Looking forward to a lovely night of tunes in Friels Lynchs Pub tomorrow night. Playing with Sorcha Curtin (concertina) and Caroline Tubridy (fiddle/concertina) and anyone else who might drop in to us! Check out Miltown Malbay too; http://www.westclare.net/miltown.htm – and – http://www.clare.ie/place/miltown-malbay/
https://www.facebook.com/Wilsons.Friels
Mike Coffey and Sorcha Curtin
Happy birthday Jimmy! I have enjoyed this past year and a half playing in Cruises with you and all our friends – old and new!! I have two reels written for you – hope you like them! 😉 Don’t worry – I don’t expect you to learn them overnight! Plenty of time for that. (I’ll post them here next week for musicians interested)
Join us any Thurs in Cruises from 8:30pm…..here is a taste of last week!
Great photo by Patrick Keating of Satoshi doing his sean-nós steps!
Lovely black and white by Patrick Keating of Andy Lambert and Áine Heslin.
Lovely black and white photo by Patrick Keating of his son Pat and also Paula O’ Regan on fiddles.
Great black and white shot of Paula O’ Regan, fiddle and Michael Coffey on whistle! Photo by Patrick Keating.
Patrick Keating took this lovely photo of Mary Caldwell in conversation with Satoshi Aoki – planning a sean-nós dance? 🙂
Colm Nestor, Michael Coffey and Bernie Kirwin playing for Satoshi Aoki and Mary Caldwell sean-nós dancing. Photo by Andy Lambert.
Jimmy Clancy on accordion, Hannah on fiddle, Patrick Keating on accordion and Pat Keating on fiddle.
Mary Caldwell on accordion.
Colm Nestor on flute and Pat Keating on fiddle.
There is a fine video clip of our sean-nós dancers – taken by Colm Nestor!
Cruises Bar in Ennis (https://www.facebook.com/cruises.bar/) hosts our seisiún every Thurs night at 8:30pm (Come in on 20th!) and I usually have some photos from the previous week to show – don’t always show everybody (Colm was gone again by the time the snaps were happening) Long post ahead warning!!
What a sad time for my friend Frank Corr over from Reading, whose mum passed away the previous week in Shannon. His brothers and spouses brought him in to the session so that he could be with us and he sang a beautiful rendition of ‘A mother’s love is a blessing’. He shared many great tunes with us over the night and we were delighted to have the Corr family with us.
Also, a musician who joined our seisiún last year pledged to return and true to her word, Lillie arrived last Thursday. Lillie is an artist as well as a fiddler and was running a workshop in Listowel with a friend. She has an exhibition starting THIS VERY FRIDAY there! Check it all out on https://www.facebook.com/LillieMorrisFineArt/?pnref=lhc.
Our very good friends Bill and Betty Connor returned once again before they head back to the States (Seattle) and we shared more good tunes and laughs too! Bill will be immersed in the flute workshop https://www.facebook.com/cruinniunabhfliuit/?hc_ref=SEARCH&fref=nf as we read this post!! Betty was joking that she might come up to our seisiún but that’s a BIT of a journey…..!!
Bill on flute and Lillie dancing ‘Shoe the Donkey’ with step-dancer Michael who came up with his wife and Lillie from Listowel to the session. He also danced a hornpipe later!
Bill Connor on my left and Betty Connor on my right! Thanks for six mths of new friendship you guys – Jimmy enjoyed your company too.
Lillie Hardy Morris, artist/fiddle player from Georgia.
We welcomed back our friend Patsy Hanrahan who, at the end of the night gave Paula and myself a lovely gift each of handmade crotchet gloves (Patsy had been busy during her time away!!) Photo incl. below.
Had to take a picture of these beautiful gloves made by our friend Patsy!
Here are some photos. Paula, Satoshi, Michael and Colm rejoined us – Bernie and John I think had not been before..but hopefully will return!
Betty and Bill Connor on fiddle and flute, John Moloney on banjo and Michael McGrath, accordion
Paula O’ Regan on fiddle.
Betty sang beautifully ‘Irish ways and Irish laws’ a favourite of mine!
Frank Corr on banjo (borrowed from our mutual friend Pat Costello, thanks Pat)
Patsy Hanrahan on piano accordion.
Lillie Hardy Morris from Georgia on fiddle
Michael McGrath, my friend from Ballynacally Bernie Kirwin on flute and Satoshi Aoki also on flute! Great night. Missing from this photo – Colm Nestor on flute.
Was very happy during the night to play my two reels ‘Mairéad’s Paradise’ (written a few years ago especially for Mairéad) and Orla’s Intent!’ (written for our mutual friend Orla Coughlan) and it’s always great to hear the tunes on instruments other than my own! Having awesome times in the seisiún in Cruises, Ennis – where sometimes as many as six musicians are playing a couple of my tunes!! Don’t know how to react but I try to thank everybody. 🙂 Happy days! Happy out! (Ps these tunes and more on my album ‘The Tunes Foundry’ which can be purchased on this site if you are curious – grateful for all purchases)
Matt Heslin singing at Easter seisiún at Madigan’s, Doonbeg.
Mairéad Considine playing mighty tunes!
Delighted to have Tara O’ Malley join us in Madigan’s, Doonbeg
Áine with Mairéad Considine on concertina at Madigan’s Doonbeg.
