Irish sessions in Australia

Subject: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: Mick Lowe
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 08:04 AM

Apparently there is nowhere in Australia you can go and join in or listen to a good Irish session. Well judging by the complete lack of response to my requests for venue information that is.
Perhaps you Aussies or just too shy
Cheers
Mick

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: alison
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 08:25 AM

Hi Mick,

Us Sydneysiders have just got back from a 4 day folk festival in the bush...... what particular area of OZ did you want to know about?

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: Mick Lowe
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 08:25 PM

Somehow Alison I knew you'd respond
Any part of Oz, providing it's a good session, you can get a feel for what I am after if you check out the site here though you might want to see the rest of it at this link
Slainte
Mick

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: alison
Date: 26 Apr 99 - 10:32 PM

Hi,

The problem (although it might not be a problem) with Sydney is that it is a really big place, and the "completely" Irish session are a long way away from me in the centre of Sydney........ they do exist....

The other thing is that we have such a cultural mix in Sydney that you get a mixture of music styles too. so I could tell you where there is an Irish session.. or where you might be more likely to hear Irish music.. but then on that particular night they might play more Aussie music..... but I'll look up some and send them off to the other site. Most of the folk clubs over here will hear a bit of Irish music during the night (especially if I happen to be there.)

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: Mick Lowe
Date: 27 Apr 99 - 08:57 PM

Hi Alison
I love this "dual conversational" mode.. i.e. here and by email.
I am intrigued though as to what comes into the class of "Aussie" music. Everyone seems to be getting rather "passé" nowadays with regards to "African" music since Paul Simon's Graceland album, perhaps it's time someone brought Aboriginal (I know I spelt that incorrectly) into the modern idiom.
Many thanks for all the info you sent me.
Cheers
Mick

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: alison
Date: 28 Apr 99 - 02:28 AM

Hi,

there isn't much Aboriginal music around the folk clubs which I have been to, (occasionally you'll bump into a didgeridoo player). Aussie songs can often be classified as Irish too....... eg Black Velvet Band, Shores of Botany Bay...... in that they mention Ireland and Botany Bay. A lot of them are transportation songs...... but there is plenty of purely Aussie stuff too.

No doubt some of the Real Aussies will get into this thread eventually and help out.

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 28 Apr 99 - 03:36 AM

G'day Mick,

Being a bit closer to the Big Smoke (Sydney) than Alison, I see a few range of Irish "sessions" ... all the way from the Plastic Paddy commercial pubs with stage Irish names to fairly serious Irish sessions in the back rooms of small (and decidedly uncommercial) pubs in the inner suburbs.

I'm sure the scene is fairly similar in all the capital cities on the Eastern side of Australia (I'm not so sure about Perth, in Western Australia, where the folk scene is very English). If you are going to be in this end of the world, give me a hint as to where you will be travelling and I will sound out some friends in that area for good session spots.

I don't spend much time in such sessions myself because I am mainly interested in what happened to a wide world of music that came, willingly or no, to these shores over the last 211 years. A lot of the most trenchant critics of the Poms' colonial ways were the Irish - both rebels and economically displaced, swept into minor crime in London's streets.

The Irish formed a very Australian style of song that was different from what they knew at home because their new home was as different from the old as they could ever imagine ... and their old enemies where just as changed by a new country and situation. This heritage of song, as well as music very different from the Irish stock, informs a style and heritage that is not found by plundering Irish & Scottish tune and song books.

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From:
Date: 28 Apr 99 - 05:29 AM

When I read the name of this thread, I thought it was about the Internet cencorship bill our government is trying to ram through.

I have a serious question. What exactly does the word "session" mean in the phrase "Irish Session". To me a "session" means a "recording session" and a "sessions player" is somebody who gets gigs in recording studios. It seems to take on a different meaning when the adjective "Irish" is added.

Murray

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: alison
Date: 28 Apr 99 - 07:03 AM

Hi,

It comes from the gaelige "seisiu/n" which according to my dictionary translates as "session"(!!?!)

I have always taken it to mean where a few (or as many as you like) performers have got together with a common purpose.. in this case to play Irish music. Don't you call them "jam sessions" in the US? (where people get together just to make music and have a bit of craic?(meaning, fun, good company etc...))

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: Ted from Australia
Date: 28 Apr 99 - 09:48 AM

Mick,

There is a weekly Irish session in Cairns every Saturday night at the back bar (Gilhooleys) of the pub at the Pier Markets.

There is also an Irish scene at Townsville and Mount Isa Ask me more ehen and if you get here.

Hi Alison, slainte.

Regards Ted

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: alison
Date: 28 Apr 99 - 11:03 PM

I'll be sending you those tapes in the next few days Ted.

Slainte

alison

Subject: RE: We must feel sorry for the Australians
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 29 Apr 99 - 03:33 AM

G'day all,

We might take Alison's etymology like the Irish take their potatoes - with a liberal helping of salt! The word session - including the Irish Gaelic spelling of the identical word - ultimately comes from the Latin: sedere, to sit; giving (again in Latin) sessionis.

A session (of law, parliament, music or whatever) is a group of people sitting down together. Gaelic is almost as rich in Latin inheritances as English, but the relationship is obscured since neither the Irish nor the Scots bother to preserve the Latin spellings.

Music sessions of all sorts occur around folkies of all persuasions. The Session bar at the recent Australian) National Folk Festival, in Canberra, was in danger of being declared a compulsory ear protection zone by Easter Sunday night! The best sessions are something that doesn't really have much place in the commercial sptectrum so they don't get much publicity. When you contact the keen musicians, you find good music sessions - but they don't always have "national" names attached.

Regards,

Bob Bolton