| Atlantic Crossroads Newfoundland 2005 |
| Martin Finn went next, with his piano. Photos of him will be later as none turned out well. He wasn�t scheduled, but Niall gave up some of his time for him to play. It was a treat, for sure. He opened with Flying Little Midget who �scares the sugar out of airline pilots.� Everybody who heard that song remembered it. They may not have remembered Martin�s name, but they knew the song. LOL! I am missing a song here, but the next one was a �song for Greville� (Mark, who played earlier) All I Want.
What a Pigeon (????) was last and then a little ditty � �Who put the Fin in NewfinLAND? I did, Martin Finn!� This was particularly funny to us folks who have been trying to get the Irish musicians to pronounce Newfoundland properly since March. They insisted on saying NewFOUNDland until Jim finally gave them the 'UnderSTAND NewfunLAND' lesson. They were still concentrating on it each time they said it. Martin introduced Niall Connoly and kept up the Newfoundland pronunciation joke when he announced � �And up next will be Niall, we call him �Cannoli� not Connolly here in NewfoundLAND.� |
| Niall giggled his way through the first song and apparently so did I, as I forgot to write down the title. The second song had something to do with his working as a telemarketer selling Blessed Virgin Mary statues and plaques, among other things. He described some of the inane phone calls he had to endure in this job. �Hello? I ordered a set of mugs and no instructions came with them�� He says he felt unchallenged and not at his �intellectual prime� so he quit. Past Living addressed this. When the Sun Is on Your Back was next, but I don't think that's the title. Geez! I wish I could think of the title. I love that song. Happens when you just put those CDs in the player and don't read the liner notes every time. Believe me, we've played Niall's CD a lot around here. Apparently Niall often loses things, suitcases included, on trips. His mom tells him to pray to St. Anthony who would help him find it. He�d pray and keep looking, so he never knew if just lookling would have done it, or St. Anthony led him to it. If You Find Me in Morocco was the song for lost things and I found the lines, �I�ll be singing for my supper in New York in the fall� to be prophetic. We�ve seen him in NYC in the Spring! I was really surprised when he dedicated the song Long Weekend to �Anne, volunteering at the door�, recalling our long weekend with the songwriters in Cork in March. |
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| Hugh was up next with his booming voice. The man does not need a mic at all. He began with Between the Jigs and Reels, a song about a touring musician�s life. He surprised everyone then, when the next selection was Sonny�s Dream. It's Ron's song and Ron had declined to sing it during his set � he must be awfully tired of singing it at this point - but he couldn�t resist jumping up on the stage with Hugh to sing. Made sure Hugh didn�t mess up, I guess! All You Need was next with a line I know all too well, �All you need is a dollar but you can�t find a dime.� Hugh told us how he came to write the next song, as he was watching Land and Sea he thought about the families taking care of the homestead while the husbands/fathers were at sea. And then he regaled us with Bay That I Love. Theresa Maria followed along nicely after that. It�s a personal favorite for one of the lines in the song that has personal meaning � �Have faith in the Captain and me.� |
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| Singing about boats led to thinking about other transportation, as he had written a song about the end of the line, literally, for the railroad in St. John�s, called Last Trains. Peter Easton, the pirate song came next and the audience really seemed to enjoy it a lot. It�s great! Hugh�s band used to be called the Jolly Rogers. I had seen them one time we came up to Erin�s last year. They called themselves that because they all worked for Rogers cable company. But some band in Philly apparently had the same name first and Hugh�s band had to change it. And then Hugh closed the evening with Bellevue Bonfire. I never knew about Bonfires, having grown up in the crowded city, where a bonfire would have been a disaster. Sounds like a cool idea, though. The song had a cool picking part at the beginning, which captured me right away. |
| When I arrived back at Erin�s after Hugh�s set, I said Hi to Darrell. Darrell told Ken about seeing him at the Folk Festival. We figured out that it was in 2000. He also remembered Jane from Virginia. Has a good memory, that b�y! I got a kick out of his wardrobe, as he was wearing the red T-shirt with the white rectangle that had shown up at several GBS shows I attended before he retired from Great Big Sea.
Bridie�s had put together some gift bags for the Irish musicians and they gave them out that night. Lillian and I had already begun to fill the gift bags that she and Jim were preparing for the group, but were going to give them out later. They got t-shirts, mugs, caps and a couple little bottles of Screech. It was like Christams! I sat with Ger, Niall, Hugh and Clare for the evening. We stayed till 4 AM of course and bought sausage dogs on the way home. When we got home, we retired to the backyard and ate them as the sun rose. WOuld you believe that Vic KNEW I was up and called on the radio! LOL! He was staying overnight at the SARDET in Delaware and was going to work some HF bands on the Ham Radio for Field Day. I went to bed after sunrise, and having talked to my honey, slept a wonderful sleep. |
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