by Rodger Hara – – –

June 2014 Ceolta Notes (photo: Pandora Celtica)

Celebrate the Summer Solstice with Angus Mohr at the Little Bear in Evergreen on the 21st at 9 PM.

The Indulgers are at the Exchange Tavern in Westminster on the 14th at 8:30 PM and at Conor O’Neill’s in Boulder at 10 PM on the 21st.

Brian Clancy is at Jack Quinn’s – Downtown Colorado Springs on the 5th, 12th, 19th and 26th at 7:30 PM, The Irish Snug – Capitol Hill in Denver on the 7th, 14th, 21st and 28th.

Albannach’s only Colorado appearance this year will be at the Pikes Peak Celtic Festival on the 20th at 6 PM, 21st at 1 and 4 PM and the 22nd at 1 and 3 PM.

Gobs O’Phun plays for the patrons of the Celtic House Pub in Parker on the 21st from 6-10 PM.

Delilah’s Revenge is at the Cheyenne Celtic Musical Arts Festival on the 14th from 4-6 PM, at Jack Quinn’s in Colorado Springs at 9 PM on the 21st. They are at the Pikes Peak Celtic Festival at 7 PM on the 20th, 11 AM and 2 PM on the 21st and 11 AM on the 22nd.

the commoners kick off Mulligan’s first Saturday Irish Music night in Fort Collins with a special guest appearance from the McTeggart Irish Dancers on the 7th at 9 PM. The Guinness Girls will also be giving away free Guinness pint glasses filled with Guinness on the 7th.

On the 21st you can hear Indigent Row play at Mulligan’s at 9 PM.

Mulligan’s Wednesday night sessions have resumed so if you live in the Fort Collins area, stop in and play sometime.

Potcheen entertains gala-goers at 7 PM on the 6th for the 42nd Anniversary Gala of the Sangre De Cristo Art and Conference Center in Pueblo at the Conference Center.

Chancer’s Hooley is in the Gold Hill Inn in Boulder on the 6th at 9 PM, tix $7; the Toad Tavern in Southwest Denver on the 12th at 8 PM, tix $4; at Jack Quinn’s, Colorado Springs on the 20th and Conor O’Neill’s in Boulder on the 28th.

The Mountain Road Ceili Band does their regular after-work gig at The Margarita at Pine Creek in Colorado Springs on the 20th.

The McDeviants open for Albannach at the Pikes Peak Celtic Festival on the 20th at 5 PM then play again at 10 AM and 3 PM on the 21st and 10 AM and 2 PM on the 22nd.

Kevin Dooley with Eric Drobny singing and playing the standup bass is at the Dickens Tavern in Longmont from 6-9 PM on the 4th at the Celtic House in Parker on the 13 from 7-10 PM. Kevin is at the Left Hand Tap House in Longmont from 4:30-7 PM on the 15th, Jamestown Mercantile from 6-8 PM on the 20th and plays for the Niwot Market Community Dinner Series from 6-8 on the 27th.

Ceol Ceili is on stage at the Pikes Peak Celtic Festival at 8 PM on the 20th and 10 AM on the 21st.

Pandora Celtica performs at Denver Comic Con June 13-15 at the Colorado Convention Center. Info at http://denvercomiccon.com/

Skean Dubh makes sweet music the 12th for the Ft Morgan Evening concert in the
City Park Band shell from 6:30 to 8 PM, on the 19th at the Louisville Summer Concert from 7 – 8:30 PM, the 21st at 3 PM for the Pikes Peak Celtic Festival, the 25th in Monument for their Summer concert series in Limbach Park from 7- 9 PM and on the 25th for the Old South Pearl St. Farmers Market from 9 AM – 1 PM.
Chancer’s Hooley is at Jack Quinn’s in Colorado Springs at 9 PM on the 7th, on the Cricket Stage of the Capitol Hill People’s Fair at 5 PM on the 8th and at Katie Mullen’s, Downtown Denver on the 27th at 9 PM.

The Juice O’The Barley will be at Mulligan’s in Fort Collins on the 28th at 9 PM.

Catch Rare Ould Times at the Pikes Peak Celtic Festival at 6 PM on the 20th and at 2 PM on the 21st and 22nd.

Colcannon plays the Longmont Museum, 400 Quail Road on the 25th, 6:30 – 8 p.m.
(303) 651-8374, http://www.longmontmuseum.org/events/concerts/ and is at the Donkey Creek Festival in Gillette, WY on the 29th.

The 2014 Pikes Peak Celtic Festival happens this year from the 20th to the 22nd at Memorial Park in Colorado Springs. Featured bands include Albannach, Ceol Ceili, The McDeviants, Skean Dubh, Rare Ould Times and Delilah’s Revenge. There will be Irish Step dancing by the Celtic Steps and Scottish Highland dancing from the Chalet Highland Dancers, heavy Scottish Athletics, WUSPBA Pipe Band competition, Renscots, Devellr Vikings, kid’s attractions, fun, food, merchants, vendors and whisky tasting as part of the festivities. Festival info and ticket prices at http://pikespeakcelticfestival.com/festival-info/ .

