'An Irish Spring' marks a change in concert production at Community Center
'An Irish Spring' marks a change in concert production at Community Center
The Sebastopol Community Cultural Center is doubling the number of concerts it produces
These last few months have been a time of unprecedented tumult for Sebastopol nonprofits. Though no definitive cuts to the city budget have been approved yet, local nonprofits, including the Sebastopol Community Cultural Center, can see the writing on the wall, and they know that, given the red ink in next year’s city budget, the chances of getting any additional funding from the city is unlikely.
Sebastopol Community Cultural Center’s response, according to SCCC Board Director Robin Latham, has been to double the number of concerts it produces. Latham said she and the center’s new interim director Tanya Sierra are hoping the new ramped-up concert schedule will help to make up for the money the city probably won’t be giving them next year.
They’re kicking off this new schedule with “An Irish Spring,” a co-production of the community center and Walker Creek Music Camp in Petaluma. “An Irish Spring” happens tonight, April 9, at 7 pm at the Sebastopol Community Cultural Center. (Doors open at 6:30 pm.)
“People are always asking us for more Irish music,” Latham said, “and this dovetailed nicely with a program from Walker Creek Music Camp, which is launching their spring music camp, with a focus on Irish Music, this Thursday.”
Michael Bryant the director of Walker Creek Music Camp said, “I told Robin, ‘Well, we've got these world-class Irish music teachers here for a while, why don’t we have a concert as a fundraiser?’”
Knowing how many Irish music fans there are in Sebastopol and West County, Robin said she jumped at the chance.
The center is going all in on the Irish theme, Latham said.
“We're doing a big potato bar—like you get a potato and there all these things you can stuff in your potato. And we're doing beer and wine and Irish coffees,” she said.
The line-up of “An Irish Spring,” features some big names in Irish music:
The Black Brothers: Shay and Michael Black are singing siblings from Ireland's foremost family of song, The Black Family, which also includes their sisters Mary and Frances and brother, Martin. Hailed in the Irish Echo as “one of the most impressive groups of Irish singers to be found anywhere; exquisite, exhilarating and nothing short of thrilling.” They raise their sibling rivalry to revelry. The Blacks adroitly accompany themselves on banjo, cittern and guitar. The Blacks are accompanied by button accordion virtuoso Félim Egan and keyboardist Eamonn Flynn. At a Black Brothers concert one can expect to hear Irish traditional ballads, Dublin street songs, music hall ditties, contemporary folk compositions, rollicking reels and joyful jigs, all interspersed with comic stories, jokes and humorous childhood anecdotes that invariably have audiences smiling broadly and joining in on the choruses. Shay and Michael are close harmony singers, with a special fondness for songs that include their audience in the chorus, and many of the songs are narratives with stories.
Liz Knowles: Though classically trained, Liz Knowles’ more than 30-year journey through Irish music has defined her musical style. She established herself as a dynamic performer and recording artist as soloist on the soundtrack for Michael Collins (fiddler with Riverdance, Broadway’s The Pirate Queen and The Green Bird) and as a soloist with the New York Pops, the National Symphony and other orchestras, and as featured artist for the Ireland 100 Festival at the Kennedy Center. She was music director and producer for several large-scale stage shows and recording projects that toured Europe, Asia and South America. She is a member of The String Sisters, The Martin Hayes Quartet, and Open the Door for Three and produces an ongoing podcast with fiddler Liz Carroll called “The Lizzes.”
Marla Fibish: Marla is one of the prominent voices of the mandolin in Irish music, bringing a deep and distinctive sensibility to the tradition on one of its lesser-heard instruments. Her dynamic playing is featured on her 2020 solo album The Bright Hollow Fog; the 2017 Noctambule release A Sweetish Tune; the eponymous Three Mile Stone recording with Erin Shrader and Richard Mandel; and The Morning Star with legendary Irish singer/bouzouki player Jimmy Crowley. She has performed and taught nationally and in Ireland. Marla also plays mandola, tenor guitar and button accordion, and is a singer and composer. She is known for her musical settings of works from a variety of poets, as well as original tunes written in traditional forms.
Eamon O'Leary: Originally from Dublin, Eamon has lived in New York City for many years. He has toured extensively throughout North America and Europe, performing and recording with many of Irish music’s great players. In 2012, Eamon released a recording of traditional songs, The Murphy Beds, with Jefferson Hamer, described by the Huffington Post as “ten beautiful, crystalline songs.” He has also teamed up with old friends John Doyle and Nuala Kennedy to form The Alt. Their self-titled debut album was released in November 2014. His songwriting can be heard, most recently, on The Silver Sun from Reveal Records.
Dave Cory: Dave Cory has been playing Irish and American folk music on tenor banjo, guitar, mandolin, bouzouki and fretted instruments in general for over 20 years. Throughout years of gigging and recording, Dave has contributed to numerous independent projects and releases, from pub sessions to theatre soundscapes, and instructional camps to touring groups. After early classical guitar lessons, and chance hearings of the Chieftains and the Bothy Band, Dave started traveling to traditional music festivals and summer schools in Ireland each year, before moving to Boston and working with the wildly active music community there.
Get tickets for “An Irish Spring.”
Find out more about Walker Creek Music Camp here.