This article is from page 71 of the 2008-10-14 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 71 JPG
THE life of one of Lisdoonvarna hidden musical treasures will be celebrated in a weekend-long free festival later this month. Accordion and box player Micilin Conlon never gained the same fame as the Rus- Sell brothers from Doolin, but the Lisdoonvarna musician was as well thought of locally in his own time.
Born in 1927, he spent virtually all of this 67 years playing music for the people of north Clare. From Friday October 24 to Sunday 26, a celebra- tion of his music will take place at the Roadside Tavern in Lisdoon.
“He essentially spent his whole life entertaining people, he was like a travelling troubadour. He played at wakes and weddings and everything in between. He played Irish music and that was his life,” said Peter Cur- tin of the Roadside.
“He loved having fun along with the music and he was always there mak- ing fun and entertaining people. He would have played at house dances in the old days before there was any formal pub scene for entertainment. He would just walk to a house in the neighbourhood for the sessions. He would walk from Lisdoonvarna up to Fanore for a house dance and he
could come home and then head off to the Cliffs of Moher for another dance after that.”
The festival will feature some play- ers who have become synonymous with traditional music in north Clare. People like Tommy Peoples, Michael Hynes, Davy Spillane and Seamus Hynes will all feature, along with Micilin’s own nephew Johnny Con- ren
‘He was a musician and his father was a musician. I can remember him telling me about coming into the Roadside on the day of his confirma- tion to play a few tunes. He lived for the music,’ continued Peter.
“We have purposely organised some sessions during the day. We want to get people to chill out a bit, and not to just head out at night and then be worried about getting up the following morning.
“Micilin was a chilled out man himself. I’d say his stress levels never got above zero in his whole life. So this is going to be more like a session than a concert. It’s about people and musicians coming in and getting into iW sTomen one
For more information on the cel- ebration of the music and life of Mi- cilin Conlon check out www.roadsi- detavern.ie.