Cheyenne Celtic Musical Arts Festival is offered earlier this year and falls on Father’s Day weekend June 13th-15th! Just across the Colorado/Wyoming border (90 minutes from Denver), this festival is Free and held downtown in the plaza in front of the Cheyenne Depot Museum to celebrate Celtic heritage and culture.
Stay after the Fridays on the Plaza and celebrate the start of the 9th annual Cheyenne Celtic Musical Arts Festival! This festival is packed with live entertainment, dancers, pipers, beer, food, artisans and much more! Don’t miss performances by Delilah’s Revenge, Giant’s Dance and The Elders!! Come back on Saturday with the opening of the piper’s procession down Capitol Avenue at 10:00 am and have fun with the whole family all day! Sunday will open with the Kirking of the Tartans and clan row. Visit the vendors and the Clans in the Depot Lobby. www.cheyennedepotmuseum.org
June 13, 8:30 pm – 10:00 pm; June 14, 9:00 am – 11:00 pm; June 15, 10:00 am – 3:00 pm

Josh Stewart and Susan Morrice will be back in Denver, fresh from an EDUCO summit in Ireland, to talk to those interested
in learning about the Award winning EDUCO holistic business model. You can meet a few of the companies that have implemented this new model
to increase productivity and overall success for your business and all those involved.
Next meeting is June 14 , 9-11AM at XJET, 8201 InterPort Blvd, Englewood CO.
RSVP Mary Ann Malone [email protected]

By Sam Westmoreland – – – (photo by Kinsey Civili)

We’re at the mid-way point of the hurling pub league season with five games down already, and the Friday night Gaelic Football League has recently kicked off its 3rd year.

In the hurling league, The Fainting Goat lead the race with four wins in their first five matches, giving them a three-point advantage over second place Dougherty’s, who sit at 3-2. The Celtic Tavern sit third, at 2-3, while The Irish Rover recently got their first win of the season to move to 1-4 in fourth place.

May also saw our Men’s teams travel to tournaments in Chicago and Dallas.
On May 17th, the Gaels’ Junior C hurlers traveled to Chicago for a tournament against the Michael Cusack Hurling Club of Chicago and the Naperville Hurling Club. The hurlers won 2 and lost 2, with only one unnamed player collecting a yellow card on the weekend.

On that same weekend, our men’s Gaelic Football team traveled to Dallas for two matches against hosts Fionn MacCummhaill’s GAA Club. The squad split their two matches with Dallas, with Ron Miller scoring a deciding goal late in one match. The GAA has grown by leaps and bounds in Texas and a split was a very good result for our footballers just starting their season.

Travel has been a big focus this year and will continue into June, as the Rogue Camogs will travel to Atlanta at the start of the month. These travel tournaments give our teams the opportunity to gain valuable experience against other clubs prior to September’s trip to Boston for the NACB championships. Win or lose, these sorts of matches, coupled with our tournament at the Colorado Irish Festival are valuable learning experiences for our teams.

For June, the hurling pub league will resume for the final stretch before we crown a pub league champion at the Colorado Irish Festival. The Gaelic Football season will be in full stride, each Friday evening at the practice field at Infinity Park Glendale. We’ll also be hosting a World Cup watch party when Team USA takes on Portugal on Saturday, June 22. We’ve got a busy month coming down the pipe, and we’re looking forward to continuing our march towards Boston!

Boulder native Shane O’ Neill scored his first professional goal Saturday, May 24, to help the Colorado Rapids win 4-1 over the Montreal Impact. Playing in front of an enthusiastic home crowd at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park, O’Neill intercepted a clearing pass from just outside the penalty area and blasted a shot into the top left corner of Montreal’s goal.

Born in Ireland and raised in Boulder where his family owns Conor O’Neill’s Irish Pub and Restaurant, O’Neill was signed to the Rapids program his senior year at Fairview High School. During his school days he was a top scorer as a forward and midfielder, but the Rapids have been developing O’Neill as a defender. Last year he took over for injured starting defender Diego Calderon who had an extensive knee injury and never letting go of his spot in the lineup. Also in the past year, head coach Jurgen Klinsmann of the U.S. National Team, called on O’Neill to play center back.

As a defensive player, opportunities to take a shot on the net and score are not frequent – O’Neill relished in the moment. “It’s been a long time coming for me,” O’Neill told reporters postgame. “It felt really good once the ball popped out. I think I had a couple of chances like that last year. I got a good touch on it. Once it left my foot, I kind of had a feeling it was going in. It was great, but more importantly, we got the three points tonight.”