Photos of Easter Saturday seisiún in Madigan’s, Doonbeg with Mairéad Considine, Matt and Áine Heslin and joined by Tara O’ Malley.
Join us in Doonbeg, this great little village in Co Clare, for a seisiún and some songs on Saturday night in Madigans Bar. Marty, Emily and family always have a warm welcome for visiting musicians. With Mairéad Considine on concertina, myself on flute and Matt Heslin on guitar/vocals – the tunes will be hoppin’! Looking forward to Easter! 😉
https://www.facebook.com/Madigans-Doonbeg-113455898988530/
Join us at Cruises again – 8:30pm in the Bar. Jimmy Clancy on accordion, myself on flute and always a nice collection of visiting musicians for this open seisiún. (Have already heard from a couple of returning visitors).
For the last couple of weeks we’ve had the company of Colm Nestor and though he was gone before the photos were taken – I’m sure I have one somewhere…! Also, Bill and Betty from Seattle who have nearly spent 6mths in Ireland soaking up the traditional music and uniting with relatives of Bill’s – came in for one of their last visits. (Betty took a few lovely photos too!) Andy Lambert was with us before going on a tour with a Galician group ‘A Gramola’. He sent me some nice photos too. Paula O’ Regan joined and I reminisced on some tunes we had learned as youngsters eg; Star of Munster jig into reel and another old jig into reel that the name escapes me…sorry. We played Tripping Down the Stairs as a jig into reel (the jig of which I’ve recently picked up from Paula) – great fun!! Jimmy and Colm steered us through a host of old Kilfinora tunes and stories too which was lovely!
Satoshi was with us again too this week on flute and once again stepped it out on the floor with his sean-nós dancing! The tinwhistle was brought out this week too. So, onto this week and whatever comes…. can’t wait!
Satoshi stepping it out with Bill Connor on flute and Paula O’ Regan on fiddle. Photo by Andy Lambert.
Bill Connor on flute, Paula O’ Regan on concertina and Betty Connor on fiddle. Photo by Andy Lambert.
Áine Heslin, flute, Paula O’ Regan on fiddle, Jimmy Clancy on tinwhistle and Bill Connor on flute. Photo by Andy Lambert.
Áine Heslin on flute with Paula O’ Regan on fiddle. Photo by Betty Connor.
Paula O’ Regan on fiddle and Jimmy Clancy on tinwhistle. Photo by Betty Connor.
Áine, Jimmy, Bill, Patrick, Jerry and Colm. Previous week’s photo for Colm playing flute (front of picture!!) 😉
I must admit that I don’t speak enough Irish – I’d like to do more but…I’ll get there. Was helping my son with his Irish spellings last week and was reminded of the names of the months!! (My musician/teacher friends are tutting as they read this.);) So this Thurs with Jimmy Clancy on accordion and whichever of our regular visitors (we might have some new musicians again) beidh an craic againn! (We’ll have the craic) Drop in to us. Open seisiún.
Pat Keating.
Pat Keating, accordion and Satoshi Aoki, flute and sean-nós dancing.
Pat Keating (Jnr), fiddle and Pat Keating (Snr), accordion.
Jimmy Clancy, accordion and Pat Keating, fiddle.
Jimmy had his accordion tuned last week by Brendan Mulhaire and when we played at Cruises I heard the lovely new tone that he had given it – Jimmy was adamant that he wanted the box to sound well with a flute – and so it did! Amazing. We had some lovely sean-nós dancing from Satoshi at the end of the evening too.
Hi again – it’s time for a session in Cruises Bar, Ennis from 8:30pm Thurs.
Some photos from last Thurs – we had more new visitors along with a few of our more regular participants – Aongus on pipes from Limerick originally but now residing in Belgium and Vincent on accordion from Holland.
Satoshi Aoki
Vincent (Holland), Michael McGrath and Aongus (Limerick/Belgium)
Also (but not in the photos this week) Paula O’Regan, Jimmy Clancy and myself.
The story behind this jig!
Thurs 16th Feb my good friend Paula (O Regan – Clare fiddle player) came into our session and was looking pensive. She was after doing her leading of the adult slow session in Ciarán’s pub and as usual came over to ours for the last few tunes. (We love to see her come in the door) Well, it turns out she had heard just 10mins before her session in Ciarán’s was due to start, that her little dog Casper (who was 10yrs old – a gorgeous, happy little dog) had eaten poison somewhere and had just died at the vet’s! Paula had bravely decided to go ahead with leading the session even though she was of course, gutted. 😦
Her generosity to her fellow musicians (and her good spirits every other night!!) lead me to offer to write a tune for Casper, and Paula was gracious enough to accept that night. I asked her to send me her beautiful photo of Casper and to tell me what type of a tune she would like. I wasn’t surprised when she said a jig – jigs are her favourite! Happy or sad? – ‘Happy’.
This jig is the one I composed for Casper but, the edited version, as I was unhappy with it for a week until I tweaked it. I hope everyone enjoys it! Play it for Casper!
(I appreciate Paula’s allowing me to write this account!)
Paula has begun composing tunes herself so watch out for these in the future.
Paula and her dog Casper!
Aine Heslin Music 
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