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Transcription: [00:14:47]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
I grew up in Brooklyn, and uh-- so this will relate; interesting. You know, it was a Catholic school,
[00:14:57]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
in a Catholic parish, in Brooklyn, and around Christmas time we'd have a Christmas party,
[00:15:03]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
and the nuns would bring in cookies and candy and all this, and they'd have a Santa Claus and everything.
[00:15:08]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
And the last day, right when everybody wanted to go home, you were supposed to bring in a record. And you'd bring in your favorite record
[00:15:17]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
and the nun would play one track off everybody-- there's fifty kids in the class. They'd play one track off each of the records, you know.
[00:15:25]

[SPEAKER NAME=Bill McComiskey]
This is how you killed the afternoon; waiting until 3:00 to get home and get into it.
[00:15:29]

[SPEAKER NAME=Bill McComiskey]
So I asked my mother about it, you know, which record should we-- should I bring in to play.
[00:15:36]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
She just said, "Well," she says "bring your favorite one," which when I was in fifth grade, she said, "Which one do you want to bring? Do you want to bring the Tulloch Cèilidh Band
[00:15:46]

[SPEAKER NAME=Bill Mccomiskey]
or the Val McHill Cèilidh Band, [[Laughter]] or do you want to bring Joe Cooley?" [[Laughter]]
[00:15:50]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
[[Background voice]]
So I decided to bring Val McHill Cèilidh Band. It's a lovely-- it's a great record. It's sort of like the same setup we have here.
[00:15:57]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
But, uh, Elvis Presley was real popular then, [[Laughter]] and, uh, and, uh, I think, uh-- Who's that other guy? [[sings, imitating Johnny Mathis]] "Chances are that--"
[00:16:07]

[SPEAKER NAME="Unknown Speaker 1"]
Johnny Mathis.
[00:16:09]

[SPEAKER NAME=Bill McComiskey]
Johnny Mathis, yeah. But everybody-- and it was a predominately Italian class, and everybody played it--
[00:16:14]

{SPEAKER name="Bill McComiskey"}
and next thing the Val McHill Cèilidh Band came blasting. [[Laughing]] They didn't understand what the heck--
[00:16:21]

[SPEAKER NAME="Bill McComiskey"]
It was a strange thing growing up-- [[Laughter]] I don't know. You, uh-- [[Laughter]]
[00:16:24]

[00:16:26]
[SPEAKER NAME=Bill McComiskey]
Yeah. Everybody has a story like that. That's that one.

[00:16:28]
[SPEAKER NAME="Speaker 1"]
Anyways, Joni or Jerry manage to top that.

[00:16:32]
[SPEAKER NAME=Joanie Madden]
[[Laughs]] If I-- I would be intimidated in that situation, Mike, because I-- I would never bring in a Val McHill Cèileidh Band record. You know I, because--

[00:16:43]
[SPEAKER NAME=Bill McComiskey]
The Bronx wasn't as tolerant as Brooklyn. Is that what you're trying to say?

[00:16:46]
[SPEAKER NAME=Joanie Madden]
Um, I-- I had some kind of reputation, I guess. [[Laughs]] He had none to be worried about. [[Laughter]] Oh, got it.
[00:16:57]

[SPEAKER NAME=Bill McComiskey]
This was before reputations. [[Laughter]] This was before this renaissance.
[00:17:01]

[SPEAKER NAME=Joanie Madden]
Um.
[00:17:02]

[SPEAKER NAME="Bill McComiskey"]
No Smithsonian Folk Life then.
[00:17:03]

[SPEAKER NAME=Joanie Madden]
No, actually, I was pretty lucky because I grew up in an Irish neighborhood, so there was a lot of kids my age that played the music before I even played it.
[00:17:12]

{SPEAKER name="Joanie Madden"}
So it was kind of accepted because they were the "cool kids", you know, that played, which I was lucky, you know, it wasn't-- [[Laughs]].
[00:17:20]

{SPEAKER name="Joanie Madden"}
So, you know, they played sports and everything, and so I felt like the guys were more intimidated than the girls were, because, you know, "Oh you sissy!" you know.
[00:17:30]

{SPEAKER name="Joanie Madden"}
"What type of- what type of music do you play?" you know. And like I said, they expected you to play--
[00:17:33]

{SPEAKER name="Joanie Madden"}
If you play music, you had to be banging on some set of drums in your basement or, you know, [[makes sound effects]] playing some guitar, but, I don't know. Jerry, what did you do? [[Laughs]]
[00:17:43]

