Adding fuel to the fire

Arts: Should Gradam Ceoil, TG4's annual traditional music awards ceremony, be given a shake-up? Siobhán Longthinks so

IT’S BEEN 12 years since TG4 inaugurated Gradam Ceoil, the awards recognising the artistic contributions made by musicians, singers and composers to traditional music. Those who fuel the fire by way of collecting, archiving, teaching, inspiring and organising backbone events (such as the Willie Clancy Summer School, now in its 37th year) are also honoured. Gradam Ceoil awards aren’t so much the Oscars of the traditional world (because recipients aren’t competing against one another, nor do they apply for consideration) as musical first cousins to the Nobel – an accolade that honours excellence over all else.

There’s a certain groundhog-day quality to the annual Gradam Ceoil concert. With an Oscar ceremony-style format (itself alien to the tradition), the proceedings tend to sacrifice the idiosyncrasies of individual performers to the demands of television. So major artists, such as Martin Hayes, get to play a few tunes, which jostle for space in a programme packed with diverse guests, second takes and audiences shuffling uncomfortably in their seats as the long hours of recording proceed.

As the awards enter their teens, maybe it’s time to shake up the formula and find a more fitting approach that honours the recipients, affords them the space to play at the top of their form and relegates the demands of TV recording to second base.

Most of this year’s winners are associated more with modest self-effacement than chest-thumping celebrations of their artistry. This year’s Composer of the Year award goes to Castletownbere-born brothers John and Finbarr Dwyer. Not only do they hide their light under a bushel when it comes to taking credit for their countless compositions, but they’ve been known to puzzle over who wrote which, so intertwined are their musical instincts.

Cathal McConnell is this year’s Traditional Singer of the Year. Although he’s lived in Scotland for nearly 40 years, he’s Fermanagh-born, and bred of the infamous clan that includes songwriters Mickey and Seán and Cormac. Cathal is a founder member of Boys of the Lough, an ever-evolving foursome who’ve put in more road and air miles than a hangar full of travel writers. Having been honoured by the Willie Clancy Summer School in 2009, for both his singing and flute-playing, McConnell makes no secret of his delight on hearing of this Gradam Ceoil award. We intercept him in the midst of a Herculean recording project with fiddle player Dónal O’Connor, which entails McConnell recording almost 200 songs from his repertoire. McConnell’s songs, whether political or humorous, recount picaresque tales that thrive in the re-telling.

“You don’t hear political songs these days, because they’re considered uncool,” McConnell observes, “which I think is really tragic, and then there are songs which are considered to be not politically correct. I’m here recording some political songs, and if some people don’t like them: well, tough. They should be heard.”

If political correctness could endanger our song tradition, what of its emotional breadth? McConnell is adamant that we have much to lose if we choose to hack away at the heart of the traditional song’s subject matter. “Love or emigration seem to be the only two things people sing about,” he reflects, “but people were forced out of their homes when they disagreed with the authorities. Our songs should reflect all of that, but the truth is: if they’re not put down [recorded] now, they’ll be lost.”

Muiris Ó Rocháin will receive this year’s Gradam na gCeoltóirí/Musicians’ Award. He’s responsible for probably the greatest annual traditional music gathering, the Willie Clancy Summer School: a Mecca for musicians, singers and dancers for the past 37 years. A school teacher from Dingle, he has collected from storytellers in south Kerry, collaborated on film projects and celebrated the Wren each and every St Stephen’s day. Anyone who’s ever been lucky enough to find themselves in Miltown Malbay for “Willie Week” will be accustomed to Ó Rocháin’s unfailing hospitality and his supreme ability to ensure that individual egos play second fiddle to the music.

“All my life, I’ve just had a great love for it,” Ó Rocháin admits, as he recounts his satisfaction at having been able to donate his extensive storytelling collection to UCD back in the 1960s. His pivotal role in establishing the Willie Clancy Summer School in 1973, was informed by a fundamental belief. “We were always concerned about authenticity and integrity. We never sought popularity. We wanted to make sure that what we had was of a high standard.”

Perhaps Ó Rocháin’s greatest contribution to the traditional arts has been his refusal to allow anything he has been involved in to become “party political”. Steering a course that side-stepped the land mines that divide traditional music collectives (where the first item on the agenda was all too often the split), he insists that the non-competitive Willie Clancy Summer School (which in recent years has accommodated 1,500 students from 41 countries with 250 tutors on all instruments) is a broad church unfettered by dogma.

“The most important thing is that people enjoy themselves,” Ó Rocháin says. “People [performers] are chosen on merit, nothing else. We have no big constitutions or regulations or rules, no hierarchical structure, and we wouldn’t be involved in it if we didn’t feel that there was some intellectual or cultural value to it. Once it has cultural value, that’s all that matters. We were never for the limelight really.”

Missing the female touch

THIS YEAR'Swinners are outstanding but there's not a woman among them. Members of the judging panel (three women and four men) say that this anomaly occupied more than an hour of debate but, ultimately, the decision was based on achievement. TG4 is not in the business of adopting a policy of positive discrimination in relation to Gradam Ceoil.

Women musicians and singers are again returning to centre stage (following the huge contributions by the late Cúl Aodha singer Elizabeth Cronin, Clare concertina player Mrs Crotty, Louth fiddler and teacher Rose O’Connor, and past TG4 award recipients Mary Bergin and Máire Ní Chathasaidh) but there is a recognition that, for many years, they took a back seat to their male counterparts. Presumeably the task of caring for families left scant time for the business of recording or performing. Now, with such a diversity of contributions from the accomplished compositions of Chicago fiddler Liz Carroll to those of Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh, Michelle and Louise Mulcahy (pictured), it seems women are again taking their place in the pantheon of the tradition.

Liam O’Connor, a former recipient of the Young Traditional Musician of the Year and a member of this year’s judging panel, is unequivocal in his defense of the winners’ list. “Each award is nominated on an individual basis and I think it belittles the award, and all past and future recipients, if you were to try to deliberately counter that. I don’t think that tokenism is what it’s about either.”

Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh has been on the Gradam Ceoil judging panel for the past four years. As an artist, he’s never shied from pushing the boundaries of traditional music, and admits that his views on the awards have shifted over time. Where once he would have craved a more “experimental” element to the recipient list, he’s now of the view that other factors count much more.

“These awards are earthy and closer to the core of the tradition than I initially thought they might be,” he says. “That’s no harm though, because it’s very important that the core of traditional music is honoured and that musicians and singers are recognised. There are so many ways of looking at what’s important in traditional music, and looking at great individual voices is only one of those ways, but these awards are fulfilling a very important role.”

Liam O’Connor, who joined the judging panel this year, believes the key to the Gradam Ceoil awards is the fact that they honour individual contributions to what is a vast and diverse tradition. “It’s an accolade for musicians who have dedicated a lot of time and thought and energy to their own playing,” he says, “but it’s a recognition too of the role and influence of their family members or local community on a national scale. For example, Seán McKiernan, (this year’s Traditional Musician of the Year), plays in the spirit of Willie Clancy, and he plays Patsy Touhy’s pipes so it might be an individual who’s receiving the award but it also reflects the people they learned from.”

The winners

Gradam TG4/Traditional Musician of the Year: Seán McKiernan

Ceoltóir Óg/Young Musician of the Year: Aidan O'Donnell

Gradam Saoil/Lifetime Achievement Award: Seán Potts

Gradam na gCeoltóirí/Musicians' Award: Muiris Ó Rócháin

Traditional Singer of the Year: Cathal McConnell

Composer of the Year: John and Finbarr Dwyer