Mark Redmond and Daoirí Farrell: a review

1st March, 2020

Towards the end of the excellent final concert of Wexford Trad and Folk Weekend, Mark Redmond, the acclaimed uilleann piper from Gorey, reflected on what a marvellous weekend it had been, wistfully expressing the view that every weekend should be as good as this one.

Redmond, with ballad singer Daoiri Farrell, was wrapping up the festival with a terrific show in St Iberius Church during which himself and Farrell traded songs, tunes and stories that delighted the audience from start to finish. To the credit of both players, they generally avoided clichéd material, and proved that there is still a massive amount of stuff awaiting to be discovered in the rich treasury that is Irish music. Farrell impressed, not only with his sturdy and mellifluous singing voice on songs like ‘The Valley of Knockanure’ and ‘Pat Rainey’, but regaled the audience with a humorous between-tunes running dialogue. Redmond is a relaxed and disciplined performer whom I’d like to hear on his own sometime, but their partnership brought a fitting celebratory end to a wonderful festival run by Craobh Loch Garman Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann.

The general buzz about town suggested that the highlights of the festival included Farrell’s solo concert at Wexford Arts Centre, John Sheahan and Dermot Bolger chatting and laughing away in Greenacres, and fiddler Zoe Conway, guitarist John McIntyre and Sheahan again combining their not inconsiderable talents at the Jerome Hynes Theatre. 

The festival, supported by Wexford County County Council, Comhaltas, Music Generations Wexford and others, has been noted as the first step towards bringing Fleadh Cheoil na hEireann to Wexford town. We can only look eagerly towards the next step, whatever that might be.

Jackie Hayden