Author: peadar

This was a tune composed for the TG4 awards ceremony as mentioned already in relation to the TG4 reel. At the press launch of the announcement of the awards we were all paraded out in Ennis in Clare. My wife is from Gleann Draoi between Tulla and Feakle and many of her family and our Clare friends were present. There is a certain sound that I associate with East Clare and in particular I would be thinking if old friends Paddy Canny and P. Joe Hayes, uncle and father of Martin. So that is the source of the melodic and tonality quality of that tune. I was delighted to hear it fit Martin’s playing so well but then a master musician can make a slave of any tune and Martin is surely a master of music and fiddle.

I recorded the tune with Martin Hayes and Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh on the Triúr album.  

Price: €15.00

Download the pdf here.

John the Rookery Ó Ríordáin was an older friend of mine from Doirín Aluinn across the river from our house. He was from an old family stock, rich in indigenous knowledge and culture. He was a farmer with a great interest in breeding horses. Not alone was he a good historian but was also a kind of “fear feasa” or wise man of all things related to our environment and culture. A car accidentally killed him in 2004. This tune came to me thinking of him leading his horses and the peculiar rhythm the horse makes as he walks on the road.

I recorded the tune with Martin Hayes and Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh on the Triúr album.  

Price: €15.00

You will find the score/dots/music notation here

TG4 is an Irish television station of which I am very fond and proud of as it broadcasts mainly in the Irish language and we all took part, for many years, in a campaign to get it founded and off the ground. It has a form of “Oscars” for the Irish traditional music scene as part of its yearly schedule. In 2008 I was presented with the award as composer of the year. I was really surprised at my reaction to the award and was delighted. I think that, in spite of always denying that I lived under my fathers shadow but, rather lived under his ‘sunshine’, I probably felt that other people did not agree with me. This award was a flag risen to my independence in this instance. I put two tunes together for the occasion as I always try to have something new for any major outing. By calling this the TG4 reel I hoped to repay their kindness in a small way. The second tune had no name so I called it…..’n’fheadar’ (‘I don’t know’)

I recorded the tune with Martin Hayes and Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh on the Triúr album.  

Price: €15.00

Download the pdf here.

My father used to play the piano for us in the evenings before we would retire to bed. He would play “characters” or people whom we knew and we would have to guess who it was form the musical lines, colors and rhythms. This sort of “storytelling” through music is a much older form of indigenous Irish Music and parallels our habits in story telling and such. It is quite different in structure to the European model, which is subject A, subject B followed by development, crises, catharses and resolution. The Irish model is not restricted in the number of subjects and is cyclical in nature. An Laoch Ó loinsigh was such a piece I had strung together describing a day in the footballing life of my local hero Anthony Lynch, the Cork footballer. He is a good lad, gentle and kind and well grounded in his local culture, which is one of the sources of his spirit on field of play where he turns into a fearless defender. This tune is part of that sequence. The complete piece is on a cd that both my good friend, Seån Ó Sé and I published under the name ‘Ó Cúm Thóla go Cúil Aodha’ in 2008.

Recorded on the Triúr album.  

Price: €15.00

Also on "Ó Cúm Thóla go Cúil Aodha" with Seán Ó Sé.  

Price: €15.00

 

Download the pdf here.