Very appropiate for St Patricks Day, I was reading of a Welsh-Norman scribe who accompanied the Normans to Ireland in the 12th century.

Far from being ambivalent toward the Irish he described them as,"barbarian", lazy, and wearing "odd" clothes, he then went on to say that they were of "splendid physique" and as for their musical skills on the Harp, he described it as "coming from the angels".

He considered them much superior to any others he had heard," they introduced and leave the rhythmic motifs so subtly, they play the tinkling sounds of the thinner strings above the sustained sound of the thicker strings so freely, they take such secret delight and caress the strings so sensuously that the greatest part of their art seems to lie in veiling it, as if," that which is concealed is bettered -art revealed is art shamed". Fair play to you Giraldus Cambrensis, well, the music descripition anyway.

Now I tell you, and this was the 12th century, this great art in music still continues to-day, pity about the "odd" clothes that hasn`t changed, bloody Jeans everwhere.