With his first professional score O’Neill also won a friendly wager with his teammate Chris Klute.
“Me and Chris had an agreement that whoever scores first had to buy the other one a video game,” O’Neill said. “We’ve been going back and forth on who would score first.”

Colorado Rapids home games are played at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park
6000 Victory Way, Commerce City. June home games are:
6/1 6:00PM vs. Houston; 6/4 7:00PM vs. Chicago; 6/17 7:00PM vs. Orlando City SC;
6/28 7:00PM vs. Vancouver. For complete schedule, updates, and information go to www.coloradorapids.com

Dirk Mewes is a Colorado uilleann pipe (Irish bagpipes) player and also makes pipes out of his workshop in Berthoud. He spoke recently with Cillian Vallely, the uilleann piper with the ever-popular Irish band Lunása. Cillian has also recorded and toured with a diverse collection of artists and shows, including Natalie Merchant, Bruce Springsteen, Mary Chapin-Carpenter, Tim O’Brien, and Riverdance. Cillian will be performing at the D-Note in Arvada May 18, 3pm, and holding workshops with Ryan McGiver, a folk singer and guitarist from upstate New York.

Dirk: “Thanks for speaking with me today! Let’s dive right in. The uilleann pipes seem like a very difficult instrument to master, being a piper myself, I have found that certainly to be true. At what age did you start playing the pipes, Cillian, and why did you choose the pipes?”

Cillian: “I think I started the pipes when I was eight years old. I was playing the whistle for a few years before that. My parents were both teachers of traditional music. They have had the piper’s club in Armagh for almost fifty years now. So they were running a little music school once a week. I used to just bring a whistle to that for a while. I remember my mother trying to teach me the fiddle, and trying various instruments, but my father was a piper and was teaching the pipes. I remember him giving me a practice set to try, and I took to it more than the other instruments.

“I never really looked back, you know. There were times when I couldn’t have cared that much about the music when I was a kid, but I always liked the pipes. I liked blowing them, and I liked the sound of them, you know?”

Dirk: “So at what point in your life did you decide that you could make a living playing music?”

Cillian: “I went to university, and I sort of studied things that I didn’t really care about. In the Irish system, you kind of have to decide what you are going to do when you are about 16, and I just did the degree in economics and business. I realized after about a month of the courses that I absolutely had no interest, but there was no changing or turning back in the system, so I finished it out anyway.

“And then I had to think of something to do, and I had no plan. So I went to Boston, and I was just going to get a summer job. But I started getting a lot of pub gigs playing music. And then I kept getting more pub gigs. And I was starting to enjoy the lifestyle of just playing music at night. So, I started getting better and better. I never really thought about whether I was going to keep doing it or not. I just kept going, and never looked back, so it just worked out that I was able to make a living. I mean, I probably wouldn’t have been able to stick to doing six bar gigs a week for the rest of my life. But I started getting better work, and getting recording work, and going on tour, and playing concerts. So, it became an interesting lifestyle, you know?”

Dirk: “It sounds like it was just a very natural progression for you.”

Cillian: “Yeah. I think a lot of things changed in my lifetime. Very few people would have played traditional music for a living. I wouldn’t have really known anybody. It would have only been the most famous people that you’d have heard about, but I think that the music became more and more popular. And it was sort of just more viable to make a living out of it. By about 1990, it was my main thing, and it was a good time, you know?”

Dirk: “It seems like in general that the uilleann pipes have seen a real resurgence in popularity in the last few years. There are more players now, and more people making the pipes than ever. What do you see as the contributing factors to the current popularity of the pipes?”

Cillian: “I suppose it is directly related to the music, itself, getting more popular. The music has gone from strength to strength, and pipes have gone along. And it’s not just done in isolation, there has been a steady increase in the amount of people playing the music. In terms of more popular culture, that can be changing – you know kind of a fad thing. There was a period in the 1990’s when pipes were getting used in a lot of commercials and movies, and I did a bit of that kind of work myself, but that’s just sort of an almost separate thing. The fact that the pipes were used in “Braveheart”, it’s a very temporary thing.

“But in terms of just the sheer number of people playing pipes, that’s been on a steady incline since the late ’60s, when it truly was at an all-time low. The more people play, the better standard the players are. Certainly, you see that with more makers, the standard of instruments is just getting better all the time. With the instruments that are made now, I’d say there has never been an era like it.

“I clearly remember teaching 20-25 years ago, and the pipes that would be brought into the class would make you cringe. And now, you go into a class and everybody plays an A, and it seems to be in tune, and people can’t blame the pipes anymore. There’s also a great standard in reed-making. With more people playing, and more people making them, there’s more quality players, and more quality instruments.

