Kathleen Loughnane Harp
with
Alec Finn - Greek bouzouki (all except 4, 10, 13) / guitar (6, 8)
Mary Staunton - Accordion (3, 6, 8, 10)
Seán Ryan - Whistle (7, 11)
Martina Goggin - Djembe (2, 5, 8)
Sharon Shannon - Accordion (2, 11)

Programme Notes

1 MISS HAMILTON
This air was composed by Cornelius Lyons, a renowned harper from Kerry and contemporary of Turlough O'Carolan’s (1670-1738). Lyons became harper to Lord Antrim.

2 I'll MEND YOUR POTS AND KETTLES. O!
THE OPEN ROAD
I first heard the polka I’ll Mend your Pots and Kettles. O! being played on the pipes by Éamonn Ó Bróithe. He kindly lent me the album Seamus Ennis: Forty Years of Piping, from which he obtained it. I composed The Open Road to go with it, with musical travelers of all kinds in mind.

3 PRESIDENT GARFIELD’S
MISTRESS WHARTON DUFF
President Garfield’s was originally written as a hornpipe but is usually played in reel time. It has been ascribed to the composer Ostinelli. Mistress Wharton Duff is a Scottish tune given to me by harper Róisin McLaughlin from Derry.

4 THE WILD GEESE
Taken down by Edward Bunting in 1803 from the Armagh harper Patrick Quinn (born 1745) and included in his third collection (1840) of Ancient Music of Ireland. It commemorates the exodus of the Irish nobility after the Treaty of Limerick in 1691.

5 GRAINE UAILE / GRACE O'MALLEY
THE MISTLETOE WALTZ

Graine Uaile appears in O’Neill’s Waifs and Strays of Gaelic Melody (Chicago 1922). He gives as his source O'Farrells Pocket Companion for the Irish or Union Pipes (4 Vols. 1804-1810). O’Neill refers to a ‘florid’ version taken down by Bunting from a piper, McDonnell, in 1797 which Bunting notes as ‘very ancient, author and date unknown’. This is included in his third collection. Graine Uaile (Gráinne Ni Mháille / Grace O'Malley) was a characterful pirate-woman with a stronghold on Clare Island. Co. Mayo. who flourished during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.

6 GREEN WOODS OF TRUIGHA
THE NORTHUMBRIAN HORNPIPE
THE WESTERN HORNPIPE

The Green Woods of Truigha I obtained from Bunting’s second collection (1809). The Northumbrian Hornpipe is from the repertoire of Roisin McLoughlin. The Western Hornpipe I first heard played by Mary Bergin, and later came across it in an article on James Kelly by Breandán Breathnach in Ceol, a Journal of Irish Music. Vol. 6.

7 INION AN FHAOIT ON NGLEANN /
WHITE'S DAUGHTER FROM THE GLEN
The glen referred to in this love song is the village of Glyn, in Co. Tipperary. between the towns of Carrick and Clonmel. This air is a version of The Blackbird, a tune well known to set dancers.

8 MCCONNELL’S
KITTY SHEÁIN’S
I learned this pair of barn dances from the fiddle playing of Dermot McLoughlin.

9 LADY DILLON
Air and Jig composed by Turlough O'Carolan and published in Buntings first collection (1796).

10 CASTLE KELLY / CAISLEAN UI CHEALLAIGH
LADY EDWARDS
The reel Castle Kelly I took from Brendán Breathuach’s Ceol Rince na h-Eireann-I. Lady Edwards is by O'Carolan. Mrs. Edwards came from Castle Coote in Co. Roscommon. She married Carolan’s good friend Lord Mayo in 1731.

11 THE DRUNKEN SAILOR
LADY IVEAGH
The first of these is a hornpipe, taken from O‘Neill's Dance Music of Ireland. Lady Iveagh, written about 1660 and attributed variously to Thomas (c. 1640- 1700) or William Connellan (Connallon). was collected by Edward Bunting from the harper Arthur O'Neill in 1792, and appears in Bunting’s collection of 1840. Lady Iveagh was daughter of the 7th Earl of Clanricarde, who married into the Butler family of Kilcash, Co Tipperary.

12 LADY GETHIN
MORGAN MAGAN
Both pieces are by Turlough O'Carolan. Lady Gethin is likely to have been written for the wife of Sir Richard Gethin, who became High Sheriff of Sligo in 1724. The Morgan Magan of the second tune lived at Togherstown, Co. Westmeath, and died in 1738.

13 PORT ATHOL
One of the compositions attributed to Rúairí Dall Ó Cathain (c. 1550-1600). I came across it in Oswald’s Caledonian Pocket Companion 1753 in the Scottish National Library. There is also a version in the nineteenth century Forde Manuscript. Rúairí Dall came from a noble family in Co. Derry but lived mostly in Scotland, where he composed tunes for members of the Scottish aristocracy - Port Gordon. Port Athol etc. This piece was written for the Countess of Athol.

14 WALTZ gan ainm
THE WATERFORD WALTZ
I have no name for the first of these.
The Waterford Waltz appears in Volume IV of O'Farrell's Pocket Companion for the Irish or Union Pipes.