Description
http://www.jameskeane.com
This is a video of James Keane from Dublin playing three reels at his home in New York around Christmas. By this time he had already undergone a battery of radiation treatments to fight esophogal cancer, with another set coming up the next morning and so on.
Despite the draining ordeal also complicated by severe diabetes, he turns to music to keep good spirits. We won't know the efficacy of the procedure for a few weeks more.
His voice is greatly diminished, but his music is still alift with that classic James Keane style.
He is playing the Castagnari KEANEBOX, a signature instrument, commissioned as a testimony to his mastery of the two row button box. This was the instrument he played on his award-winning albums and critically acclaimed That's the Spirit, Sweeter as the Years Roll By, and the first release LP by the super-group Fingal.
more info: http://www.jameskeane.com
------------REELS-------------
Derrycrag:
James learned this tune from the great East Galway fiddle-player named Aggie Whyte in the late 60s. The reel was composed by missionary priest Father Kelly, also from that musical area that produced Jack Coen, Patsy Touhey, Mike Rafferty, Joe Madden and a long list of greats. James recorded the reel on his 1999 Sweeter as the Years Roll By album that was voted one of the top twenty traditional albums of the last twenty years by Irish America Magazine.
The Whistling Postman (or Gallagher's):
James learned this reel from Paddy Reynolds, the great Longford fiddler who lived and became legendary in New York City. It was recorded by Reynolds on an album that featured James on one side, and the fiddler with Charlie Mulvihill and Felix Dolan on the other. Made in 1970, Sweet and Traditional Music of Ireland is a classic of the genre, and a collector's item for any connoisseur.
The Galway Reel:
This reel was chosen by Paul Brady for an album he began recording with James, and which has yet to be finished. On it, Brady lilts to Keane's instrumental.