“In terms of the way the public’s being drawn to it, when people go to a concert and there’s a really good player on the stage, with a good sound, in tune, and playing well, you know people love the instrument. It’s a very special instrument in that sense, and definitely people connect with it. A lot of people put a lot of stock in the kind of things like Riverdance, Titanic, and Brave Heart, but I think that’s more in terms of influence, and a sort of making the instrument wider known…”

Dirk: “I grew up listening to ‘Planxty’, the ‘Bothy Band’, and the ‘Chieftains’, and there were pipes in all three bands, and I heard a lot of recordings of that, but I never actually saw a set of uilleann pipes until 20 years ago.”

Cillian: “Yeah, and people now can get a good set. They can hear whatever it is they hear – The Chieftains, or Lunása, or whatever it is at a concert, you know, and you can buy a record, and listen, and get hooked on the sound, and then they can go and find somebody to make them a set, and then you can get started, and it’s a relatively easy thing. It’s not simple, but it can be done! It wouldn’t have been the case 25 years ago. The internet is a great resource, as well. You can read forums, watch videos online of people playing – and you can even get lessons online!”

Dirk: “In May you are coming out here with Ryan McGiver. Can you tell us how you met Ryan, and what we can expect to hear at your shows?”

Cillian: “I met Ryan, I’m not sure exactly when, it was at least five years ago… He’s from upstate New York, and had moved down to New York City, where I am living. I ended up doing a few sets and bar gigs with him. He’s a great player and a great singer, but apart from that, we became good friends, and enjoy each other’s company. So, we ended up doing a festival, and then we kind of turned the festival into a tour. So, Ryan sings, he accompanies the tunes that I do on the whistle and the pipes, – and that would be strictly Irish music. But then, he sings American folk songs. So, we have worked out a show combining the two. And I enjoy it myself. I spend most of the year playing, not just with Lunása, but also with other ensembles of at least three or four other people.

“So, I’m enjoying the freedom of just the two of us. It’s a smaller sound, but it gives us the freedom to do what we want. We change the repertoire up a lot, and I play some of the tunes that I’ve written myself. “

Dirk: “The pipes have been known to be more of a solo instrument, are you going to be playing more of a solo method as well?”

Cillian: “In this show I will do a few thing unaccompanied, and use a lot of drones and regulators, and then we do some things with just the chanter and guitar, and there are things that will match the chords of guitar – matching them with the regulators, and we do a bit of that on the songs as well, kind of using all the parts of the pipes, to back up the song.

“I enjoy both that part of playing with groups and not playing with groups, and I always see it as playing the thing that works for that particular setting. In a group setting, you’d put a lot less ornamentation in and a lot less of all of your piping stuff at the expense of everybody around you, but when you are playing on your own you have a lot more freedom do what you want to do… On the pipes, you would never play a set of chords on the regulators if there was a completely different harmony in the rhythm section. Whereas if you are the only one playing, then you can do whatever you like. It’s a very different musical experience – and I like that it’s different, because I like both things.”

Dirk: “You’ve been with Lunása for about 15 years now. What is that like, and how do you find ways to keep that music fresh?”

Cillian: “Well, I mean, it is difficult. The beauty of playing with the same people year-in, and year out is that is becomes very tight, very solid, you become very trusting of the other players. It’s a sort of very dependable thing, but you can definitely get jaded, over the years, if you keep playing the same material. So, we change the material up a lot, and we write some of our own music, and we try not to play the same things every night. We do solos, and we change them up a lot. But we don’t tour as much as we did before, you know. In the early days of the band, we were on the road 200 plus days of the year together, and none of us really played any other gigs, and it was harder to keep it fresh in that sense. Then we’ve had a new guitarist the last couple of years, that brings something new into the group, and we’d do the odd collaboration, and that sort of helps things, you know?”

Dirk: “You’ve also have had some help from you musical brother, as well, in the latest recordings.”

Cillian: “Yeah, with the ‘National Concert Orchestra’. Niall, my brother is a traditional musician, but he has studied music at college, and he’s always played classical music, and he’s done a lot of arranging in the last ten years, for kind of smaller ensembles. I took part in a lot of his projects myself. He had written the music for a BBC documentary on the ‘Flight of the Earls’. It was the 400th anniversary of that. We did a series of concerts for a twelve-piece classical ensemble. And he’s certainly been writing more and more. Then the opportunity came up with the RTE orchestra, and he arranged the music of Lunása for a full orchestra. It was a great thing to do! I played a lot of classical music growing up, and I had played in an orchestra for six or seven years, but I’d never played the pipes with an orchestra. So, I’d sort of enjoyed bringing the two things together, at last. I think it collaborates very well with Irish music.