[SPEAKER NAME=Jerry O'Sullivan]
Uh, I guess, by the time I started to play, I was going, uh, over to Ireland most of the time so, it wasn't as bad, you know, as it was.
[00:17:50]

[SPEAKER NAME=Joanie Madden]
If ever-- if anyone asked you if you played the bagpipes, would you tell them?
[00:17:53]

[SPEAKER NAME=Jerry O'Sullivan]
[[Background voices]]
Oh, yeah, you know, I kept-- I kept a pretty low profile in school, so it didn't-- it didn't matter too much. I did my own thing in my time off so, yeah.
[00:18:02]

[SPEAKER NAME="Speaker 1"]
Brendan Mulvihill there doesn't look like the sort of person who would be easily intimidated by peer pressure.
[[Laughter]]
[00:18:07]

{SPEAKER name="Speaker 1"}
I just wonder, Brendan, eh, if you've ever had-- had a negative [[Laughs]] consequences towards playing the fiddle in the Irish mode.
[00:18:14]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill]
[[Background voice heard]]
[[Laughter]]
No, none at all.
[00:18:16]

[SPEAKER NAME="Speaker 1"]
[[Laughter]]
Well, um,
[00:18:18]

[SPEAKER NAME="Brendan Mulvihill]
I could add--
[00:18:19]

[SPEAKER NAME=Joanie Madden]
He just looks--
[[Laughing]]
[00:18:20]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill}
Fiddle looked small when I carried it around.
[[Laughter]]
I should have been playing a double bass.
[[Laughter]]
[00:18:26]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill}
Like people say, "Isn't that a small instrument under your trousers?"
[[Laughter]]
[00:18:32]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill}
The fact that I'm six or seven to eight times bigger than the instrument.
[[Laughter]]
But, uh, I, uh, learned my music in, uh,-- from different people.
[00:18:43]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill
My father, and, uh, people were-- people were teaching it in New York like Peter Kelly, and I learned from him for a while,
[00:18:52]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill]
and I learned some of my best music, strangely enough, when I went back to England, in 1972.
[00:18:58]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill}
I had the, uh, the, you know, good fortune to play with the Collins from Roscommon and I learned a lot of music from them,
[00:19:06]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill}
[[Background voice]]
and I played with the Birmingham Cèillidh Band which is a-- which is a very good, established band to play with, and a lot of good musicians in it.
[00:19:15]

[SPEAKER NAME=Brendan Mulvihill]
That's where I learned my music when I-- I increased my repertoires. I didn't have much trouble.
[00:19:22]

[SPEAKER NAME=Speaker 1]]
Andy here, on my left, grew up in County Kerry, and I don't know if Andy had-- I've ever even asked Andy if his own experience was similar to mine,
[00:19:30]

[SPEAKER NAME=Speaker 1]]
but we were growing up in so-- in an environment which didn't at that particular time, uh, place a great deal of importance on doing the old music; the traditional music. I don't know, was it the same for you, Andy?
[00:19:40]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
Well, it was in a way but to a lesser extent. I think you grew up in a- in a city. I grew up in a rural area and, uh, course, the radio had all sort of rock and roll,
[00:19:51]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
and most of the time, and maybe fifteen minutes out of the week it had the traditional programs, and also, this was back in the late fifties;
[00:20:01]

{SPEAKER name="Andy O'Brien"}
you still had the odd street singer going around, and they would come every so often and they'd stand in the yard and sing a song, and then they were finished.
[00:20:13]

{SPEAKER name="Andy O'Brien"}
They'd come up to the door, and my mother would give them some- a few pennies and, uh, that's how I heard the songs first.
[00:20:20]

{SPEAKER name="Andy O'Brien"}
And we also used to have a dance in our house about twice a week, and we used to have a big crowd of people, and-- and like Jack was saying, we didn't have any instruments.
[00:20:32]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
Maybe once in a while a fiddle pair would show up but, uh, usually it was mouth music, you know; daggling, as we'd say, or lilting.
[00:20:40]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
And we had this woman; she was a great lilter; and she provided all the music, and my father didn't care for it; didn't care for the dancing much.
[00:20:53]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
Not that he didn't like company, and- and dancing, and all that, but we had a concrete floor in the kitchen,
[00:21:00]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
and every couple of months that concrete floor would have to be renewed because with all the hobnail boots. The dancing on top of it was like a jackhammer,
[00:21:09]

[SPEAKER NAME=Andy O'Brien]
so that it would come up in no time at all [[Joni laughs]] and my father would have to put in a new floor. So, that's my experience learning music; being exposed to it for the first time.
[00:21:19]