Decade of Centenaries Programme 2020-23
Shannon Waters Flow Songs, Stories & Cultural Change in 1920s Leitrim The Shannon has always carried more than water. It carried people, memory, music and ideas — flowing outwards from Leitrim to the wider world and back again. Shannon Waters Flow brings together songs, stories, people and moments from a […]
Memory, conflict and the songs that carried the people through In the spring of 1921, County Leitrim — often remembered as a quiet border county — found itself drawn directly into the final, most intense phase of the Irish War of Independence. Two events in particular, the Sheemore Ambush and […]
Picture courtesy of Val Fitzpatrick, Mohill – taken at Leitrim Fleadh 1983. Back Row (l-r) Felix Gallagher (Drumshanbo), Tom Mulligan (Bornacoola), Barney McCormack (Drumshanbo), John Daly (Jamestown), Patricia Coffey aka Bangles (Dublin). Front Row (l-r) Packie Duignan (Arigna), Mick Clancy (Manorhamilton), Jack McGrath (Carrick-on-Shannon), Peter “Pee” Fitzpatrick (Aughavas/Mohill) Lilting Nobody […]
When times were hard, good times were simpler – and whether an occasion was serious or not, wherever people gathered, there was a bit of craic. Here Charlie McTeague from the Ballinamore area remembers May Day customs and bonefire night. He also speaks about the pattern at St. Brigid’s […]
The Good People “Long ago, there lived a lone girl in a house on the side of Clooncarne rock. Beside the house was a fairy tree where the fairies used to stay. So one day the girl had a very bad fire and she went out gathering sticks to put into the fire. When […]
Pat “Phildy” McGowan James Doherty Great Characters Described as “great characters” who are “in a class of their own when it comes to story-telling or entertaining… or play-acting”, Paddy McGowan and James Doherty are introduced in this radio programme which focuses on the pair who were from Geaglom, Drumkeeran and […]
Competitions Scór competitions were established by the GAA in 1969 “to promote Ireland’s traditional pastimes and culture while offering club members the chance to meet up, have fun and represent their club during the winter months while Football and Hurling had ceased.” There are eight events in Scór that cover […]
John McKenna is regarded as one of the most influential flute players of the 20th century. Born in a small cottage in the townland of Tents, Tarmon near Drumkeerin in 1880, McKenna emigrated to New York and became a prolific recording artist during the 1920s and 30s. These 78 recordings […]
Whilst not a whole lot is known about Francis J. Cox’s early years, we hear him tell Tom Munnelly in 1971 that he had a brother and sister and that he was the youngest in the family. He mentions that his brother was shot in Flanders and that his mother […]
Thomas Moran was born in 1876 in Drumrahill, Eslin and was often known around the place as “Old Moran the ballad singer”. He had a vast repertoire of ballads and it is not clear where he acquired so many of these songs, although it is mentioned that he got many […]
