Modern Music

     As it is said in the 'Encyclopedia of Irish History and Culture', “Irish traditional music, at the beginning of the twentieth century, was generally played, sung and danced in the domestic setting.” Singing was an important occupation while working or simply as entertainment. Although most musicians and dancers were not professionally dedicated to music, they spend their free time singing, dancing and playing instruments in groups. Usually, those groups were make up by the members of the same family, and so the songs were orally transmitted from one generation to the next.

     But by the end of the century, this background suffers a complete change. On the one hand, instead of the performances in rural areas, there were music festivals, and radio/television studios; and instrumental music was most commonly played for listening to rather than for dancing. The intention of becoming widely known and being understandable for more people is the cause, little by little, of the decrease of spoken Irish.

     On the other hand, instruments were more easily purchased and the foundation of organizations for the promotion of Irish music (as Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann in 1951; or Cáirde na Cruite in 1960; Na Píobairí Uilleann in 1968), made possible the increase of listeners and also new musicians who were taught in this kind of music. Also the growth of three different varieties of dancing: set dancing, céilí dancing and step dancing. The Set dance derives from the French dance 'quadrille'; Céilí dancing and céilí bands, were groups which used Irish dances composed for its promotion; and Step dancing, was taught by dancing masters and controlled by the Coimisiún le Rincí Gaelacha (Irish Dancing Commission), which organized dancing competitions known as feiseanna throughout Ireland and overseas.

     In the U. S. these bands started using drums and pianos, and soon after, the same happened in Ireland thanks to the development of the means of communication. In the 1920s and 1930s some famous musicians from the U. S. were for example Michael Coleman¹ and James Morrison. Another significant change in the 1960s: the voice (and not only the instruments) was given importance, as it is shown in New York with the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem², and both in the U. S. and Ireland, The Dubliners³ and The Wolfe Tones⁴ were significant.

     I powerfully recommend you to see these videos so that you can have an idea of what am I talking about:

     Unfortunately, after this decade Irish traditional music became a minority because of the diversity in the music available. But musicians like Seán Ó Riada introduced a fussion of Irish traditional music with many other genres and innovations (like the bodhrán). He was particularly known for being the first person to introduce Irish music to the concert stage; some of his compositions like Mise Éire⁵ became really popular, so much so that nowadays it is possible to find multiple versions of the song; (I chose this video because it also shows some beautiful irish landscapes).

The Chieftains^{I; 6-7} and Ceoltóirí Laighean developed from Ceoltóirí Cualann. And Míchéal Ó Súilleabháin, combined plenty of genres.

^II already posted some of their videos in my previous entries, but as it is one of my favourite bands of Irish music, I will post two more of them just in case you want to listen to them, but they have lots of really good songs and collaborations with another musicians and bands:

     As you may see, nowadays it is performed professionally and not only in Ireland or with Irish emigrants abroad but also among non-Irish people. By the 1970s there were groups as Planxty⁸, Horslips⁹, De Danann¹⁰, The Bothy Band, and Moving Hearts, who played fussions of genres and instruments. Stage shows of step dancing as “Riverdance¹¹,” “Lord of the Dance,” began in the 1990s but there is still versions of them this years.

Relevant Studies and Organizations:

-Captain Francis O'Neill published his volumes on Irish music in the United States.

-The Irish Folk Song Society (1904 – 1920s in London) collection, publication, and study of Irish traditional music.

-In 1935 the Irish Folklore Commission collection and preservation of traditional culture.

-The Folk Music Society of Ireland (1971).

-Breandán Breathnach's collections Folk Music and Dances of Ireland (1971).

-Irish Traditional Music Archive in 1987.

Source:

Encyclopedia of Irish History and Culture, vol. 1./ James S. Donnelly, Jr. (editor in chief) Macmillan Reference USA. Thomson Gale.

Soon to come

In my next post I will introduce you to an Irish singer named Austin Durack. He’s going to share some typical Irish sayings and their meanings with us. Who more than a native Irishman will know so much about this theme?

