I very much enjoyed George Martin's recent television series, The Rhythm Of Life. The venerable composer, conductor and Beatles producer wandered the world in search of the meaning of music without any of the analysis-paralysis you usually get when experts take hold of something so precious. But then George Martin is a musician first and I always trust musicians - at least when it comes to music.
Some of what was said in the series was obvious enough and some of it was quite startling. But even so, he really should have been in Donegal a couple of weeks ago for the ultimate exposition of what it's really all about.
It was with a feeling of renewal that I was back once more at the foot of Errigal (Fujiyama as the poet O Searcaigh calls it) to say my cupla focail and declare open the Frankie Kennedy Winter School - an annual extravaganza to honour the memory of a greatly missed gentleman and Altan flute player.
This week of classes, concerts and seisiun famously peaks on New Year's Eve with a mad outpouring of rhythm, melody and sheer bedlam and has quite definitely become the hottest ticket in the country for seeing in the New Year. I only wish Sir George had been there to experience this relentless night of what in America might be called "soul" but what, in Donegal, musicians tend to call "tunes" - endowing that simple word with a certain loaded magic.
And of course music is magic. In his programme about rhythm, George Martin and a man with a microphone headed into the forest to record the sounds of nature. One of these recordings was then presented as something of a mystery as percussionist Ray Cooper played along with bald enthusiasm, clearly very impressed by this indisputably natural rhythm.
We all guessed that the creature responsible for this sophisticated percussion was probably some class of woodpecker, a grasshopper perhaps, or maybe even the fifth beetle himself rubbing his legs together. But we were all wrong. The rhythm was in fact the sound of the inside of a tree! More things in heaven and earth etc. George then talked about nature and heartbeats and the rhythms of life and it all made particular sense in under the quartzite and scree of Errigal/Fujiyama - a territory that is home to Altan, Clannad and the solo Brennan, Enya. Dig a bit deeper, however, and you will find a place of very peculiar genius - especially the fiddlers, some of them long gone like the great Johnny Doherty, and others like Vincent Campbell and Tommy Peoples who are thankfully still alive and fiddling.
This is also Daniel country and his music too must surely be as real and valid an expression of the place as anything else. There's no denying it - even if you wanted to.
The week began with much ritual. First the pilgrimage itself to the far north-west. Then the arrival, the convergence and the reunions. Various musicians are either accounted for or rumoured to be on the way. The presence of very specific musicians is confirmed as quickly as possible for we know it is they who are the hard core who will play "tunes" that will only cease at breakfast time.
With all of this in place, a big feed is always a wise precaution and this is where Kitty and Francie Mooney stepped in to preserve the honour of the county by catering for those of us who desperately needed to eat.
That very kettle Bridie Gallagher always sang about was already on the boil and there was soup and stew for everyone. Mairead (about to perform with Altan) was dishing out the most magnificently fortified boiled cake, Steve Cooney was conscious that he wouldn't get a chance to eat again until six in the morning and Martin from Dorset was playing In The Bleak Mid-Winter on the saw.
And so, well fed and watered, we returned to the hotel to let the music take control of the evening. As soon as Cooney and Begley and assorted members of Altan took to the stage a definite power was unleashed and the room seemed to change its very shape. The glare of electric light was replaced with the excitement of light and shade and a sort of ecstatic frenzy grew with breathtaking energy and speed - everything propelled along by music which built and built in ferocity as the old year passed and the new one came in with happiness, confidence and reassurance.
People's faces began to change too, their postures altered, they began to dance, they began to clap, they began to shout. And as the evening melted into the night, we began to almost forget ourselves. I say almost because most of us were more conscious than usual and very much living in real-time. We were not, as we might have been otherwise, lamenting the past or fearing for the future. We were, thanks to the music, properly tuned-in, and I understood exactly what Stravinsky meant when he said that music is "the sole domain in which man realises the present".
Maybe music is the most important thing in the world? After all there wouldn't be much love, pleasure or necessary ritual without it. Every society needs it. It enables us to do many things - not least communicate with ourselves and others. Certainly it lifts the heart in a way that is thrillingly irresistible. The real thing is a truly glorious expression and apart from the many charlatans in the music business (and its assorted offshoots) most human beings know very well the value of music.
There was no talk of "product" in Donegal. No word of demographics. No crass pigeon-holing. No conspiracy of the bland. Just the open and honest expression of something quite indescribable.
George Martin, in his television series, did a good job in getting across some of the more indescribable aspects of music. Why, it has the power to make us happy, sad, edgy, warlike etc.
He also explained our need for it and even some of how it is done. Not that knowing how it is done is something we should concern ourselves with very much. For the listener, it demands a certain surrender and not the analytical eye of the scientist, the critic, the academic or the consultant.
We should really endeavour to keep these people away from our musicians - and leave them alone to create, re-create and play their music. As Evan Eisenberg says in his book The Recording Angel - "An ornithologist knows better than the birds how flying is done. But no one expects him to fly."
Eisenberg goes on to describe musicians as "self-conscious birds" who have music both in their muscles and in their minds. And that must be a wonderful state of being. It is for this reason that I have a certain well-meaning envy of musicians. I enjoy their company and I value them as our most important force. They create, with the rest of us, nights like New Year's Eve in Donegal where we can all live - really live - in the present.
George Martin said that music was the difference between life and death. As Bill Shankly famously said about football - it is much more important than that.
John Kelly is a writer and broadcaster.