Jan/Feb 26 Round Up

There’s been a few live music outings in the early months of the year, so I have enough for a bit of a round up. But first, let’s get the weather out of the way.

Bhí Sé An Fhliuch

I’m continuing with my Gaeilge classes, so this is handy spot to drop a few phrases in. I could have said Bhí sé an fliuch above - it has been wet - but that would be incorrect, so putting ‘an’ in front of ‘fliuch’ makes it ‘very’.

It has seemed relentless at times, often for what seems like days at end. It has dominated conversations (Favourites include ‘The ground is saturated, the water has nowhere to go’ ‘Worse than last year, don’t ever remember it like this’ etc etc) and there have been floods and a lot of damage done. Part of me is worried about what we’re going to talk about when the weather turns. Which it will.

Apparently there was an American tourist in Market Street in Armagh last week standing under an umbrella. He asked a local school child going into the library if it always rained in Ireland. She replied she didn’t know, as she was only seven.

Here’s a few more:

Tá sé ag cur agus ag cur — It's raining and raining (lashing)

Tá sé ag stealladh báistí — It's pelting rain

Tá sé gaofar — It's windy

Tá sé scamallach — It's cloudy

Tá sé dorcha — It's dark/gloomy

Tá mé fliuch go craiceann — I'm soaked to the skin

Don’t say you don’t learn anything from my blog.

Books

Not a huge amount of reading over the past few weeks, for various boring reasons. Pico Iyer’s ‘Aflame’ was a suitable companion as I spent a few days in a valley in Wicklow after Xmas. I did finish the 800 page heavyweight ‘Lonesome Dove’ by Larry McMurty, a sprawling epic with unforgettable characters about two rangers leading a cattle drive across America.

More recently was ‘Flesh’ by David Szalay, the life story of István. Unsentimental but compelling, I found.

TV and Movies

In a sad sign of the times (as if we needed any more) our local cinema has closed. I realised this a few weeks ago when I went to book a ticket for ‘Hamnet’ - the closure had been mentioned in the local media but I didn’t think it would be so soon. I had to find other ways of watching Hamnet.

Obviously Jessie Buckley is deserving of every award coming her way. I was familiar with her after ‘Fargo’ and ‘The Lost daughter’ and knew she was good but this is something else altogether. She brings that wildness to Agnes, and she operates somewhere between heaven and earth. But it’s not airy or otherwordly - her grief and rawness are all too believable.

She deservedly has the headlines but I thought Mescal was compelling as Shakespeare. He’s really cornered the market on characters with quiet intensity, brooding and troubled. He’s one of those actors that doesn’t really need to speak many lines, and you can feel everything that goes on under the surface.

I was a big fan of the book, but even though I knew what was coming, the death scene and the aftermath really moved me. I was more surprised by my reaction to the ending - the idea of Shakespeare transforming his grief into something that would outlast everything. That really got me.

Small Prophets

Got into the habit of listening to music in the evening, so not as much TV, which is a good thing. Too much mediocre choice I think, and I often watch shows half heartedly. I did enjoy the first few seasons of ‘Industry’ but can’t get past the first episode of the new season, whilst ‘Knight of the Seven Kingdoms’ was a much more entertaining trip back to Westeros than I imagined it would be.

My favourite show this month was ‘Small Prophets’ from the writer and star of ‘The Detectorists’, Mackenzie Crook. Six episodes, 30 minutes long, it’s like an old school quirky comedy with a warm heart.

It’s about a guy called Michael Sleep, who has never got over his wife leaving him seven years earlier on Christmas Eve. A visit to his dad in the nursing home (Lovely turn from Michael Palin, who was also on the Tommy Tiernan show a few weeks back) gives him the mad notion of growing some homunculi, which as everyone knows are small prophesying spirits.

A mixture of the magical and mundane, this was a welcome antidote to the dark February evenings and the contents of the news.

Music

As mentioned earlier, lots of music for me the past few weeks. The local theatre is two minutes walk from my door, so I’m blessed to be so close. I’ve mentioned other artists appearing there before, but I’m pretty sure there’s been nobody as big as the first one I attended this year- the Belfast cowboy himself, Mr Van Morrison.

As I’m not on social media, it was only down to my eagle eyed sister that I was lucky enough to nab a ticket for this, along with my niece and mam. There was a huge demand for tickets, and they sold out quickly, as you’d expect for the chance to see someone as renowned as this locally, in a 400 seater venue.

He had a small band with him - drummer, couple of backing singers, lead and bass guitars, with a piano/organ player. For me they were pretty tight, and the sound itself was jazzy, bluesy, soul infused. As you’d expect for Van really.

The man himself - no words to the audience, behind shades, occasionally playing the saxophone and harmonica. His voice was in good nick for someone 80 years old.