Besides the expressions I will also be sharing a link where you can hear some of his music.

Stay tuned and Slán leat!

Sláinte!

     Once we have dealt with some introductory aspects, let's see something that I am sure you already know or that you have heard about. Ireland is worldwide known by its beers. Our goal in this post will be to show you some terms (either in English or Gaelic) related to beer.

     Before all, we have to distinguish three brands of beer in Ireland by their manufacturing process: Lager ("smooth, elegant, crisp, and clean" ), Ale ("hearty, robust, and fruity") and the most typical one, Stout, with a dark color, heavy, and richly flavored.

     If you ask somebody about the best Irish beer, you will probably get this answer: Guinness; actually the most ever know Irish stout.  First elaborated in the 18th century, it has its own history, tradition and museum as well.  Somebody said it is "a rich and creamy Irish favorite, this hearty brew is best straight out of the bottle", well I guess it is a matter of taste.

     Now, let's imagine you are in an Irish pub in which it is spoken a particular Gaelic dialect; 
How would you say "Get me a pint of Guinness, please!"? 
Pionta Guinness, le do thoil
And "Cheers!"?           
Sláinte!
What about "Are you drunk?"?
An bhfuil tú ar meisce?
If we are asking somebody "Are you going to drink?" we will say:  
An mbeidh deoch agat?

     Then we can also distinguish between bottle (buidéal), glass (gloine), pint (pionta), mid-glass (leathghloine) and mid-pint (leathphionta) as measures for a beer.

     I hope you have fun with a stout, or as they would say a "leann dubh", when you are spending some time Ireland.

Sources:

http://www.gayot.com/beer/top10irishbeers/main.html

http://unzaragozanoenirlanda.wordpress.com/2011/06/23/las-cervezas-irlandesas-irish-beers/

http://innisfree1916.wordpress.com/curso-de-irlandes/

The History of Éire

     We don’t know too much about what was going on in Ireland until the arrival of Christianity due to the lack of written sources of information. However, from this period, we still preserve a large amount of megalithic remains all over the island (like dolmens, menhirs and cromlechs) along with remains of mine production.

Poulnabrone dolmen, the Burren, County Clare.

     Coming from Central and Eastern Europe, the Celts will arrive at the island in the 4th century BC. This new people, who are very similar to the Gauls in Gallia or the Britons in England in terms of culture and lifestyle, will replace the original settlers of Ireland.

     Despite the Celts will be scarcely organized, living in small little kingdoms (and even fighting each other) the Romans won’t be interested in conquering Ireland (as they did with Britannia) what made possible the survival of the Celtic culture for much longer. However, they will be interested in doing business with the Celts and this will lead to the cultural rapprochement between them. The arrival of Christianity is the best example of Roman influence in this society. In the 5^th century, the whole island will have assimilated the new religion and many monasteries will be built.

Round tower at Kildare Abbey, County Kildare. Kildare monastery was one of those that were built by the Christians during the 5^th century in Ireland. The only portion of the original building that remains today is the Round tower. 

     It is very interesting to notice the name that the Romans used for Ireland: Hibernia. It comes actually from Greek and means “land of the winter”. They also referred to Ireland as Scotia (“land of the Scoti”) since the Scots originally came from Ireland.

     Attracted by the wealth of Irish monasteries, in the 8th century the first Viking invasions took place in the island. This nation founded Dublin and occupied the territories around this city and for two centuries they will spread terror around the island plundering and destroying everything in their path. This situation will last until 1014, when they will be defeated in battle by Irish king Brian Boru.

     In the 12^th century a new invasion took place in Ireland. The Normans, leaded by Henry II of England, conquered the Island and soon after, Ireland became part of the British Crown and many new castles and fortress were built.

     The British dominion of Ireland will last over seven centuries. During this period there will be many rebellions which will be harshly crushed, and this situation will become even harder when Henry VIII broke with the Church of Rome and imposed the doctrine of the new Anglican Church.

