Good news everybody, An Ceoldráma, the series I cut last year for director Colm Bairéad is being repeated on TG4 in the run up to christmas. The series runs for 4 weeks with the first episode airing this tea time at 5:55 (Dec 3rd). If you missed it the first time out, nows your chance to see it. Its a really lovely series and it is in my opinion among the best things I’ve had the pleasure of working on.
The series was nominated for 3 IFTA’s last year, Best Director, Best Youth and The Irish Language Award.
Here’s a wee trailer for the series to give you an idea what its like
A few years ago, while spending a summer in New York, I met up with director Niall McKay from Media Factory and IFNY. He wanted me to cut a music video for Susan McKeown, the grammy winning Irish singer based in New York. That video was for a song called No Jericho and can be seen here.
I got an email from Niall in August asking would I be interested in getting the old team back together. So here we are with another video for Susan McKeown!
The song is called ‘On The Bridge to Williamsburg’ and its a duet with Declan O’Rourke. Its a lovely song, thats insanely catchy and the video itself made my quite nostalgic for my old apartment just of Bedford and underneath the Williamsburg bridge!
The song is off Susan’s album ‘Belong’ which you can buy here
So this weekend my hometown, the beautiful little town of Milltown, Co. Galway is hosting a really great line up for the first ever PJ Conlon traditional music festival. The festival celebrates the life and music of one of Milltown’s most famous native sons and brings a wealth of traditional music, workshops and master classes to the village. This is an event well worth going to as it should be a huge amount of fun
PJ Conlon was born in Milltown in 1892. He came from a talented musical family and became an accomplished accordian player before emigrating to Manchester in 1909 and subsequently to New York in 1912, where he sucessfully broke into the recording business in 1917. He was among the first musicians in the USA, or anywhere for that matter, to record traditional rural Irish dance music commercially. In all, he made 52 record sides between November 1917 and March 1929 and his recordings are some of the oldest examples of Irish music in existence.
The whole town is no doubt in a heighted state of excitement as they welcome the President of Ireland Michael D. Higgins for the official opening of the festival on Friday August 2nd at 8pm. The president will be accompanied by his wife Sabina, a native of Milltown, although she went to mass in Ballindine as I reliably informed.
Michael D and Sabina securing the Mayo/Galway border from the Milltown side
A host of well known national and local artists will perform at the PJ Conlon Festival in Milltown this year. Don’t miss John Faulkner, John Carty, Andrew McNamara, Una Ni Fhlannagain, Clare Keville of Clare FM and TG4, Charlie Harris, Brid Dooley (RTE), Maigh Seola, Maude Connolly and many more.
The ITMA will be recording proceedings of the weekend for the the Traditional Music Archive
All the great things in life start out as puns. And so it was with Tradiohead, who play the Cobblestone, Smithfield in Dublin on Friday 16th November at 9. Theirs is a show that should not be missed. Frontman, Jimi McDonnell, a man no woman can tame, is worth the admission fee alone.
No surprises? Well, not quite. Tradiohead take the songs of Radiohead and re-imagine them using instruments more often associated with Irish traditional music. Tradiohead are Jimi McDonnell on vocals, Philip Fogarty on accordion and bodhrán, Pat Hargan on guitar and Michael Chang on violin, viola and mandolin.
The unlikely meeting of Radiohead and some gems from the Irish trad catalogue now has a name: Tradiohead
Here they are playing Knives Out in Campbells Tavern
Last year I edited a music video directed by my mate Jonathan Shaw for the group Readers Wives. That track was called ‘Victors Mother Juliet’ and now the group have followed that EP up with an album proper. The album is called ‘Rachels Apartment’ and is available to buy from July 1st. However for the month of June they are offering it free as a download from here. Written & recorded over the course of four months in the band’s squat in Temple Bar, it will be launched with a live show in The Workman’s Club, in Dublin on July 1st. for more information visit the groups bandcamp site
John Murphy 