It Occurs To Me:  Light in the gloom

On Saturday evening in the Ulster-American Folk Park, the bluegrass festival was in full swing when the air ambulance flew overhead during the concert on the main stage. 

Earlier, we had been informed that a very serious accident had happened outside the park and roads to and from the venue were closed. Now we realised that most probably there was a fatality or fatalities. 

I had been introducing bands at the gig and trying to simultaneously find out how the Donegal v Tyrone game was going, but all that paled into insignificance with this tragic news. 

In due course the decision was made to finish up three hours earlier than usual, on the advice of the PSNI, and I read a prepared statement to a very understanding and sympathetic crowd.

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It wasn’t until the following morning that we heard of the tragic death of Bernie Cranley from Lifford, and our thoughts and prayers were with Bernie’s family and with the family of the other injured parties. 

Our penultimate act was Muireann Bradley and she got two standing ovations. One girl and her guitar so enthralled the audience that you could hear a pin drop, until they rose to their feet when she finished. 

My Donegal heart was bursting with pride and the honour of introducing her on stage will stay long in my memory. 

The other artists from the US and Europe who watched from the wings were equally blown away by her extraordinary guitar playing and singing.

Considering what was taking place outside, her 45 solitary minutes on stage was infused with an appropriate quiet dignity and consequently, her ovations weren’t raucous, rather an acknowledgement of one young girl’s ability to woo and communicate. 

Frank Galligan at Bluegrass Omagh in the  Ulster-American Folk Park with Richard Hurst, the founder of the festival

We resumed as usual on the Sunday despite the road closures and diversions, and in the afternoon, I had the pleasure of presenting the founder of the festival in 1992 with a special Belleek Crystal from his former colleagues in the Ulster American Folk Park,  as an acknowledgment of Rossnowlagh man Richard Hurst winning the Distinguished Achievement Award at IBMA last September, for his services to bluegrass. A weekend where I was reminded of the lines by German writer, Jean Paul Richter… “Music is the moonlight in the gloomy night of life”. 

                                         Kevin O’Donnell 

Regrettably, I couldn’t get to Ardara this year for the annual Cup of Tae Festival which honoured musician and tutor Kevin O’Donnell. 

I’m delighted for Kevin who has taken over Paddy Ward’s legendary Music Shop in Donegal. I was moved by his Facebook tribute to his father Aidan earlier this week…it read:

“It is a year ago today since dad’s passing. A lot of stuff has happened in that year for me personally and it’s just a pity he wasn’t around to see it all. One thing that stands out for me is that he truly would have loved to have seen all his grandchildren take to the stage a few weeks back to play with myself and Aidan in concert. He would have got some kick out of that.”

Indeed he would…he is sorely missed…I have many happy memories from our Bogagh days. 

                                         Jimmy McBride RIP

This morning, I’ll be attending the funeral of Jimmy McBride in Cootehill. I’ve written here in the past about Jimmy, a Downings man who played alongside my father in 1957 when they won the County Junior Championship. 

In fact, Jimmy is the last surviving member of that team. At the Peile Comortas na Gaeltachta in Ardara in 2015, I interviewed Aogan O’Fearghail, GAA President was fulsome in his praise of the contribution of  Jimmy McBride, to football in Aogan’s native Cootehill for over fifty years as a schoolteacher, player and administrator. I last spoke with Jimmy on the telephone a year ago…may God rest his soul. 

                             It is not antisemitism!

Watching an emaciated Gazan child on the verge of death on the RTÉ news made my blood boil with sadness and rage. 

Children being slaughtered in schools and hospitals, Israeli settlers destroying bags of flour destined to feed the starving and far too much denial in the West that we are dealing with genocide…pure and simple. Shulamit Adler was born in Poland. Her family migrated to Mandatory Palestine when she was a child, and Aloni grew up in Tel Aviv. She was sent to boarding school during the second world war while her parents served in the British Army. 

As a youth she was a member of the socialist Zionist Hashomer Hatzair youth movement and the Palmach. During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, she was involved in military struggles for the Old City of Jerusalem and was captured by Jordanian forces. Following the establishment of the state of Israel, she worked with child refugees and helped establish a school for immigrant children.

In 2008, at age 80, she published  “Israel: Democracy or Ethnocracy?” a harsh assessment of her homeland. She wrote on the cover: “The state is returning to the ghetto, to Orthodox Judaism, and the rule of the fundamentalist rabbinate is becoming more profound.

“Well, it’s a trick, we always use it. When from Europe somebody is criticizing Israel, then we bring up the Holocaust. When in this country people are criticizing Israel, then they are antisemitic. And the organization is strong, and has a lot of money, and the ties between Israel and the American Jewish establishment are very strong and they are strong in this country, as you know. And they have power, which is okay. They are talented people and they have power and money, and the media and other things, and their attitude is ‘Israel, my country right or wrong,’ identification. And they are not ready to hear criticism. And it’s very easy to blame people who criticize certain acts of the Israeli government as antisemitic, and to bring up the Holocaust, and the suffering of the Jewish people, and that is to justify everything we do to the Palestinians.”

                                         The emoji cowards

When the first rumours about Mayo manager Kevin McStay’s medical emergency came to light, one imbecile posted up a laughing emoji on social media. 

I don’t know what team this excuse for a human being supports, but he is a lowlife. The same applies to those whose reactions were similar when a car drove into celebrating Liverpool supporters last Monday. 

It beggars belief, but in my experience, they neither have the gumption to come out from behind their emojis nor the spelling ability to put a coherent sentence together. If they were living in the USA, guess who they’d be supporting? 

                                     A big beautiful pun

I see where Trump has been promoted to running all of the McDonald Farms. 

He’s going to be known as the C...IE...IO…!

“And on that farm, he had some dicks,(sorry, ducks?) CIEIO,

With a quack quack here, and a quack quack there…”

You know the rest!