FORTHCOMING

1001 Gems, in The Lyric Feature, RTÉ lyric fm, date to be confirmed.

Seán Doherty explores the life and music of Chicago Police Chief and Irish music collector Francis O’Neill.

Photo: Seán Doherty (left) with Martin Hayes

In 2020, composer Seán Doherty was unexpectedly reconnected with the traditional Irish music that he had grown up with. It became the start of a quest to research the life and music of Francis O’Neill (1848-1936), Chicago Police Chief and an important collector of Irish music.

In 1001 Gems, Seán explores O’Neill’s life and music. He hears about O’Neill’s early life, police career and interest in music from two biographers, Nicholas Carolan, author of author of A Harvest Saved: Francis O’Neill and Irish Music in Chicago and former Director of the Irish Traditional Music Archive (ITMA) in Dublin, and Mike O’Malley, Professor of History at George Mason University in Virginia and author of The Beat Cop: Chicago’s Chief O’Neill and the Creation of Irish Music, and from Aileen Dillane, Lecturer in Music at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance at the University of Limerick. James McDermott, lecturer in the School of Computer Science in the University of Galway, explains how he is using computer technology to help Seán with his research and analysis of tunes.

Aedín Ní Bhróithe Clements, subject specialist in Irish studies at the Hesburgh Library at Notre Dame University in Indiana, shows Seán some of O’Neill’s correspondence, while broadcaster and historian of Irish music Harry Bradshaw and Barry Stapleton, Director of the Ward Irish Music Archives in Milwaukee, tell him about the discovery of rare wax cylinder recordings. Also in the programme we hear from musicians Martin Hayes, Marta Cook and Siobhan McKinney, owner of Chief O’Neill’s pub in Chicago.

Martin Hayes performs Sergeant Early’s Dream, while Seán performs a selection of other tunes from O’Neill’s collections, finishing with joining a group of musicians in Chief O’Neill’s pub to perform Shandon Bells, the first tune in O’Neill’s collection The Dance Tunes of Ireland: 1001 Gems.

1001 Gems is produced by Claire Cunningham (Rockfinch Ltd) and funded by Coimisiún na Meán with the Television Licence Fee and RTÉ. Producer for RTÉ lyric fm: Eoin O’Kelly.