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Paddy Reynolds landed in New York from County Longford in 1948 and briefly settled in Brooklyn before moving to the Bronx. He had already led his own dance band back in Ireland, while simultaneously working on the Ballyshannon hydroelectric project, but was awed when he encountered Lad O’Beirne’s fiddling and re-made himself in New York as a Sligo stylist. Paddy formed a firm partnership with Andy McGann, often taking gigs referred to them by Paddy Killoran when the old master had too much on his plate.
Paddy Reynolds was born on 17 December1920 to James and Mary Ann Quinn Reynolds, who farmed 67 acres in townland of Garvary in the parish of Dromard (Lower Killoe) in north County Longford. Paddy had to steal his first tunes on the fiddle, using an instrument reserved for his eldest brother James, but the youngster’s precocious talent could not be denied. His earliest musical influences were his mother, who played the fiddle, and his aunt Ellen, a singer and lilter. By the age of ten he was playing at house parties and dances with a group called “The Moonlight Rovers” and later played at a local concert that featured the great uilleann piper Leo Rowsome.

During World War II, Paddy worked as a farm laborer in Fermanagh. After the war, while working on the Ballyshannon hydroelectric project in Donegal, he led a group called the Four Provinces Céilí Band, playing for dances in south Donegal, north Leitrim and Derry. In 1948, he took a liner to Halifax, Nova Scotia and made his way to New York, where his sisters Helen and Mary had preceded him. He moved to Brooklyn and got his first musical employment in a trio with John and Nancy Ryan. At one of their gigs, he met Elizabeth “Lilly” Roughneen from Mayo. They married in 1951 and settled at Cypress Avenue and 149th Street in the south Bronx, a neighbourhood already crowded with traditional musicians, including Sligo fiddle great James Lad O’Beirne.

Paddy became a regular attendee at Lad’s Friday night house sessions, where he played with Paddy Killoran, Larry Redican, Martin Wynne, Louis Quinn, and other members of the city’s Irish music aristocracy. Paddy formed a duet partnership with fiddling neighbour Andy McGann. Over the next three decades they would play together at countless parties, weddings, céilidhe and step dancing feiseanna .In 1958, Paddy was a founding member of the New York Céilí Band, joining a fiddle section that included Andy McGann and Larry Redican. He was with the band when they travelled to Boyle, County Roscommon in 1960 to compete at the All-Ireland fleadh.

In the 1960s Paddy and Lily moved to Brooklyn, where they raised their daughter Mary and two sons Stephen and James. Paddy struck up a music teaching partnership with accordionist John Glynn. There were few opportunities for Irish traditional musicians to perform in public in those years, but live television offered an occasional outlet, especially around the time of St Patrick’s Day, and Paddy appeared on the Ed Sullivan and Merv Griffin shows.

In the 1970s, Paddy finally got a chance to put his fiddling on record. In 1971 he collaborated with button accordionist Charlie Mulvihill and pianist Felix Dolan to record eight solo and duet tracks for Sweet and Traditional Music of Ireland, a Rego Irish Records LP that also included cuts from button accordionist James Keane. Paddy and Charlie’s contributions to that disc were later reissued on the Kells Music CD The Atlantic Wave. In 1977 Paddy and Andy went into the studio with a then-obscure guitarist named Paul Brady to make an LP for Shanachie Records, a disc widely regarded as one of the greatest Irish fiddle duet recordings of all time. Paddy can also be heard on the 1990 Green Linnet CD My Love is in America recorded at an all-star fiddle concert at Boston College. He featured prominently in From Shore to Shore, a 1993 video documentary on Irish music in New York City, and played for a dance scene featuring Brad Pitt in the 1997 Columbia Pictures film The Devil’s Own. Paddy passed away in Staten Island in 2005 at the age of 84. Paddy Reynolds: Classic Recordings of the Irish Fiddle Legend, a collection of privately made and unreleased tracks, was issued shortly after his death.

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]

Roscommon-born Larry Redican (1908–1975) joined flute players John McKenna and Eddie Meehan, and pianist Frank Fallon on a few 1937 recordings by the “Rosaleen Quartet.” Most of Redican’s music making, however, was heard in private sessions, at Gaelic League céilidhe or step dancing feiseanna.

While he enjoyed a brief career as a 78 rpm recording artist before the war, his real heyday was in the 1950s and 1960s. Redican was particularly in demand to play for dancers. The world of New York step dancing was upended in the 1950s with the arrival from Belfast of teachers Peter and Cyril McNiff, who introduced a new style that radically slowed the tempo to allow for more fancy footwork. To play for this kind of dancing required rock-solid tempo and precision, and Larry Redican was the one recruited by the McNiffs (along with Louis and Sean Quinn) to play with them on a 1961 tour of Ireland. He also joined Andy McGann to play for the McNiff dancers on St. Patrick’s Day-themed television programs hosted by Arthur Godfrey or Ed Sullivan. Redican also played the tenor banjo. He delighted in unearthing old tunes from printed collections and composed a few himself that are still popular with today’s traditional players. He passed away doing what he loved best, playing the fiddle, at the Irish American Society in Mineola, Long Island.