Arts and Entertainment
While the area folk/traditional music scene (like pretty much all other music scenes) remains under quarantine, there are two special “virtual” events this month of interest to Irish/Celtic fans.
The popular Massachusetts Fiddle Hell, an annual gathering... Read more
Molly Pinto Madigan can’t tell you exactly when or how she first came across the centuries-old Scottish folk ballad “Tam Lin.” All she knows is, it has occupied a pretty large part of her life since then.
Madigan, a singer-songwriter from Salem, has... Read more
The Coronas, “True Love Waits” • Sure, go ahead and crack jokes about The Most Dubious Band Name of 2020 – no doubt The Coronas have heard them all. In fact, one of its members, guitarist Danny O’Reilly, was quoted as saying, “I’d swap ‘The Coronas’ with... Read more
It’s a somewhat improbable combination of voices: West Country English, Scottish/Orkney Islands, and west suburban Boston.
But this blend works just fine for the Anglo-Celtic folk trio Bellwether, which formed in Boston last year and has played several... Read more
Outside of the larger-than-life figure of Patrick Kavanagh (1904-1967), Co. Monaghan has produced only a handful of poets whose work is known and read widely. The most notable of these include Mary O’Donnell and Aidan Rooney. Also a prolific writer of... Read more
Stephen Puleo
Voyage of Mercy
St. Martin’s Press
303 pages
By John Duff
A disease appears and quickly wreaks havoc on all it reaches. Governments situated to respond to the plight of their citizens do so slowly and ineffectively. News of the plight... Read more
Hannah Harris, “Tea for Tunes” • A native and resident of Michigan who – you may have heard this one before – started out as a classical violinist but became enamored of Irish fiddling enough to make it the focus of her music. She wound up at University... Read more
There are bands that can hardly wait to make an album. The ink is barely dry on their business cards, the official website is freshly uploaded, they’ve only just worked out a practice schedule, and they’re already making the rounds of recording studios to... Read more
The concert film that Irish singer Cara Dillon and her husband and musical partner Sam Lakeman debuted online on Aug. 13 represented more than the culmination of a project. It was catharsis.
Like many, Dillon and Lakeman have endured frustrations and... Read more
The concert film that Irish singer Cara Dillon and her husband and musical partner Sam Lakeman debuted online on Aug. 13 represented more than the culmination of a project. It was catharsis.
Like many, Dillon and Lakeman have endured frustrations and... Read more
Like any number of Celtic musicians – and practically just about everyone else, for that matter – Boston-area native Katie McNally has had to significantly scale back the plans she made for this year.
For McNally, who grew up in Westford and lived in... Read more
Kern, “The Left and the Leaving” • An inherently strong sense of place, combined with a blended musical purposefulness, helped County Louth trio Kern’s 2016 debut album, “False Deceiver,” garner acclaim. That’s how it is when you have Barry Kieran (fiddle... Read more
Call it the first few steps on the long road back. On July 10 and 11, the Irish Cultural Centre of New England in Canton featured live music in its outdoor dining area, the first time the ICC had had flesh-and-blood musicians – as opposed to those... Read more
Tuesday, July 14, ICCNE will present Irish singer Mary Culloty O'Sullivan, live on their Facebook Page. Starting at 7pm EST, go to http://www.irishculture.org/ to enjoy this wonderful performance.
by Sean SmithSpecial to BostonIrish.com
It has been a tough spring for many Irish/Celtic musicians, their performance and teaching schedules decimated by the COVID-19 pandemic — and the summer doesn’t look to be much better.
But a recently launched online... Read more
Nestled in the northeast corner of Jamaica Plain, right near the Angell Animal Medical Center, the Brendan Behan Pub prides itself as a “cozy gathering place.” Its website prominently displays a quote from the namesake Irish author and legendary raconteur... Read more
Marla Fibish, “The Bright Hollow Fog” • Fibish is highly regarded for her playing of Irish traditional music on mandolin, emphasizing the instrument’s qualities of tone and sustain over speed, with a superb ability to tease out ornaments and triplets. She... Read more
In 1938, the year before he died, preeminent Irish poet William Butler Yeats spelled out in his valedictory poem “Under Ben Bulben” explicit instructions for the epitaph he wished to have cut into the slab of local limestone that would mark his grave:
... Read more
Nestled in the northeast corner of Jamaica Plain, right near the Angell Animal Medical Center, the Brendan Behan Pub prides itself as a “cozy gathering place.” Its website prominently displays a quote from the namesake Irish author and legendary raconteur... Read more
Summer BCMFest – the warm-weather counterpart to the annual winter BCMFest (Boston Celtic Music Fest) – will take place in a virtual format on July 5 beginning at 7 p.m., featuring Cape Breton music by the Leland Martin Trio; Boston-area Irish musicians... Read more
