Conor Caldwell

#belfast needs to have a conversation about how we allow the name of a colonial psychopath like Arthur Chichester to still adorn our streets.

‘We spare none of what quality or sex soever, and it has bred much terror in the people.’

Excited to announce this upcoming gig in Belfast’s Duncairn Arts Centre with the award-winning Ryan Molloy, Ben Castle and special guest Cathal O’Curráin!

Bígí linn!

Ticket link: theduncairn.ticketsolve.com/ticketbooth/...

Call for papers from @birzeit.bsky.social for forthcoming conference on The Palestinians and the genocidal
War on Gaza.

I’m really disappointed to see Catherine Martin lose her seat. A revolutionary Arts Minister, the best since Michael D. #GE24

Brilliant to experience the live college sports band experience up close at the #friendshipfour in old Belfast town. Band of @merrimackcollege.bsky.social during the period break.

Kneecap win case over 'unlawful' UK govt funding block Irish language rap group Kneecap has won its discrimination case against former Conservative minister Kemi Badenoch.

Irish language rap group Kneecap has won a discrimination case over the British govt's refusal to award them an arts grant

Bhí Altan linn i nDámh Chruinne Éireann inné!

Mighty to have these legends working with our students!

@unioflimerick.bsky.social

Beautiful place! Báin sult as!

8/ Bunting bound it with its own manuscripts which in turn found their way to the library T Queen’s University in Belfast where you hand view it today. To read more, you get Nicholas Carolan’s edition of the Neal collection from the Irish Traditional Music Archive Website ITMA.ie

7/ Through this book we see the many threads and strands of influence that shape Irish traditional music today. A century later only one copy of this book survived - it’s our luck that it found its way to the hands of Edward Bunting, himself one of the most important collectors of Irish music.

6/ The music of the Jacobites is also found here in the airs Limerick’s Lament and Patrick Sarsfield, essentially the rebel music of its day referring back to the events of King William’s conquest only three decades earlier. That’s as recent as Italia ‘90 is to us.

5/ A few tunes from the great harp composer Turlough Carolan were already famous enough to be published during his lifetime in this book. Carolan was referred to in Dublin as Signor Carrollini where he supposedly mixed with the composer Geminiani. One of his most beautiful airs is The Fairy Queen.

4/ The authors ran in bohemian circles in Dublin during the penal laws and had. A friendship group that included Catholics and Protestants. They were largely allowed to go about their business without issue, telling us that the Penal laws were less harshly interpreted in Dublin than elsewhere.

3/This might tell us a lot about how quickly knowledge of the Irish language was collapsing in the early c18th in Leinster. It’s also important to realise that these pieces were songs, but stripped of their Irish lyrics and arranged for ‘polite’ audiences. Cultural appropriation in essence.

2/ This book of Irish music tells us an enormous amount about the Irish language, the Penal laws, Jacobite culture, the so-called Glorious revolution and Anglo-Irish Dublin. The first thing to take away is the transliteration of the tune tutors from Gaelic into English phonetics (see below).

Trad Music 🧵 This year is the 300th anniversary of the most important Irish book you’ve never heard of: first Irish publication of Irish music, The Neals’ ‘A Collection of the most celebrated Irish Tunes proper for the violin, German Flute or Hautboy (Dublin, 1724). Why is this important? Read on…

First post on BlueSky of happy recent music times with Ryan and Ben. Here’s to building a good community in this new space.