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‘Elder statesmen’ stay young in music

February 17, 2011

By Staff Reporter

Fans of Mike Rafferty (age 83), Joe Derrane (age 79), and Martin Mulhaire (age 72) still love the glad grace of their music. The rocking chair has become kindling for the musical fires raging in all three, putting youth to shame while serving as models for how not to “go gentle,” as another Celt poet, Dylan Thomas, urged in 1951.
At this past summer’s memorable Catskills Irish Arts Week in East Durham, N.Y., I visited a few nighttime events where Rafferty and Mulhaire seemed indefatigable, topped by Martin switching to hoofer on the hardwood with his wife, Carmel, at a ceili. I could only watch in wonder as both men kept younger players and dancers, well, on their toes.
Born in the village of Larraga in the parish of Ballinakill, East Galway, flute, whistle, uilleann pipes, and Jew’s harp player and lilter Mike Rafferty arrived in America in 1949. Since then, he has made an ever-widening, ever-deepening imprint on Irish traditional music in the U.S. His musical energy and output have become the stuff of lore. Over the past 14 years, he has made one solo album, three albums with his daughter Mary, and one album with fiddler Willie Kelly. That last album, “The New Broom,” came out this year and may be Mike’s best to date. In addition, over the past four years more than 600 tunes from his vast repertoire were published in two books, “300 Tunes from Mike Rafferty” and “Second Wind,” each compiled and transcribed by Lesl Harker, his former music student.
Why the selection committee for the National Endowment for the Arts’ National Heritage Fellowships continues to overlook this octogenarian giant of Irish traditional music in the U.S. remains a frustrating mystery to me and countless others.
Turning 80 this March 16, Boston-born button accordion virtuoso Joe Derrane, the last Irish musician to win an NEA National Heritage Fellowship (2004), has released six albums since his fabled comeback on the D/C# box at Wolf Trap, Vienna, Va., on May 29, 1994, at age 64. With John McGann backing on guitar, a brand-new album, “Grove Lane,” has been recorded, mixed, and mastered in Massachusetts, and will be released sometime next year. On this new, 12-track CD are several new Derrane compositions, including “Tango Derrane” that displays the full range of the button accordion and his skill on it. He still executes his trademark triplets with impressive dexterity and vigor.
Younger players, take note: 79-year-old Joe Derrane has recorded more music after his 1994 comeback than he did before it, including the 78-rpm tracks he made during the years following WWII.
When admirers of Derrane’s recent music remark to me that it’s a pity he didn’t play the button box in public for three decades, I always reply, “It would be a greater pity if he had never returned. Be grateful for the miraculous music he’s given us since.” No comeback in the history of Irish traditional music has been more momentous and fruitful than his.
From Eyrecourt, East Galway, button accordionist and composer Martin Mulhaire toured the United States with the legendary Tulla Ceili Band in 1958 and opted to remain here. His decision was a stroke of good fortune for Irish America, the direct beneficiary of his exceptional music ever since.
Mulhaire has the sole solo, “Cottage Groves / The Sally Gardens,” on the greatest ceili band album ever made, “Echoes of Erin,” recorded by the Tulla Ceili Band in 1958. (The remastered CD was issued on Dublin Records in 2004.) If he had never entered a recording studio again, his reputation would have been secured by that classic release.
But what’s little known today is that Mulhaire also made three solo 78-rpm recordings in 1958 for Dublin Records. They were issued as three singles with two tracks on each.
In 1986 he appeared on two tracks of “Fathers and Daughters” (Mike Rafferty also appeared on two tracks of that album), and in 1993 he recorded “Warming Up” with fiddler Seamus Connolly, flutist Jack Coen, and pianist Felix Dolan. That latter CD features seven Mulhaire compositions, including three acknowledged masterpieces: “Carmel Mahony,” “Grandpa Tommy’s Ceili Band,” and “Mulhaire’s #9.”
Of the 20 tunes written and placed in circulation by Mulhaire, “The Golden Keyboard” and “Land of Sunshine” are also considered classics. His tunes have been covered by more than 50 musicians, including the Chieftains’ Matt Molloy and Sean Keane, Andy McGann, Sean Maguire, Billy McComiskey, and Dermot Byrne.
For the past 14 years Mulhaire, who lives with his Cork-born wife Carmel (nee Mahony) in Pearl River, N.Y., has been a member of Pete Kelly’s busy Premier Ceili Band. The group performs most weekends of the year.
Mike Rafferty, Joe Derrane, and Martin Mulhaire are “elder statesmen,” “senior masters,” “seasoned pros,” “forever young” (apology to Bob Dylan) instrumentalists, or whatever phrase you can conjure to describe their lofty place and ongoing vital role in the Irish traditional music of America. To quote the epigram printed in Mike Rafferty’s latest album: “A new broom sweeps clean, but an old one knows the corners.” The music of these three players is ageless. They know the corners–and can still sweep clean.

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