| With the release of their self-titled album in 1975, the
sound of The Bothy Band was instantly described as electric. The band
represented a "dream team" of sorts, with Matt Molloy on flute, Paddy
Glackin on fiddle, Micheal O'Dhomhnaill on guitar, Donal Lunny on bozouki,
and Triona Ni Dhomhnaill singing vocals. Their sound would later
be enhanced by the sounds of fiddlers Tommy Peoples and Kevin Burke.
The traditional superband brought together this small handful
of Ireland's best individual musicians and created an ensemble sound
like no other. The Bothy Band drew inspiration from the pioneering work
of Sean O'Riada and The Chieftans, but whereas the work of those ensembles
had become familiar to many by the 1970's, The Bothy Band's approach
was truly cutting edge. |
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| The Bothy Band only recorded a few albums together before
its group members parted ways to pursue different individual and other
group projects. The height of the Bothy Band's prominence, however,
was truly a period of dominance within the world of Irish music. Their
tunes and arrangements were the hot topic of every conversation at the
local session, gigs were sold out, and to this day the band's legendary
status is respected by all those truly interested in Irish traditional
music. The Bothy Band helped to take Irish music away from its historical
role as solely a dance music, as the band infused the Irish traditional
sound with an energy and a musicianship that firmly established it as
a listening music. Their most notable albums were "Old Hag You
Have Killed Me" and "Out of the Wind and Into the Sun." The band's
work not only paid homage to traditional musicians who had come before,
but it was also right in step with the fastly developing musical and
cultural worlds of the 1970's; most would argue that it was actually
a step ahead. |
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Revival Home Sean O'Riada The Chieftans |
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| More Links about The Bothy Band: http://www.ceolas.org/artists/Bothy_Band/ http://pws.prserv.net/kevinburke/html_discography_bothyband.html |