“I think a lot of people are very taken by the ‘Celtic Rock’, but actually, I think that the classical music world is closer to the Irish music world. As long as the classical players stay away from the melody! I say that, kind of joking… The classical players are trained to be able to play anything. But when Irish music is written, it’s not written as played, and classical players play what they read, so if what they read is not written correctly, then what they play sounds. You know you could nearly start laughing sometimes if you hear a violin player play an Irish tune from a book. But, that’s because the music is written in its simplest form.

“People like myself that read and play, know how to play from sheet music, but if you don’t know both things, then you can’t possibly play from sheet music, because it’s not written correctly. It’s the same in any music. If you take a jazz book, and you played a transcribed John Coltrane tune, it would sound laughable, if you played it as written. You can’t possibly write the correct swing. There would be so many dots and little tags to get that rhythm. It’s like that with Jazz or Irish music, you write a basic form so people can identify the actual note to be played, and then you find the rhythm from listening, and you find the right groove.”

Dirk: “Is there anything else you would like to say about the collaborative work you have done with Niall and others – combining classical and traditional music?”

Cillian: “You asked about keeping the music fresh, and doing collaborations. I think one thing is that when you play professionally, you play a lot more, so you get a lot better than you would have been than if you played just once a week. You end up playing four-to-five hours a day, all the time. So, when you do something new in a collaborative project with classical musicians, or whatever, it definitely helps keep the excitement levels up. We’ve done a lot of that stuff!

“We did a nice thing with Natalie Merchant a few years ago, and others with Lunása. Last year, I recorded with Bruce Springsteen. A few years before that, I did a thing with Tim O’Brian. In all these things, you learn a lot about yourself, and your own music my having to play it, or trying to play your stuff in those kind of settings.”

Dirk: “I have only heard parts of the latest Lunása recording with RTE. I am looking forward to hearing the rest of that!”

Cillian: “Yeah, it was a fairly interesting project. There was a great conductor who had knowledge of both genres, and that helped a lot. Niall’s arrangements were kind of done the way a lot of pop or rock arrangements are done with orchestras. The arrangements and chords of the band were kind of extended into the full orchestra. So, the kind of grooves and harmonies that we were already playing were sort of spread out among the rest of the instruments. And Niall picked the tracks that he felt would work best – just based on the sort of colors that he could have from the orchestra, whether it was strings, or percussion, and brass, and woodwind, and stuff, and sort of give all the parts of the orchestra a role to play.”

Dirk: “With your father a famous piper, and your talented brothers Niall and Caoimhin both sharing recording with you especially on Callan Bridge, is there a story you’d like to share with us about growing up with your musical family?”

Cillian: “I mean, it’s one of those things if you grow up, you grow up. That’s what it is. You can’t go back and grow up in another household, and compare the difference, you know? It was just part of life. With music school, it was always concerts, and practices, and sessions. My father taught me for the first few years, and then he handed me on to one of his pupils who was maybe only 15 years old, Mark Donnelly, he was a great piper. He taught me for a while, and when I was about that age, I was teaching some of the younger guys. You know, that’s sort of the way the club always worked. The pupils become the teachers, and it’s still going very strong. My younger brother Caoimhin, he’s a fiddle player now and piano player. We all came through that, and we have two younger siblings, Lorcan and Maire, and they all play. Not as much as the three of us, but a lot of it was taken for granted.

“I was more into sport, myself. I was a runner and footballer and I probably enjoyed that more as a teenager. But the music was there. I never gave up on it, I still played. I really got back into it when I was probably 18 or 19. The good thing was, I wasn’t a beginner . When I should have got my bug for wanting to play the pipes all day long every day, I wasn’t just starting, you know. I had already been playing for 10 or 11 years. I appreciate that now, but when you’re younger and it’s just there, and it’s your family, you certainly had no sense of feeling lucky or this is great. It’s only with hindsight that you realize that it’s a privileged upbringing of culture, you know?

“I have small kids now, so I’d love them to play, but I know the one thing I won’t be doing is ramming it down their throats. My father never did that with me. I just kind of went along, and if I wasn’t overly enthusiastic, it didn’t matter. I wasn’t forced. But you were surrounded by the music and you were surrounded by hearing great players. So you knew how it should sound. You always knew how it sounded when it was played well. So it was just a matter of practicing and figuring out how to do that. I think the approach of trying to turn kids into geniuses or trying to turn them into champion players, I don’t think it works, myself. They’ll either be good or they won’t.”

Dirk: “Can you give us a preview of what your workshop students should expect to learn when you’re here?”

Cillian: “I suppose there’s a limit to what you can do in any workshop. But I would certainly advise people about how they’re executing things. I think one thing, no matter how advanced you are on the pipes – or any instrument, is that you can always improve your sound, and you can always improve your rhythm. Piping can be incredibly technical and incredibly complex if you want it to be, to sound great. And pipes sounding good is not just about having a good reed and a good chanter, that’s only the start of it.