     Finally, in 1912, a law which allowed the administrative autonomy of Ireland was passed by the English Parliament. However, the outbreak of the First World War paralyzed the process and the law wasn’t applied which lead independence movements to get angry and declare the independence in 1916.

     The British army crushed the uprising in 1919. However, the struggle for the independence persisted until 1921, when the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed. This treaty meant the much-anticipated independence of Ireland, although the North of the island still remained as part of the British Kingdom. Nevertheless, many people weren’t in agreement with the division and this eventually leads to the outbreak of a civil war that devastated Ireland from 1922 until 1923.

     In 1949, Ireland severed its last constitutional ties to Great Britain and an Irish Republic was finally proclaimed.

Early Modern Music (From 1500 to 1800)

      The most remarkable characteristic of this period is the origin of Irish traditional music and the consideration of harp music as obsolete. This could be because both Henry VIII and Elizabeth I prohibited music: the píobare (piper), bard (figure which I will explain in detail later), and aois ealaíon (artistic class) were frequently outlawed. Only some Tudors allowed Irish music in the court or to the Gaelic kerne (professional soldiers) of the Fiach MacAodha Ó Broin being led into battle by pipers. Native musicians also registered their impressions of the Tudor conquest. From now onwards, the differentiations of the figures of the file (poet), reacaire (reciter), and cruitire (harper) are no longer valid.

     Music has seemed to be a good way of transmitting news and also a good report of political and war issues, (i.e., “Seán Ó Duibhir A'Ghleanna”¹ (lauding the exploits of John O'Dwyer during the Cromwellian Wars);“Clare's Dragoons”² (extolling Wild Geese valor in the French army at Fontenoy in 1745)). The theme of love keeps being recurrent (i.e., “Dónal Óg”³ by anonymous poet and a vernacular song (in gaelic amhráin)). Other kinds of love songs are: caoineadh (laments), amhrán bheannaithe (sacred songs), keening songs, and the formal and semilearned marbhna (bardic elegies), the aisling (“vision poem/ song”, in which the poet meets an echanted lady, symbolically Ireland) increased notably in number. “Úr Chill an Chreagáin”⁴ by the Ulster poet Art Mac Cumhaigh (1715-1774) is among the best known.

     Here there are the videos for the songs before mentioned. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did. (In some of them, the lyrics are also included but only on youtube's webpage).

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

     By 1730 folk music became community oriented by dealing with religious, legal, and economic issues. Jacobite songs, which reflected a common Gaelic culture that linked Ireland with Scotland, emerged in the 1700s with songs like “Mo Ghile Mear”⁵ and “Rosc Catha na Mumhan”⁶ which are still very popular. And the last one helps perfectly to introduce the next coming topic: Dancing.

DANCING

     Throughout the 18^th century, traffic in and out of Ireland had a direct impact on music (i.e., the adoption of the modern violin (fidil in Irish)), song and dance, and helped to disperse Irish music. Some popular forms by the 1600s were: “hay”, “fading”, “trenchmore”, and “rince fada” (long dance).In 1780, there is a very interesting quotation by Arthur Young (English geographer) who noted that “dancing is general among the poor people, almost universal in every cabin. Dancing masters of their own rank travel through the country from cabin to cabin, with a piper or blind fiddler; and the pay is sixpence a quarter. It is an absolute system of education.” He cited jigs, minuets, and cotillions as the most common dances. Reels and hornpipes were not that common until the 1790s. By then, the printed collections of some Scottish composers were gaining new audiences in Ireland and that is why it is possible to find reels like “Miss MacLeod” in Irish repertories.

