"Frank Harte "There's Gangs of Them Digging"
Label: Daisy; DLCD022; 2007; Playing time: 77:47 min
If you just have to know one Irish folk singer and song collector, it is the late great Frank Harte (-> FW#7, FW#30). Frank passed away in 2005 (-> FW#31), having just completed the recording of "There's Gangs of Them Digging". His collection of Irish labour songs, the title is a quote from the song "Mountains of Mourne" by Percy French who not only had been a vaudeville artist but also an inspector of drains, spans three centuries -- before the arrival of the Celtic Tiger in Ireland. From the spailpíní, the migratory harvestmen, who were looking just for seasonal work all over Ireland or Scotland to the navvies who spent the rest of their lives in Britain and America to build roads and railways, the underground and hydro dams (having fiddles and flutes in their cases to spread the gospel of traditional Irish music too). Frank Harte, having been architect as an occupation so he knows the trade, is at his best digging up familiar tunes such as "Galbally Farmer", "Blantyre Explosion", "Hot Asphalt", Dominic Behan's "McAlpine's Fusiliers" and Ewan MacColl's "Tunnel Tigers", and moreover the unfamiliar songs from the Irish song tradition such as "Tambo" (The Magherafelt Hiring Fair), "When the Breakers Go Back On Full Time" or Kieran Halpin's "Aran Labourer" written in the late 1970's when Kieran (-> FW#31) was working on a building site in London. "There's Gangs of Them Digging" is a labour of love, the songs unaccompanied or sparsely accompanied by Donal Lunny, With its extensive liner notes it is the consummate legacy, as perfect as anything he did in his lifetime. Thank you, Frank! Rest in peace!
Daisy
Walkin' T:-)M"