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IT HAS taken a while: almost 37 years in fact. But on the weekend after next, the village of Cúil Aodha in West Cork will finally get around to unveiling a statue in honour of Seán Ó Riada, its most famous resident, who spent his later years there before dying in 1971, aged only 40, writes Frank McNally

An initiative of friends and relatives, the statue (by Kerry sculptor Mike Kenny) portrays Ó Riada playing the organ and will be located in the grounds of the local church, where one of his most enduring compositions - the Ó Riada Mass - is still sung every Sunday by a choir led by his son Peadar.