Anyone who loves the traditional folk music of Britain and Ireland should listen to Celtic Folkweave. It would be Mick Hanly and the late Mícheál Ó Domhnaill’s only album together. Originally released in 1974 on Polydor Records, it never got the attention it deserved, surprising considering the talent of these two alongside an incredible lineup of Liam O’Flynn, Matt Molloy, Donal Lunny, Tommy Peoples, Declan McNeils & Mícheál’s sister Tríona Ní Dhomhnaill.
Despite initially falling into obscurity, it has since become a cult classic. A lot of the music released around this period was influenced by the Breton folk revival of the 1970s and had an undeniable energy that many have since sought to recapture. It marked a shift and gave some, such as Planxty, rock-like status.
The Tara label has reissued this classic and gone a leap further – the album has been remastered and includes four additional bonus tracks from the previously unreleased The Banks Of Sweet Primroses. Celtic Folkweave is available across multiple formats, including CD, LP (180g Vinyl), Digital Standard and Digital Deluxe. The album is beautifully presented with an excellent introduction from Mick Hanly and sleeve notes from the knowledgeable and engaging Leagues O’Toole (the man behind Foggy Notions and author of Planxty’s excellent biography, The Humours of Planxty).
Before we dig in, it’s worth giving some background. In 2008, Gael Linn released a beautiful book-CD titled ‘Keep ‘er Lit’, a tribute to the songs and music of Mícheál Ó Domhnaill, who passed away at his home in Dublin on July 7th, 2006. The album featured music from the many collaborative projects he’d been a part of, and the proceeds went to The Irish Traditional Music Archive (ITMA). Those collaborations included performances with Kevin Burke, Paddy Glackin and the bands Skara Brae, The Bothy Band, Relativity and Nightnoise.
Mícheál was born in Dublin in 1951, the second child of five. They were a musical household, and his father, Aodh, hailed from Rann an Feirste, an Irish-speaking area of Donegal. As well as being a school teacher, Aodh also worked as a collector for the Irish Folklore Commission. During the summer, the family often stayed in Rann an Feirste, where Aodh’s sister Neilí Ní Dhomhnaill lived, a talented singer with extensive knowledge of Irish and English songs. It was from her that much of the song repertoire of the Ó Domhnaill’s came, including The Heathery Hills of Yarrow, which features on Celtic Folkweave. The album’s liner notes also reveal that Mícheál would later collect works from Skye and Lewis during his time as a student at the School of Scottish Studies.
Mícheál was smitten by the guitar, which he began playing at 14. Later, while in Rann an Feirste, he met fellow guitar enthusiast Dáithí Sproule from Derry, who was based at the Irish Summer College at the time. They, along with Mícheál’s sisters Maighread and Tríona, would form Skara Brae, who released just one album in 1971. In the album notes, O’Toole shares how they were influenced by the more popular music of the time, including the Beatles and their D-A-D-G-A-D guitar tunings were inspired by the likes of Bert Jansch and John Renbourn.
Two years later, in 1973, Mícheál formed a duo with Mick Hanley, who also later performed as a duo with Andy Irvine, and Donal Lunny and replaced Christy Moore in Moving Hearts from 1982 until 1985. They called the duo Monroe (was also written as Munroe), named after the United Irishman Henry Munroe, one of the leaders of the 1798 rebellion. The name wasn’t kept for this release. They first met in 1972 at the Swamp Folk Club in Rathmines, one of the very first folk clubs set up during the revival years of Irish folk music. It was here that they developed an impressive broad set of British and Irish folk songs, which they sang in Irish, English and Scottish Gaelic.
Born in Limerick, Hanly’s routes to folk, like many at the time, started from the other side of the water with American folk singers before falling for the recordings of Seán Ó Riada and Willy Clancy. While O’Toole’s album notes observe how their contrasting styles shaped their sound, describing Mícheál as having a fragile singing tone and Mick Hanly as sounding more brusque, it’s not something I’m really aware of when listening as the overriding character of the music is primarily warm and mellow.