“I always feel that with teaching the pipes, a lot of what people would call ‘technique’ is really fingering technique, but there’s a lot more to technique than the just all the tricks with your little fingers. A lot of the technique is holding the pipes, applying the right pressure, and playing with good rhythm. You know I always believe everybody can improve in that department. I would listen to what people are doing already, and advise them how to improve from where they are, and also, obviously explain to people what I do and what I believe in.”

Dirk: “I have had several lessons with you in the past, and I’ve always learned something very valuable from you, so we’re all looking forward to your Colorado trip!”

Cillian: “Yeah, great! Looking forward to getting out there!”

Dirk: “Let me know if you want to go on a fly fishing or skiing trip when you’re out here – there will probably still be some snow left!”

Cillian: “Yeah, I’m a bit afraid of the skiing. I’ve never ski’d before. You’d have to put me on the baby slopes, is that what you call them? One of the times Lunása was out there, I actually didn’t go, but a number of the lads went to Loveland, was it? They arrived back black and blue. They had gone on the baby slopes, and then had gone for the big ones right away. There was black eyes and bruised ribs… It was nearly very bad. But they had fun, I believe.”

Dirk: “It seems like you guys always have fun.”

Cillian: “Oh yeah, well, we play to, anyway…”

Cillian Valley and Ryan McGiver will perform a matinee show at the D-Note in Arvada on May 18 at 3PM: The D-Note: 7519 Grandview Avenue in Olde Town Arvada (Corner of Grandview and Old Wadsworth) Sunday, May 18, 2014 3PM. $20 at the door. http://thednote.com
If you’re interested in participating in one of the workshops held by Cillian or Ryan, email [email protected]. More information about Cillian can be found at http://CillianVallely.com. More information about Ryan at

By Rodger Hara – – –

Colorado audiences have had the privilege of seeing and hearing Dubliner Glen Hansard many times during his tenure with The Frames that began in 1990; most recently in 2005 when they played at the Bluebird Theater. And after the success of the music from Once, Hansard and his co-star Markéta Irglová have appeared as The Swell Season on stage at the Ogden Theater in 2007 and the Ellie Caulkins Opera House and the Telluride Bluegrass Festival in 2008.

The film, written and directed by former Frames bass player John Carney in 2006 with additional input from Hansard and Irglová, made it to the Sundance Film Festival almost by accident in January 2007 where it won the World Cinema Audience award in the Dramatic category and the title song written by Hansard and Irglová won the Oscar for best song in 2007. Hansard wasn’t even Carney’s first choice to play the male lead, known only as “The Busker” and was looking for an older woman to play the female lead, “The Girl”; when Carney’s choice dropped out, he turned to his old friend Hansard who recommended the 19 year-old Irglová, daughter of a Czechoslovakian friend, for the part and the rest is movie, music and theatre history: How three friends armed with a few songs and a bit of a script made a low-budget ($160,000) film that earned over $7 million in its first three months of world-wide release, wins the Oscar for best song, then is turned into a multiple-Tony-award winning musical on Broadway that also wins a Grammy for Best Musical Theatre Album.

And if all of that isn’t enough, there’s a touch of James Bond to the story as well: Barbara Broccoli, producer of the last six James Bond films, acquired the stage production rights to the movie and approached Englishman John Tiffany to recreate it on stage. Tiffany’s initial reaction was, to say the least, unenthusiastic. “I thought it was a terrible idea. I never think about adapting films for the stage. That’s not the way I work. And when I was approached about Once, I hadn’t even seen the film. But one of my best friends said, ‘You will love the music.’ So I downloaded the soundtrack, and absolutely loved it. I’d never heard music like that, and the music is the reason why I wanted to do the show. Not just the music itself, but the fact that it’s a story about creating music, a story about the healing power of music. Immediately I thought, ‘We’re going to be able to see actors create that music in front of us.’ That’s really exciting. Actors have played instruments onstage for years, but not always in a show about making music.”

From that beginning, Tiffany then suggested to the producers that Dubliner Enda Walsh write the book for the play, saying “We’ve known each other since 1997, when we were working in Edinburgh. I felt that if you’re going to do a piece of theater about Dublin, then you get Enda Walsh from Dublin to write it.”

Walsh had much the same initial reaction as Tiffany. “I guffawed when my agent called and asked me to speak to the producers. I said, ‘What a stupid idea. It’s a two-hander with very little plot. It’s delicate.’ So I called the producers and told them it wasn’t for me. There’s no tradition of musical theater in Ireland, so I rubbished the idea. Then they told me John Tiffany was attached to it as director.”

The two spoke and decided to closet themselves for two days to read the screenplay, listen to the songs and talk about how it might work. At the end of the two days they concluded that they wanted to do the show. Walsh thought that with the Irish people hurting from the recession it would be “…sweet to do a little love letter to Dublin.”

