How to start… Posting on Facebook is sometimes a strange experience, as while it is often a public bulletin board of our stuff and events, it is also a place of shameless self promotion, political agenda, videos of cats and dogs, and now people dumping ice cubes on their heads for a good cause. well, this is certainly a self-serving meandering that can only happen when you are in Ireland for 2 weeks, and in the middle of that adventure. There are a few truths about this land that I hold to: -if the Irish tell you you are great, it is probably true. -if the Irish tell you anything less, it is also true! I spent 4 hours in the car today listening to RTE radio and heard: Scarlatti, Ravel, trad, jazz, folk, Monterverdi, Dvorak, Bach. Decided to visit the town that my Irish grandmother was born, Moylough, co Galway, and was met with a number of surprises… First, I have not been back there in 4 years, since my cousin Tom and his wife Noni died. Now, you have to realize that I met them both in 2002 through the friendship of Liam Lawton and Sean McHugh(from Moylough), and once Tom knew that I wasnt there to claim the farm, I was welcomed onto the land that bore my grandmother….Tom would come to every mass and concert that I gave in Ireland that he could drive to for all of that time until his death. He would send me and my family cards filled with living shamrocks throughout the year…..this is something that everyone should get in the mail! Tom Tully bought himself a CD player so he could play my music for anyone who entered his home. So, today, I pulled up to the front of the family home in rural Galway off the Roscommon road, and turned the radio back on just before arriving at my destination……and RTE decided to play the second movement of The Beethoven 7th……………. Well, this is my favorite symphony of LVB, and the 2nd mvmt is sheer heaven……and it helped mw deal with the fact that this place was now going to change. The house was overgrown, and a road was being built through the 75 acres that was the farm. While standing beside the road, a tractor approached-a common sight in rural Ireland-and I hailed the driver to stop. I asked, Did you know the Tullys? And as the words were formed, I realized how foolish they were, because tractors on rural roads pass the same homes and farms for many years. And as I then suspected, the tractor man and my cousin were close friends. When He heard my name, he said, You are the musician from the states….. He always talked about you! Ireland is called the land of welcomes. It is many things to me, but it is a place of vibrant living, colors, conversation, music, and deep spirituality. At my friends house tonight, I had to celebrate the day by making pasta with steak, peppers, mushrooms, a great French wine, and continue the smorgasbord of music with Sinatra and Hendrix-Electric Ladyland-Voodoo Child! Tomorrow is a day of recording great trad playing on a new project of mine, with Ciaran Somers, Gerard Moloney, and Dave Sheridan. ON friday I head back to the north for a concert, a workshop, masses, and then back down to Dublin for more of the same. Heaven on earth!
Posted on: Wed, 20 Aug 2014 19:47:53 +0000
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