BARDS

     First of all, and as I have mentioned before in my previous post “History of Irish Music” I want to clarify again the fact that Bards were basically Poets and not Musicians. Once this is clear, we can look at the dramatic change of social status that bards suffered by this time. From being an important figure in the history of music, to almost become extinct. Most of the composers turned to be itinerant harpers becoming also musicians because of necessity. Only those who were patronized by important landlords or wealthy Gaelic families could do it for a living. The most prominent was Turlough Carolan (1670- 1738) whose work was published during his own lifetime because of his wade repertoire. It is needed to say that efforts were made to preserve the oral art of the harper that was facing extinction, for example at the Belfast Harpers' Festival in 1792 or collections of Irish Music.

THE END OF THE EARLY MODEN ERA

     The work of previous songwriters of the 1790s (Raiftearaí, Ó Súilleabháin) is now marginalized by macaronic songs (bilingual lyrics) and English language ballads. But all of them shared the topics of love, work, recreation, death and the supernatural. There were also political songs but not as important as they were the centuries before. As for the instruments, pipe makers perfected the unique multireed uilleann pipes. By 1742 Irish traditional music had spread worldwide.

     An interesting detail is that in the rural clacháns⁷ of the west of Ireland, music making followed the cyclical calendar of the agricultural year. Dance music and set dancing experienced dynamic growth in the late 1700s, until they were erased by famine and diaspora.

⁷ A group of houses clustered together with no apparent order or pattern.

     Source: Encyclopedia of Irish History and Culture, vol. 1./ James S. Donnelly, Jr. (editor in chief) Macmillan Reference USA. Thomson Gale.

Religion in Ireland

    The predominant religion in Ireland is Christianity, with the largest church being the Roman Catholic Church. In 2011, 84.2% of the population identified themselves as Roman Catholic. The Catholic population of both the Republic and of Northern Ireland together is about 3,9 million. Most churches are organized in all-Ireland basis which includes both Northern-and Republic of Ireland. The Catholic church is involved in education and health services.

    The second largest Christian denomination, the church of Ireland or the Anglican church, declined in membership for the most of the twentieth century, but has more recently experienced an increase. In the 2011 census 269,811 people (5.9%) had no religion, with 3.905 and 3,521 people describing themselves as “atheist” and “agnostic” respectively. Those who did not state a religion numbered 72,914 (1,6%).

    The patron saints of Ireland for Catholics and Anglicans are Saint Patrick, Saint Bridget and Saint Columba. Sain Patrick is the only one of the three who is commonly recogniced as the patron Saint. Saint Patrick’s day is calebrated in Ireland and abroad on 17 March.


Religion and education

    Large number of schools in Ireland are runned by religious organisations but parents can ask for their children to be excluded from religious study if they wish so. However, religious studies as a subject was introduced into the state administered Junior Certificate in 2001; it is not compulsory and it deals with aspects of different religions not focusing on one particular religion.

    Freedom of religion for belief, practice, and organisation is guaranteed to every citizen. Ireland is in general a place where there is great tolerance and respect for diversity in religious belief, leaving the situation in Northern Ireland aside.


The Role of Religion in Modern Ireland

    “It is interesting to note that while 90% of people stated that they were Catholic in the 2006 census, a Europoll conducted several months earlier found that just 72% of people believe there is a God which appears to suggest that there is a large number of Catholics in Ireland who do not believe in God.” These apparantly irreconcilable numbers can be explained by looking at the place religion has in everyday life in Ireland. By European standards church attendance is still relatively high - 60%. Still the reduction on the 85% who attended church regularly 25 years ago is huge. Church is starting to be more and more a place to go on special occasions like to babtize children, to get married or to bury their dead.

     “Being Catholic, or Protestant, in Ireland is as much a cultural as a religious statement – it’s a statement about a heritage rather than a belief. There was often a significant misunderstanding by outside observers looking at the long running conflict in Northern Ireland who frequently saw it as a “religious war”. It never was, it was a struggle between communities with diverse histories and cultures. Thus the well known gag about the Belfast man who stated that he was Jewish, only to be asked “Yes, but are you a Catholic Jew or a Protestant Jew?”


