Concert Preview—

The Best Chance This Year To Hear An Unforgettable Combination

By Andrew Carey

For more than fifteen years, the three members of the band Sliabh Notes have been playing the distinctive music of their small but artistically rich region to appreciative audiences around Ireland and across the world.

Meeting by chance in the early 1990s at a casual gathering of Irish musicians, fiddler Matt Cranitch, button accordionist Dónal Murphy, and singer-guitarist Tommy O’Sullivan forged a musical partnership which led first to a series of concerts and then to the their first CD, Sliabh Notes (1995).

“Like lots of these things,” Mr Cranitch said during a phone conversation earlier this week, “it was kind of accidental and fortuitous ...  We happened to be in Dingle, County Kerry, where Tommy, our guitar player, lived, and Dónal and I were there on other missions, so to speak, and we met up ... and we turned out a great session. And soon thereafter, somebody that was at that session was running a concert and said ‘God, those lads played well together.  I’ll get them for the concert.”

On Thursday, March 4, at 7:30 pm, Sliabh Notes will return to Newtown Meeting House for a third time, brought once again by Fairfield County’s own Shamrock Traditional Irish Music Society.

As a general rule, bands from Ireland come to the area after playing in New York City, Boston, or some other large city. But this time, Sliabh Notes is beginning its latest American tour in Newtown. Mr Cranitch is flying over early to teach a fiddle master class in Middletown, N.J., on Sunday, February 28 (2:30 pm at the Middletown Arts Center, $35 per student; email phil_weir@hotmail.com to sign up or for more details). Following the Newtown concert the band will head to Dallas for the North Texas Irish Festival.

No other northern dates are scheduled for this tour. The Newtown concert represents the best chance this year for people in our state to hear Sliabh Notes’ unforgettable combination of rhythmic dance tunes and soulful slow airs with Mr O’Sullivan’s heartfelt songs.

The name Sliabh Notes (pronounced “Shleeve Notes”) is derived from the band’s home: Sliabh Luachra (“Mountain of Rushes”) in southwestern Ireland, a hilly region on the banks of the Blackwater River, at the juncture of Counties Cork, Kerry and Limerick.  Sliabh Luachra has a long history in the arts, being the birthplace of Eoghan Rua Ó Súilleabháin and Aogán Ó Rathaille, two of the great Irish Gaelic poets of the 18th Century, and is particularly famous today for its distinctive dance music.

Although in most parts of Ireland 4/4 reels and 6/8 jigs predominate, in Sliabh Luachra 2/4 polkas and 12/8 slides make up the larger part of the repertory played at sessions and dances. Sliabh Notes plays tunes from around Ireland, but the Sliabh Luachra sound is at the heart of their music.

Sliabh Notes unites the talents of three master musicians. Matt Cranitch, born and raised in Rathduff, County Cork is not only a fantastic fiddler but a respected academic and a renowned teacher. He is a popular instructor at the annual Catskills Irish Arts Week in East Durham, N.Y., and wrote The Irish Fiddle Book, which many fiddlers credit as the most straightforward and effective explanation of Irish style and technique ever written.

Dónal Murphy was born in Birmingham, England, but when he was a young child his family returned to Abbyfeale, County Limerick. He began playing music on the tin whistle at eight years of age, but soon switched to the button accordion, his father’s instrument. He was a founding member of the popular band Four Men and a Dog, and has played with many other great musicians and dancers, including Michael Flatley of Riverdance fame.

London-born Tommy O’Sullivan’s family also moved back to County Kerry during his childhood; he grew up with a wide range of influences, from Irish traditional and English folk music to the Beatles and American blues.  An impeccable guitar accompanist for Irish traditional music who has backed many top players, including the Bothy Band’s Paddy Keenan, he is also a fine singer whose unique vocal style, sometimes described as “Blackwater blues,” blends the best parts of all his influences.

Sliabh Notes’ Newtown concerts have consistently filled the meeting house to capacity, and some have sold out well before the day of the show. Early reservations are recommended. Tickets are $20 for adults, $5 for children.

For reservations call 203-256-8453 or send email to TMQuinn@optonline.net. More information may be found at the society’s website, ShamrockIrishMusic.org.