St. Patrick’s Concerts Aplenty

THE St. Patrick’s season is upon us now in full swing, and there will be so much great trad music on offer that you will have to go out of your way to avoid it.

Opportunities abound to see and hear some of the finest Irish music anywhere in comfortable theater chairs or amiable pub settings, so commit yourself to finding one or more locales for an evening’s entertainment with your family and friends.

Right off the bat this coming Friday, March 2 is the first of the World Music Institute Irish nights in March with the ethereal Martin Hayes and Dennis Cahill performing in concert at the very simpatico Symphony Space on Manhattan’s Upper West Side at 95th Street and Broadway.

The Clare-born fiddler and his Chicago sidekick have been mesmerizing audiences around the world without any signs that the spell has lost its touch, and they have proven to be a popular attraction for the WMI (www.worldmusicinstitute.org) in the past.

In addition, the WMI have a second Irish night slated for Saturday, March 24 with Danu featuring the fetching vocalist Muireen Nic Amhlaoibh on their now-rare U.S. sojourns that finishes in New York City (see below). Tickets are available via the WMI website or by calling 212-545-7535.

Martin and Dennis will also team up with fiddlers Bruce Molsky and Alasadair Fraser along with cellist Natalie Haas in their “Highland, Heath and Holler” collaboration that I wrote about coming out of APAP at the acoustic treasure known as the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall. It is on Saturday, March 10 at 8 p.m. for anyone near the Troy/Albany region, and details are available at 518-273-8945 or www.troymusichall.org.

On Saturday, March 3 at 8 p.m. the Clancy Brothers legacy will be very much in evidence in Bergen County, New Jersey when the Hurdy Gurdy Folk Club welcomes Aoife Clancy as its main act at the Central Unitarian Church at 156 Forest Avenue in Paramus.

The daughter of Bobby Clancy from Tipperary, who settled in the Boston area away from his more famous brothers, Tom, Pat and Liam who took New York and the U.S. by storm along with Tommy Makem for decades, has really made her own independent musical path that included vocals with Cherish the Ladies.

The opening act will be a South Jersey couple, Kathy Deangelo and her husband Dennis Gormley, who are multi-instrumentalists known as McDermott’s Handy in the Celtic folk scene in a rare Northern New Jersey appearance. Ticket and concert info at phone 201-791-2225 or www.hurdygurdyfolk.org.

The City of Yonkers shows its appreciation for trad artists with a free concert on Friday, March 9 at 7:30 p.m. at the Mark Twain Middle School at 160 Woodlawn Avenue. Yonkers resident piper Jerry O’Sullivan tops the bill along with his Tara Circle teaching colleague Bernadette Fee on fiddle and Dublin accompanist and singer Eamon O’Leary, founder of the legendary Mona’s Session in the East Village.

Call 914-377-6438 for details. For good measure, the Niall O’Leary School of Dance will also perform.

Music Without Borders impresario Steve Lurie, who was the music booker for the short-lived Satalla World Music Emporium, is giving the club S.O.B. in the West Village a try with the Battlefield Band on Monday, March 5 at 7:30 p.m. which is an early show time. Call 212-243-4940 or www.sobs.com for further info.

As you would expect the bands and artists from Ireland flock like the Wild Geese to Amerikay in the green season, and here are some further highlights —

Flook is hitting the Midwest before stopping in the New York area and Boston (Burren Pub, March 14). On Saturday, March 10 at 8 p.m. they play the Algonquin Arts Theater down the Shore in Manasquan, New Jersey with Michael McGoldrick filling in for Karen Allen on flute to pair up with flutist Brian Finnegan, bodhran player extraordinaire John Joe Kelly and Ed Boyd on guitar. Details at www.algonquinarts.org or phone 732-528-9221.

Flook will be at Ulysses Bar at 95 Pearl Street in the financial district of Man-hattan in the back room on Sunday, March 11 (call 212-482-0400 or www.ulysses barnyc.com), where Dervish will be following them on Monday night, March 12 as well for what promises to be much more entertaining than the Eurovision contest they will participate in.

Dervish have a much more extensive U.S. tour, and the details are all available at www.dervish.ie, where you can also view their recent Late Late Show appearance with the winning Irish Eurovision nominee “You Can’t Stop the Spring” written by John Waters and Tommy Moran.

Teada will be trouping through also with a couple of intriguing double bills within a tank of gas from New York City. On Thursday, March 16 they will be at the Capital District Celtic Cultural Association headquarters (www.cdcca.org) in East Greenbush outside Albany with Danu that ought to blow the roof off the newly established Center. The joint concert begins at 7 p.m.

On St. Patrick’s Day itself, they’ll twin up with Grada down in Lakewood, New Jersey at the historic Strand Theater (www.strandlakewood.com or phone 732-367-7789) in a show that begins at 8 p.m.

Once road-warriors, Danu make strategic, family-friendly forays now abroad that include these stops on the upcoming tour Somerville Theatre in Boston (March 16), Flynn Theatre in Burlington, Vermont (March 17), Narrows Centre of the Arts in Falls River, Massachusetts (March 22) and the University of Hartford in Connecticut (March 23) among other venues outlined at www.danu.net.

Last year Solas reminded everyone why they have been such a force in the Irish music scene with the release of the critically acclaimed double CD and DVD, Reunion, pulling together all the musicians who created the sparks over the first ten years. Most of the band is now living in Ireland and like the others find this a lucrative time to be in the U.S.

There are a good few opportunities to catch their second leg of the seasonal tour which begins at the Barns at Wolf Trap in Vienna, Virginia (phone 703-938-2405) on Wednesday, March 7 before a sold out appearance at Philadelphia’s World Music Cafe on Friday, March 9 at 7:30 p.m., where founder Seamus Egan makes his home.

Their New York gigs begin on Wednesday, March 14 at 8 p.m. at the Tarrytown Music Hall (www.tarrytownmusichall.org or 877-840-0457), with Joe’s Pub on tap for Thursday, March 15 at 7:30 p.m. (212-967-7555 or www.joespub.com) in lower Manhattan.

The last New York gig is in Orange County at the Bodles Opera House on Friday, March 16. Call 845-409-4595 for information.

That ought to help you get a head start on the St. Patrick’s Day celebrations concert wise, and we’ll have some more information on the Chieftains and Karan Casey events in the zone next week.