In the introduction to this reissue, Mick Hanley humbly states, “I must hold my hands up here and say that, at the time, I considered myself a fairly average guitar player…and my knowledge of Irish traditional music was zero… I was still the developing chrysalis, while Mícheál was the fully formed, beautiful butterfly.” Despite this, the guitar accompaniment and unforgettable gentle vocals and harmonies gave them such a beautiful and memorable sound.
Hanly expands on their playing in the notes, explaining how they intentionally chose 12-string Hagstrom guitars – with just six strings on both. Mícheál usually finger-picked in D-A-D-G-A-D, while Hanly used D-G-D-G-B-D. With the larger 12-string bodies, they were able to create a bigger, far richer sound. Richer and bigger doesn’t mean louder – subtlety is a crucial ingredient throughout this album; from the guitar playing to the vocals, it’s that gentleness and almost intricate-like delivery that draws you in. The atmosphere these two are capable of creating washes over you on the likes of The Heathery Hills of Yarrow and even on the subtle psych-folk string-bending Pentangle cover (No Love Is Sorrow) Songbird; their playing is considered and never showy. This track would have fitted in well on the highly acclaimed Cherry Red Boxset Dust On The Nettles, that examined the metamorphosis that British folk underwent during the late 1960s and early 70s.
There are subtle hints of that psychedelic dust on the more traditional Breton Dances. It may be more a reflection of that period and their influences seeping into their music, but nothing on this album is hurried. That pacing is highlighted on the likes of Éirigh’s Cuir Ort Do Chuid Éadaigh, a far more relaxed take than that chosen by Clannad on their 1976 album Dúlamán. The same can be said of An Bothán A Bha’ig Fionnghuala, one that Ó Domhnaill would later revisit for a more energised delivery with The Bothy Band, whose members include some of those present here – Molloy, Lunny, Ní Dhomhnaill, Ó Domhnaill, and Peoples.
Among the extended tracklistings is their debut 7-inch, which includes My Johnny Was A Shoemaker. The well-paced finger-picked opening lends an urgency to the press gang song, which is followed by the contrasting unaccompanied ‘The Glasgow Barber’ and the tale of a haircut gone wrong (seeking a Mayo haircut in Glasgow is never going to end well), the comedy is heightened by the mournful delivery.
The notes for this release include details of the album artwork, which was designed by Des O’Meara & Partners and is centred around a triskelion graphic, a neolithic design featuring a triple spiral with rotational symmetry. We’re told that the term folkweave is derived from a style of loosely-woven fabrics and could relate to this style of record on a number of levels, the interconnecting Gaelic traditional cultures represented in the tracks, or indeed the manner in which Mick Hanly and Mícheál Ó Domhnaill and this wider pool of musicians constantly weaved in and out of various ensembles across the interconnected tapestry of 1970s Irish trad and folk music.
They toured Brittany in the run-up to the release. Still, the collaboration was short-lived, spanning just four months before they pursued other projects and collaborations mentioned above. Despite this, it’s an album that deserves so much more attention, and hopefully, this reissue will allow that to happen. This is the first time you’ll be able to listen to the album on streaming services – if you love it, I highly recommend getting a physical copy on vinyl or CD for the accompanying notes.
Celtic Folkweave is a folk classic that’s up there with the very best, including Planxty and The Bothy Band and it is finally getting the attention it deserves.
CELTIC FOLKWEAVE TRACKLISTING
1. An Bothán A Bha’ig Fionnghuala (Album Version)
2. Breton Dances
3. The Heathery Hills Of Yarrow
4. Éirigh’s Cuir Ort Do Chuid Éadaigh
5. (No Love Is Sorrow) Songbird
6. The Bold Princess Royal
7. The Banks Of Sweet Primroses*†
8. Bíodh Orm Anocht
9. The Banks Of Claudy
10. Hè Mandu*
11. The Hiring Fair At Hamiltonsbawn
12. The Hills Of Granemore*
13. Bríd Óg Ní Mháille
14. My Johnny Was A Shoemaker*
15. The Glasgow Barber
16. An Bothán A Bha’ig Fionnghuala (Acapella Single Version) *
*Bonus singles added to the original album
†Previously unreleased
Pre-order via Claddagh Records