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O'Neill - Irish Minstrels and Musicians, Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 105

O'Neill - Irish Minstrels and Musicians, Volume 1, Issue 1, Page 105
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periodical Publisher
Regan Printing House, Chicago, 1913
periodical Editor
[none]
periodical Title
O'Neill - Irish Minstrels and Musicians
volume Number
1
issue Content
Famous Performers on the Irish or Union Pipes208 Irish Minstrels and It/Iusicians209A very entertaining but lengthy story of OLearys adventures and experiencewith the fairies at the fort or rath of Doon will be found in another chapter.JoH N McDoxouGIlFar more truly can it he said that (ialway was the Mother of Pipers thanthat Virginia was the Mother of Presidents. Although obviously inadvisable toinstitute comparisons, yet in introducing the subject of this sketch as second tonone in his profession from Galwav, or any other county in Ireland for that mat-ter, we are but voicing the opinion which prevails among oldtime musicians.John McDonough was the best player of irish music on the pipes known inhis (lay, Mr. Burke tells us. He always claimed the parish of Aimaghdown, onthe banks of Lough Corrib, as his native home (the same in which I was born),but he traveled about from place to place (luring the greater part of his life.Even fifty years after his death, which occured in 1857, old people speak ofthis remarkable pipers facility in giving to the music an appeal and expressionpeculiarly his own. An all-around player, capable of meeting all demands, he hada preference for piece or descriptive music.Much of his time was spent in Dublin, and we are informed by his daughter,Mrs. Kenny, Queen of Irish Fiddlers, that while in that city lie had for a briefperiod been engaged by the late Canon Goodman at Trinity College, either for thepurpose of teaching his art, or furnishing entertainment.In this Mrs. Kenny is simply mistaken, for her father died ten years beforethe Canons appointment to a professorship in Trinity. McDonough may haveentertained the faculty or students in earlier years, in Goodmans sophomore days,or what is more probable lie may in his wanderings through Ireland have met thereverend piper when a curate at Berehaven, or Skibbereen, and there given himinstructioii.Whatever the occasion may have been, McDonoughs name was placardedconspicuously in Dublin as the celebrated Irish piper from Annaghdown, CountyGalway. especially on the bridges crossing the Liffev.\Vhile playing on the streets one evening, to the keen (lelighit of an appre-ciative audience, some well-to-do gentry who came along were so captivated byhis inimitable execution that the - took him into a clubhouse or hotel in the vicinity.No doubt he was treated with much liberality, but when he reappeared on thestreet some time afterwards, it was noticed that lie was under the influence ofintoxicants. This so angered the waiting audience that they stoned the building,and didnt leave a whole pane of glass in the windows within reach of theirmissiies.in his native province and even beyond it John McDonougli was commonly re-ferred to as Mac an .-lsal from the following circumstance: His father, who wasa dealer in donkeys or asses, made a practice of getting Johnny to play the pipesalong the highway to fair or market while mounted on the back of one of them.\Vhether the fathers motive was parental pride in his sons musical precocity, ora shrewd appreciation of the value of commercial advertising, we are unable tosay, btit it certainly attracted attention. Later in life, from one of his favoriteexpressions, he was called Home with the rent.To no class in the community did the terrible famine years prove more disas-trous than to the pipers. Those who lived through plague and privation found butscanty patronage thereafter. The pipers were gone out of fashion. as one ofthem ruefully expressed it, so poor John McDonough, the peerless piper, findinghimself crushed between poverty and decrepitude. took sick on his way back to hisnative Galway and died neglected and ignored in the Gort poorhouse.His splendid instrument, made specially for him by Michael Egan, the mostfamous of all Irish pipemakers, while both were in Liverpool, was treasured byhis widow for seven years after his death. Necessity however forced her tosacrifice her sentiments, and though costing originally twenty pounds she disposedof it for a trifle to a pipe-repairer named Dugan, of Merchants Quay, Dublin.KEARNS FITZPATRICKIt appears that Edmund Keating 1-lyland and William Talbot were not theonly Irish pipers who had the honor of playing for the entertainment of KingGeorge IV during his visit to Dublin in 1821.K.earns Fitzpatrick enjoyed that distinction also, but probably on account oftile tones of his instrument being deficient in volume for such a large auditorium,he was not equally successful in appealing to the royal generosity, although hisplaying of St. Patricks Day and God Save the King was greeted withapplause.How the prestige of having played before the king affects a musiciansreputation. is well illustrated by a quotation from the letters of a German princewho toured Ireland in 1828, addressed to his sister:In the evening they produced the most celebrated piper of Ireland, KeansFitzpatrick. called the King of the Pipers, having been honored with the appro-bation of His most gracious majesty, King George the Fourth. Indeed themelodies which tile blind minstrel draws from his strange instrument are often assurprising as they are beautiful, and his skill is equal to his highly polished andnoble air. These pipers, who are almost all blind, derive their origin from remoteantiquity. They are gradually fading away, for all that is old must vanish fromthe earth.The prince. evidently much impressed with the piper and his instrument, tookoccasion to cultivate a closer acquaintance. Four days later he writes: As Fitz-patrick tile piper, whom I had sent for to my party yesterday, was still in town,I had him come to play j5rivatiin, in my room while I breakfasted, and observedhis instrnment more accurately. it is as you know peculiar to Ireland, and con-tains a strange mixture of ancient and modern tones. The primitive simple bag-pipe is blended with the flute, the oboe, and some tones of the organ, and of thebassoon; altogether it forms a strange but pretty complete concert. The smalland elegant bellows which are connected with it are fastened to tile right arm bymeans of a ribbon, and the leathern tube communicating between them and thebag lies across the body. while the hands play on an upright pipe with holes like aflageolet which forms the end of the instrument, and is connected with four orfive others joined together like a colossal Pans pipe. During the performance theright arm moves incessantly backwards and forwards on the body, ill order to fillthe bellows. The opening of a valve brings out a deep humming sound whichforms an unisona accompaniment to the air. By this agitation of his whole body,while his fingers were busied on the pipes I have described. Fitzpatrick producedtones which no other instrument could give out.The sight in which you must pictllre to yourself the handsome old man withhis fine head of snow-white hair, is most original and striking; it is, if I maw sayso. tragi-comic. His bagpipe was very splendidly adorned, the pipes were of ebonyornamented with silver. the ribbon embroidered, and the bag covered with flame-colored silk fringed with silver.
issue Number
1
page Number
105
periodical Author
O'Neill, Capt. Francis
issue Publication Date
1913-01-01T00:00:00
allowedRoles
anonymous,guest,friend,member

O'Neill - Irish Minstrels and Musicians

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