They ultimately decided to set the show in a Dublin pub and to also include music played by stage characters who weren’t musicians in the film. They retained the songs from the film although in a somewhat different order and occasionally with modified arrangements. Martin Lowe, who did the orchestration for the show, observed that “The songs feel just a little bit bigger than they did in the movie. That’s unusual; it’s the movies that are always bigger. But the most musicians on any number in the movie is five. We’ve got 12 onstage, although they’re not all playing all the time. Often, we have three or four guitars playing at any one time. We also use ukuleles, mandolins, strings, drums, an accordion, and a banjo. The banjo is in quite a lot of the songs because one of the actors wanted to learn it.” And just like a session in your local, there are different people who start and stop the different tunes depending on who is on stage at the moment. To close the musical loop, Hansard and Irglová visited the show while it was in development off-Broadway, made some fine-tuning suggestions and then gave it their blessing.

When asked why he thought Once was so successful as a film and a stage musical, Tiffany said “I think what’s very moving about the piece is how sometimes we meet people who we don’t necessarily stay with forever, but they give us the resources to move on to the next part of our life. There’s something very truthful in that. People have said to me, ‘When I was sitting in the theater watching Once, I felt like I was watching it with everyone I’ve ever loved, whether or not they’re still in my life.’”

Featuring a multi-talented touring cast that sings, dances and plays their own instruments, Denver theatre-goers will be able to see for themselves that Once deserves the eight Tony awards it received including those for Best Musical, Best Direction of a Musical (John Tiffany), Best Book (Enda Walsh), and Best Orchestrations (Martin Lowe) . Once plays at the Buell Theater in the Denver Performing Arts Complex May 6-18; performance times are Tuesday-Sunday at 7:30 PM and 2 PM on Saturdays and Sundays. Tickets and information at http://www.denvercenter.org/buy-tickets/shows/once/about.aspx or call 303.893.4100, 800.641.1222 or TTY: 303.893.9582.

Photos courtesy of Denver Center Attractions, © Joan Marcus

The Bennett School of Irish Dance will fill the stage at the Lone Tree Arts Center with the exciting sounds and color of Irish music and dancing on Saturday, May 10th. Spirit of Ireland 2014 is the latest in the series of shows which have delighted audiences every year with traditional steps and modern choreographies in the Irish tradition.
This year marks the 20th anniversary of Riverdance, the phenomenon which brought Irish dancing from church halls and country pubs to Broadway. What better way to celebrate that revolution in world entertainment than by enjoying Spirit 2014?
The Lone Tree Arts Center at 10075 Commons Street will provide a luxurious setting in keeping with the quality of Spirit 2014. More than 100 Bennett School dancers will showcase the audience-pleasing skills they hone in more than 80 performances per year, including the Cheyenne Celtic Musical Arts Festival, Elizabeth Celtic Festival, Colorado Scottish Festival, Long’s Peak Scottish/Irish Highland Festival and Summerset Festival.
The roots of Irish dancing reach back thousands of years, but the dancing has always thrived on innovation as dancers devise new steps and routines to fit traditional tunes, and fit traditional steps to new music. Spirit 2014 will draw on both strains to present colorful costumes and skillful steps in an ever-changing variety for an exciting evening’s entertainment.
Spirit 2014 will be presented 6:00-8:00 PM on Saturday, May 10th (doors open at 5:30.) Tickets are $15 (adults) $10 (seniors) and $8 (children 7-15.) Tickets are available online from the Lone Tree Arts Center’s web site or by calling their box office at 720.509.1000; you may also buy tickets at the door. By Bill Bennett

The Granias, Lyons Colorado-based, all-female Celtic band, will perform
in Denver this month.
The Granias. inspired by their namesake, the famous 16th century Irish Pirate Queen Grania, these Celtic women bring their graceful, swashbuckling sound to Denver’s Swallow Hill stage on May 10. Expect traditional fiddle tunes “powered by pure energy” (Boston Music Spotlight), “exceptional” vocals (Irish Music Magazine) and “beautiful” harp, (The Folk Harp Journal), driving guitar and rhythmic Irish bodhran drum.

Fiddler Jessie Burns recorded three number one World Music albums while touring with Celtic supergroup Gaelic Storm. Sirotniak is known for her rich, session-style playing and unparalleled community spirit that earned her a place in the Longmont Times-Call’s Top 100. Gadbaw and Krimmel’s latest duo release was described by Colorado Public Radio as “stunning,” and by British folk magazine What’s Afoot as “an absolute joy to listen to.” With a varied repertoire of ancient melodies on the celtic harp, rollicking fiddle tunes, Irish traditional ballads and sing-alongs, The Granias are sure to steal your heart.
In addition to Burns on fiddle -Beth Gadbaw (vocals/drum), Annie Sirotniak (guitar) and Boulder harpist Margot Krimmel comprise traditional Celtic folk group.

