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Claire Keville. Musician, music teacher and broadcaster originally from Claran, near Headford in Co. Galway. She taught herself The Boys of Bluehill on the tin whistle at the age of six and from there enhanced her repertoire by picking up the odd tune from her maternal Grandfather who played both tin whistle and melodeon. Formal lessons ensued and Claire began learning classical piano at seven and later at the age of nine, she started on the concertina.

She has always been drawn to the music of East Galway and regards the music of Paddy Fahey as inspirational. She won the Oireachtas as a teenager and later studied music at U.C.C where she obtained a distinction in performance playing both classical and traditional music. In 1999, she read for a Masters degree in Ethnomusicology at University of Limerick and graduated with a first class honours degree.
She works part time as a traditional music broadcaster on Clare fm. Claire has performed on TV many times, most notably in Dec 2007 where she presented and played concertina on Geantraí. She has also appeared on Geantraí in 1998 and 2004 and has performed on Sé mo Laoch and The Miltown Sessions.

In addition, she has worked as a researcher for TG4 and has presented awards at the annual Gradam Ceoil concert where she was a member of the jury from 2006
She teaches each year at the Willie Clancy Summer School and frequently gives workshops /concerts at home and abroad .

In 2009 she released her début solo recording entitled The Daisy Field playing both concertina and harpsichord with guest musicians comprising of Liam Lewis and her
sister Breda Keville on fiddles, Geraldine Cotter on piano and Terence O guitar. This CD was funded by the Arts Council of Ireland and features a no. of Paddy Fahey compositions and also tunes by other Galway composers such as Tommy Coen and Paddy Kelly.

Michael McNamara was born in 1936 to parents Patrick McNamara and Bridget Reilly. Second eldest in a family of five living children, Michael’s mother died when he was five years old. Subsequent to his mother’s untimely death, Michael was reared by his father in their homestead in Carrickavoher, Aughavas, Co. Leitrim.

Though life was not easy on a subsistence farm, Michael and his siblings grew up in a house which constantly received visitors, particularly local farmers who visited on a Sunday night to ‘ceili’ and keep company with Michael’s father Patrick. Though not musicians or singers, these neighbours were influential in developing Michael’s great interest in storytelling.

Michael’s dad also had songs that he would sing around the fireplace to his young children to entertain them after the chores for the day were completed. This had a particular influence on Michael’s sister Josephine.

Of particular significance in Michael's life were the visits from local flute player, singer and storyteller, John Blessing. Witnessing this master player an early age, progressed to lessons on the whistle in 1951 and eventually the flute.

Michael met his wife Mary (nee [?]) at a dance in Belturbet, Co. Cavan in the early 1960s where she was dancing and he was playing as a member of the Eugene Leddy Ceili Band. They married in 19[??] and raised a family of five children all of whom play traditional music. While reluctant to be in the musical limelight Mary was the 'nucleus' of the McNamara Family. Mary died in August 2015.

Michael’s passion for the music, and desire to hear and learn good music, motivated him to acquire a Philips reel-to-reel tape recorder in 1959. Few such devices existed in the Irish traditional music community at that time. It was on this tape recorder that Michael captured the Ceili Mór in Aughavas in 1959, and the local crowning of his sister Josephine as the Ballad Queen of Ireland, following her successive wins at All Ireland Fleadh Cheoil in 1958 and 1959.

As more advanced technology came to the market, Michael invested in Toshi and Sony tape recorders. The Sony tape recorder is shown below. The expense and availability of new tapes meant that many of the reel-to-reel tapes were re-used for recording. But in total 83 reel-to-reels still exist capturing multiple hours of material from 1959 to the early 1970s.

From the early 1970s Michael moved to the more convenient cassette tape recorder.

Reid, Seán. (1907–78). Fiddler, piper, organiser. Born Castlefi n, Co. Donegal. His father, and uncle John Reid, played fiddle; the family home was a meeting place for musicians throughout his childhood. This listening was supplemented by 78 recordings and he learned fiddle and was taught ‘classical’ piano. School life involved Irish dancing; local fiddler Eddie Toland provided music for this. Raised by his mother, in 1927 he went to Queen’s University Belfast to study civil engineering and science; while there he learned to play bagpipes in the Officer Training Corps, and was a committed and successful athlete. Interested in literature, his regular browsing in the city’s famous Smithfield market yielded a Tom Ennis 78 rpm record and kindled his passion for the uilleann pipes. Competing in an athletics event at Feis na nGleann in Cushendun soon after brought him into contact with Meath-born piper R.L. O’Mealy. A period in Dublin brought him in contact with John Potts’s family and friends, a circle which included Breandán Breathnach and Tommy Reck.

Clare
In 1937 he began work with Clare County Council as a civil engineer. A friendship with fiddler Martin Rochford of Bodyke resulted in the two of them working together at learning uilleann pipes. Leo Rowsome was one of their mentors, as was Johnny Doran whom Seán visited regularly. Joe Leyden, who worked with Seán, was another invaluable contact in those years. Seán Reid’s presence in Clare was to have an important influence on the music and its players. From his house in Ennis he was a catalyst and voluntary coordinator for many of the musicians in the county and he played an important role as musician and leader in the Tulla Céilí Band. He brought players together at a time when transport was scarce and communication difficult, often taking them to competitions as far away as Dublin. Humorously described as one of the ‘driving forces’ in Clare (one of the few who had a car), he frequently endured personal sacrifice and expense supporting issues in which he believed, never afraid to speak out where he felt it necessary. His application and commitment to traditional music as an Irish art, as a bridge across political division, and to piping in particular, marks him as critical in the traditional music revival.

Dedication
He was involved in the early CCÉ, in 1956 a key figure in introducing it into the northeastern counties through the Derry and Antrim Fiddlers’ Association, and he was the proposer of setting up Na Píobairí Uilleann in 1968. His work in the field of piping has been extremely valuable. In the years when pipes were held in little regard he collected several sets, passing them on to pipers when interest had revived, thus ensuring that players would have good instruments with which to continue the tradition. A gentle personality, a careful researcher and collector, a tireless organiser and a humble, caring, scrupulously honest man, he impressed and succeeded by conviction and discussion: one of music revival’s most fondly remembered mentors. [ JIO, EDI]