IrishMusicInfo
The Sunday Tribune Weekly Traditional Music Column by Fintan Vallely
990321
On Monday last the all-party Joint Committee on Heritage and the Irish Language issued ads. welcoming submissions from "organisations or individuals" on Traditional Irish music. They have been placed in an effort to glean information which was not provided by a February report commissioned for £2,000 from Senator Labhr‡s î Murchœ. Had that looked beyond his own employers, or even asked one question from the most obvious organisation - the Arts Council, of which his wife òna î Murchœ is an active member - there would have been no need for any such expenditure by an honestly-motivated committee with tight resources. The ads. cost c. £3,500, more than last year's Arts Council allocation to the voluntary independent, South Sligo Summer School which this year will have thirty teachers coaching six hundred students for a week. To redeem an appalling situation such action by this committee demonstrates scrupulous integrity, and for this it must be commended. But if the logic of extra expenditure is to be followed, have they not also responsibility to avoid public mis-information? Pending a balanced report is it not common sense to withdraw from public sale the present non-representative document? All information from committee secretary P‡draig î hAil’n on 01-618 3886. Bangor fiddler Dianna Boullier's book Exploring Irish Music and Dance is the first attempt at providing comprehensive information on Traditional music for children. Exquisitely produced by O'Brien Press, its crisp, clean photographs, beautiful line-drawings by Julian Friers, and acres of space between the lines make it a luxury to indulge for the laziest mind. This is a book that the children can be read in bed, lose themselves among in imagination, pore over in a school or library, and will remember for life from a grandparents'. Yet its topics would seem to defy such virtue: styles, versions, set- and cŽil’-dance, versions of tunes, oral transmission, the written note, lilting , instruments and composers are spread like cherries in a cake - one now, another later, maybe in a clump. Matter of fact too, nothing is complicated, it just becomes obvious. Serious moments are lifted by imagination and calm humour: P‡draig O'Keeffe's death on a cold night is followed by the Kerry polka Out on the Ice. Effortless and generously non sexist, the book's fairy tales draw the reader too into a world where music can also be magic. In great variety of reel, strathspey, polka and jig, a hundred tunes woven into the topics quietly inform on variety and outside influence; there is no bother in their invitation to be whistled, lilted or played. Not for picky pedants, this is a book too for any generous-spirited adult to languish over; here is the passing on of music itself, the essence of oral tradition in print, at £7.99 in hardback a robust treat.
©Fintan Vallely, IrishMusicInfo.com
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