The Granias
Saturday May10 at 8 p.m.
Swallow Hill’s Tuft Theatre, 71 E. Yale Avenue in Denver
Tickets $10 in advance, $12 at the door, 303.777.1003,www.whitebirdsmusic.com

By Luke Henderson – – –
The lows of 2013 have quickly been replaced by highs in 2014 for fighter Maureen ‘Baby Face’ Riordon. After injuries kept her on the shelf and fights fell through, prospects for her career reaching the heights she hoped for were dimming.
“Literally the same week I had surgery, they announced there were tryouts for women in my weight-class for The Ultimate Fighter and I locked myself in my room and cried,” Riordon said, talking about the Ultimate Fighting Championship’s (UFC) reality program that ends with fighters receiving contracts.
But setbacks like that are in the past and Riordon made her own headlines in March with the announcement that she had not only signed a contract with national MMA organization Resurrection Fighting Alliance (RFA) but had also signed one to make her professional fighting debut in a kickboxing match for the internationally known ‘Glory’ promotion, which is set to make its Denver debut at the 1st Bank Center on May 3 with GLORY 16.
Riordon sees the opportunities before her and intends to grasp them tightly.
“It’s a great chance not just for me, but for the community. Women’s MMA is a growing sport and the last year has been incredible. Things like this, things like fighting for RFA and for GLORY, all of that is an opportunity for me to show what I can do, but also for all of us to bring attention to Denver and Colorado and bring in organizations like this,” Riordon said.
While RFA is well known in the state, fans may be unclear just how large the news is regarding GLORY coming to town. The ‘16’ show will be broadcast on SPIKE TV and will be their immediate follow-up to a show in Istanbul. Billed as the world’s premier kickboxing league, the organization’s decision to come to Denver brings in a great deal of attention, revenue and pride to the state.
All of this Riordon is well aware and eager to justify through her performance, but she gets downright giddy when talking about the venue.
“Of course fighting at the 1st Bank Center is a dream come true. I can’t even put into words what fighting there, in my pro debut, means. There are no words to be able to be there with my family, friends and fans, to see me on that stage. No words. I would have to draw a picture,” Riordon said with a laugh.
But as she prepares for this next step in her career, Riordon is not losing sight of where she has come from. m“Adopted at birth, I take pride in the Irish heritage gifted to me by my family. That last name became my entire identity, my heritage. I hope the Irish community will embrace me, as I have so profoundly embraced them. Faugh A Ballagh!” Riordon shouted. ‘Clear the way!’
Riordon intends to make 2014 the best year of her fighting career and with the opportunities laid before her the sky seems to be the limit.
To purchase tickets for GLORY 16, May 3 at The 1st Bank Center in Broomfield, go to www.altitudetickets.com.

John Gillis A visiting Irish manuscript conservator who conserved the Faddan More Psalter–the 8th-century manuscript that was found in a bog in Co. Tipperary in 2006. A lecture about this Treasure from the Bog will be in Colorado Springs: lecture–7 pm, Wednesday, April 30, Gaylord Hall, Worner Center (NW corner of Cascade and Cache L Poudre), Colorado College; and a reception at Heller Center, UCCS, Friday, May 2, 4 – 6 pm. Both events are free and open to the public. For more information, see (for Colorado College lecture): http://www.coloradocollege.edu/events/2014-04-30-treasure-from-the-bog-the-faddan-more-psalter#.U1BdO1yIzFI or (for reception at UCCS): http://www.uccs.edu/heller/events.html or contact: [email protected]

This lecture tells the story of the discovery of the Faddan More Psalter, an early medieval
manuscript unearthed from a peat bog in Co. Tipperary in the summer of 2006. The manuscript was probably written in about 800 in one of a number of monasteries in the area. A unique feature is that the inside of the leather cover is lined with papyrus, probably as a stiffening, an indication of the links between the Irish and Coptic churches at the time

Gillis will discuss the many new and exciting discoveries were made during the lengthy and difficult task of conserving this important archeological find, which had survived in an extreme environment for over a millennium and examine how that same environment was somewhat responsible for its survival. In
conservation terms much of the technique employed was developed as work progressed due to
the unique nature of the project, with little in the way of comparative work existing.
The contents of manuscript will be examined, which contains the fragmented remains of the one hundred and fifty Psalms from the Old Testament and includes areas of illumination and decorated
lettering. We will see the cover in remarkable original condition; possibly the only one of its kind in
Western Europe and one of only a handful of extant original early medieval Western book covers.
Gillis will draw comparisons with structures that hail from lands as far away as Egypt. We will also
look in detail at some of the surprise features from the cover that have raised more questions than
answers but without doubt will play an important role in adding to the history of book making and
monastic life in early medieval Ireland.