style that they like.they should not be playing in a style just because they think it might win them a competition.
# Posted on May 15th 2011 by Nicholas Jelinek