Fdo: Anna-Leena Launonen

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_the_Republic_of_Ireland
http://www.dochara.com/the-irish/facts/about-religion/

Bases of the Gaelic Phonology

As you have learned with my fellows' posts, the Irish Gaelic is a Celtic language, has nothing to do with English, so words and pronunciations are completely different. We also know that there are some particular dialects and by consequence particular pronunciations.

Well, in this post we will have a look to the bases of pronunciation, just a brief introduction to phonology. In terms of phonology, the first thing you have to know is that in Gaelic, you will find  just 18 consonant sounds (phonemes), these are: /b/ /d/ /f/ /g/ /h/ /k/ /l/ /m/ /n/ /p/ /r/ /s/ /t/ /tʃ/ /ʃ/ /ʒ/ /dʒ/ /v/. When learning Gaelic it is also helpful to distinguish 10 vowel sounds, five long vowels and five short ones.

Long vowels                                                            Short vowels

í: /i:/ For example: sí (She).                                      i: /ɪ/ For example: sin (This).

é: /eɪ/ For example: mé (Me).                                   e: /e/ For example: te (Hot).

á: /oʊ/ For example: lá (Day).                                  a: /ʌ/  For example: cat (Cat).

ó : /ɔ:/ For example: bó (Cow).                                o:  /ʊ/ For example: donn (Brown).

ú : /u:/ For example: tú (You).                                  u:  /u/ For example: bus (autobús).

Dipthongs

Pronounced as short vowels           

ai, ea: /a/                                ei: /e/               ui, io: /ɪ/

Pronounced as long vowels

aí, oí, uí, uío, ío, ao, aoi: /i:/  oi: /ɜ:/              eo, eoi, eó: /ɔ:/           úi, iúi: /u:/

Pronounced as dipthongs

iai: /ɪə/                                    uai: /ʊə/          eá, eái, ái: /oʊ/           ae, éa, éi, aei: /eɪ/

Gaelic speakers also have the so called non-written vowels which are pronounced between some consonants although they are not written. This happens between  r, l, n  and m, b, bh, g, where it is necessary to pronounce a /ə/.

Now, let see the consonants. Consonants are different when they come to be analyzed as phonetic elements, so that we will find a particular pronunciation for a single consonant depending on the vowel that follows it. For instance, consonant "t", followed by "a", will sound  /t/ and when followed by "e" it will sound /tʃ/; that is how they work. Here is the whole list of consonants and their pronunciations.

T: ta, to, tu sound  /t/, while te, ti sound /tʃ/.

D: da, do, du  sound /d/, while de, di sound /ʒ/.

L: la, lo, lu sound  /l/, while le, li sound  /dʒ/.

N: na, no, nu sound /n/, while ne, ni (In this case the pronunciation is not clear but seems to be like the Spanish /ñ/).

S: sa, so, su sound /s/, while se, si sound /ʃ/.

R: ra, ro, ru sound /r/ (strong "r" in this case), while re, ri sound /d/ (soft, like an Spanish simple "r").

C: always sounds /k/.

Ph: always sounds /f/.

Fh: is mute.

Th: always sounds /h/.

Ch: cha, cho, chu sound /k/, while che, chi sound /h/.

Bh/mh: sound /v/, but in the middle of a word, bha, bho, bhu sound /oʊ/.

Gh: gha, gho, ghu sound /g/, while ghe, ghi sound /ʒ/.

Dh: dha, dho, dhu  sound /g/, while dhe, dhi sound /ʒ/. In the middle of a word they always sound /ʒ/.

As you will have observed, the sound switches every time we find an "e" or "i" after the consonant we refer to.

These are the basic issues every learner of Irish Gaelic has to deal with for the first time. Nevertheless we must keep in mind that this is an standard, and depending on the region words will be pronounced in a different way. 

I hope you all have learned a little bit and have enjoyed this post.

Sources:

http://www.ehowenespanol.com/hablar-gaelico-irlandes-como_133865/

http://innisfree1916.wordpress.com/curso-de-irlandes/