Search Results for 'Alec Finn'

Prior to 1961, public performance of Irish traditional music in Galway took place primarily in the form of céilís in large dancehalls — namely in the Hangar, the Commercial and the Astaire. These were enormously popular — remember the hundreds of bicycles parked outside the Hangar on a Sunday night — but they began to go out of fashion in the sixties and were regarded as old fashioned and backward.

With a family musical legacy that stretches to the folk powerhouse that is De Danann, Cian Finn brings his ancestral roots to his fresh reggae sound that combines electronica with hip hop, dancehall with soul.

AT EVERY arts event in the city he would be there, the jolly man with the glasses and the long hair, a smile and good company, enthusiastic for what he, and we, were about to see that night, be it theatre, music, literature, visual arts - and he usually had an important role in supporting it.

By the 16th century Galway was a compact, well laid out town, with handsome buildings, protected by a strong wall. The wealth of the so called Tribal families, originally Anglo/Normans, built up over decades of canny, and adventurous trade, bought them total control of the municipal authorities. Loyalty to the English crown rubber-stamped their laws to keep the native Irish out of the town. They built large houses in a style that reflected their power, while meeting the aesthetic standards of their European contemporaries. Galway was a place apart from the rest of the island.

The world of Irish traditional music is this week coming to terms with the loss of one of Alec Finn, one of its most influential masters over the last four decades.

DE DANNAN, singer-songwriter Lisa O'Neill, sean-nós legend Seosamh Ó Neachtain and fiddle player Jesse Smith, are among those who will play the seventh annual Traidphicnic festival in An Spidéal.

The incomparable Frankie Gavin was recently announced as the winner of the prestigious TG4 2018 Gradam Ceoil Traditional Musician of the Year Award - an accolade that marks the culmination of an eventful year for Gavin, and the Gradam Ceoil gala concert and award ceremony in Belfast next February, is an early highlight in a year that also promises much.

THIS SATURDAY marks the 30th anniversary of the death of the legendary Galway fiddle player and traditional Irish musician Mickey Finn. His passing will be marked in a weekend of memorial sessions at The Crane Bar, from Friday April 21 to Sunday 23, featuring Mickey’s widow, Lena Finn, as well as Sean Ryan, Jackie Small, and Mickey’s brother Johnny Finn.