Gotta say, I loved the show. There was a sprinkling of classics in there - he opened with my own personal favourite, ‘Into the Mystic’, and there was also ‘Baby please don’t go’ ‘Crazy Jane on God’, ‘Foreign Window’ and ‘Wild Night’. Also ended with a pumped up, elongated ‘Gloria’.

I really enjoyed some of the covers he did -Fat’s Domino’s ‘Ain’t that a shame’ among them, as well as John Lee Hookers ‘Think twice before you go’. I wasn’t aware of his own recent material, which we got a bit of. Hard to beat the old ones thought, and ‘Days like this’ was one of the highlights of the night.

Not so much for the band though - you could see him gesticulating to the drummer during ‘days’ and he seemed to want to finish it early. Also seemed to change up the setlist half way though, cue some mad running about from one of the crew, with pages flying around. I’d say you earn your corn in a Van Morrison band.

One of those pinch yourselves momments for me - seeing someone you’ve listened to for years playing beside your home in an intimate venue. Went home happy, as did everyone else it seemed.

Ruth McGinley

Only a week later I was back in the smaller studio theatre to see Ruth McGinley, one of Ireland’s leading pianists. Myself and my niece were lucky to get seats just left of centre, right behind her. (My niece had been to see Ruth before - back when she was a music student, she was the page turner; we noticed it’s done automatically on the Ipad now).

The first half was as the music of Philip Glass - wonderfully meditative and introspective. I got a lovely surprise when she said the second half would be something different - music from two well known Jazz composers.

The performances were two I’ve gotten to know well over recent months - Bill Evans and Keith Jarrett. ‘Peace piece’ by Evans of course got an airing. How to describe it? Those hypnotic two chords from the left hand, whilst the right hand roams freely. Hypnotic, intuitive, with an utter stillness at it’s heart. Like most attempts, you can’t describe music with words.

One of my oft repeated lines is “talking about music is like dancing about architecture” (I can’t find who this is attributed to, but I didn’t come up with it.) Anyway.

What a lovely evening, listening to well chosen pieces from a superb pianist. Here is Ruth playing the opening from ‘Glassworks’.

Imelda May

Finally we have the Queen of Dublins Liberties, Imelda May. I was only slightly familiar with her work from seeing her on TV quite a few times, and could probably name a couple of songs. I knew she’d been through a number of incarnations (Rockabilly/Soul/Rock) but I always like that in an artist. She’s also done a programme recently on RTE where she explored the Irish Language.

It was pure luck I secured these tickets - my Mam is a big fan, and even though it was sold out, I called down to the venue and they told me to put my name on the waiting list. I was checking my inbox a few days later when a first come first serve email arrived - I was in like a rocket and got two lovely seats, right in the stalls, always the best place soundwise for a gig in the theatre.

For this ‘Raised on Songs and Stories Tour’ the stage had been transformed into an old time living room, instruments scattered around, an old piano, family pictures, lamps. Homely and stripped back, which is exactly what this show was. The band too was sparse, just her, bass and lead guitarist.

From the moment she sauntered out, this was a special gig. There were obviously songs she was going to play, but there was an unpredicatability to the evening that always kept it fresh. Obviously from the name of the tour she was always going to play ‘Dublin in the rare oul times’ which she opened with and she later played a few of her own hits, including ‘Johnny got a boom boom’ but there were some lovely surprises along the way.

I loved the stories between songs, which felt natural and unrehearsed and included some lovely ones about her mam and dad and their foreign travels. Too many to mention, but one that stood out was about the song ‘Kentish Town Waltz’ which involved Jeff Beck, David Bowie, Tony Visconti and Lou Reed. Oh, and a pet crow that she had carried around with her.

That voice. There was a ‘Raglan Road’ that had me spellbound, and some of her songs including the aforementioned ‘Kentish Town Waltz’, ‘Diamonds’ and ‘Meet you at the moon.’ Her voice - she can go from throaty and raw to wonderfully delicate in the same song. And always her own. Something like ‘Raglan Road’ - she just gets it.

Like I say, there was an air of unpredicatability about the evening, best exemplified when she asked the audience did anyone want to sing. Two brave local people obliged, nearly taking the roof off the place. ‘Sweet forget me not’ was one and then we had ‘Blues eyes crying in the rain’ by Willie Nelson. Another audience member came up after Imelda heard her singing. The encore was a soaring ‘Sweet Sixteen.’

Just an intimate, heart warming evening. Imelda May - Banfhile, Lán de bheatha. (Poetess, full of life).

——————————————————————————————————

As usual I try to include a piece of music that’s been on heavy rotation for me recently. This time round I’m ending with Ganavya and ‘Nine Jeweled Prayer’ from her 2025 album ‘Nilam’. It’s based around devotional music and the folk songs of Tamil Nadu, and includes her parents background vocals, which adds to it’s warmth and intimacy. I mentioned earlier about the uselessness of words to describe music, so I won’t. Except that this is like a big musical hug, which we all need right now.

May you be happy, may you be well, may you be free from suffering.