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Written by Bob Tallent

Parent Category: Entertainment-Arts-Other News

Category: Music . . . . .

Created: 28 January 2012

Last Updated: 05 January 2016

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Fifty years of Rare Auld’ Times

Bob Tallent

It’s 1961. English teacher Ronnie Drew returns to Dublin from Spain where he has been learning the guitar. At parties, he starts singing, playing and telling stories. His voice is described “like coke being crushed under a door”. Comedian John Molloy asks him to warm up the audience at his Gate Theatre show. Ronnie brings with him Barney McKenna, a tenor banjo player. The lads then meet every Friday night in Dublin’s O’Donoghue’s Pub on Merrion Row. Luke Kelly, just returned from England, and student Ciaran Bourke joined them. The rest, as they say, is history, and to this day, the music has never stopped in O’Donoghue’s.

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Written by Administrator

Parent Category: Entertainment-Arts-Other News

Category: Music . . . . .

Created: 20 January 2012

Last Updated: 05 January 2016

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A woman with many strings to her bow

Vanessa-MaeShe uses one of two types of violin: a Guadagnini acoustic or a Zeta Jazz model electric. The Guadagnini was made in 1761 and bought by her parents at an auction for £250,000 when she was 10. It was stolen in January 1995 and recovered by police two months later. She dropped and broke it but it was repaired.  At seven she won the title Young British Pianist of the Year, then gave up the piano and turned to the violin.  At eight, she was invited by Prof Lin-Yao-Ji to Beijing to continue training by him. The course, scheduled for three years, she finished in months.

I’m talking about Vanessa Mae.

She was born Vanessa-Mae Vanakorn Nicholson in Singapore on October 27^th, 1978 to a Thai father and a Chinese mother.  When she was four, her family moved to London.  After Prof Lin-Yao-Ji she travelled in 1988 to Schlezwig-Holstein for summer master-courses, where she trained under Prof Felix Andreyevsky.  That year, she started her concert appearances with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London.  She was the youngest soloist in history to play Bach’s, Mozart’s and Kabalevsky’s concertos with the orchestra.  At 11, she passed entrance exams for a one-year course at the Royal College of Music where, a year later, she became the only child in its history to gain the Professional Diploma Course.  They say of her: “What she has, like Mozart and Mendelssohn, is maturity beyond her years, for this – her spirituality – you have to go back to Heifetz, Menuhin and Kreisler. Vanessa-Mae is a violinist to transcend labels.”

At 12, she played with the London Mozart Players celebrating the 200th anniversary of Mozart’s death.

Fast forward.  At 21 she met Lionel Catalan in Val D’Isere on a skiing break. They fell in love instantly. Interestingly, Lionel, Vanessa-Mae’s senior by 10 years, had no idea when they met that she was a world famous musician and celebrity. The relationship developed quickly and when Vanessa-Mae moved out of her family home to her own luxurious apartment in nearby Kensington, Lionel practically moved in with her. Today, they remain a very happy couple. Lionel started his own wine trading company in London.

Throughout her career, Vanessa-Mae has collaborated with various musicians. She played a track on Janet Jackson’s album The Velvet Rope in 1997; she worked with George Martin for one song on a CD In My Life with special arrangements of old Beatles songs; she shared the stage with groups like The Scorpions and The Back Street Boys; she participated with many other musicians in experimental jazz session with Prince to produce an album called Xpectations in 2002 – this CD has never been released but was available for a short time as an mp3 file via the NPG Music Club; she produced and played on the album Flow Of Soul together with the Japanese rock musician Takuro. Also, Vanessa-Mae joined and participated in several promotion campaigns for high value commodities like Siemens mobile phones, Mercedes C, Rover cars, The Oriental Mandarin Hotel group and Rado watches, indicating that she is seen as an interesting partner with irreproachable reputation by these organisations.

To date, she has received more than 40 platinum awards.

Her innovative style, which she calls violin techno-acoustic fusion, has made her a multimillion-selling worldwide phenomenon and the breakthrough artist who virtually defined the fusion of classical and pop that became known as crossover.

At 23, she was voted FHM’s 100 Sexiest Women in the World list in its 2001 poll. She was born exactly 196 years after Niccolo Paganini.  She classes him as special and draws parallels between herself and him. He was first and foremost a great violin performer, perhaps the greatest ever, and only secondarily a composer. He had a flashy style that caused some to consider he was being possessed by a demon. He was innovative and controversial in his day.

Vanessa-Mae has been performing concerts the world over, but I don’t think she ever played in Ireland – yet.

Enjoy the videos below.

Copyright © 2011, DPNLIVE – All Rights Reserved

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Written by Bob Tallent

Parent Category: Entertainment-Arts-Other News

Category: Music . . . . .

Created: 14 January 2012

Last Updated: 05 January 2016

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A poet in songwriter’s clothing – 77 years young and still singing

By Bob Tallent
12th January 2012

Leonard CohenBorn in Westmount, Montreal, Quebec Canada on September 21^st 1934 (three months before Elvis) where he grew up. He is 5ft 8ins, hazel-eyed, a Lithuanian Jewish musician, singer/songwriter, novelist and poet. His mother emigrated to Canada from Lithuania and his great grandfather emigrated from Poland. His grandfather, Lyon, was the founding president of the Canadian Jewish Congress. His father, Nathan, who owned a reasonably sized clothing shop in Montreal, died when he was nine. He went to Westmount High School in 1948 where he studied music, poetry, learnt the guitar (acoustic and then classical) and started a country folk group called the Buckskin Boys.

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Written by Administrator

Parent Category: Entertainment-Arts-Other News

Category: Music . . . . .

Created: 09 December 2011

Last Updated: 05 January 2016

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Written by Marcus K

You may not like American country music but there is one band out there that hits you in the eye when it comes to composing and playing music: Rascal Flatts!

The group originated in Columbus, Ohio, USA and since its inception, Rascal Flatts has been composed of three members: Gary LeVox (lead vocals), Jay DeMarcus (bass guitar, keyboard, piano, and vocals) and Joe Don Rooney (lead guitar, vocals).

What sets them apart from many country bands is some of their songs. ‘What Hurts the Most’ was a major success for them on both the country and the main contemporary charts, peaking at number six on the Billboard Hot 100 after its late 2005–early 2006 release. One of the tracks, “My Wish” hit the number 1 spot and there is no surprise in this.

The words to this song are something else.

“My wish, for you, is that this life becomes all that you want it to”

Man this says it all. And when you follow it up with -

“I hope you know somebody loves you, and wants the same things too,

Yeah, this is my wish.”

To some this is may be corny stuff. However throw in a very good music background and you have one hell of a song!

Between 2000 and 2010, Rascal Flatts recorded for Disney Music Group's Lyric Street Records. The band released seven albums, all of which have been certified platinum or higher by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) while on that label. In order of release, these albums are ‘Rascal Flatts’ (2000), ‘Melt’ (2002), ‘Feels like Today’ (2004), ‘Me and My Gang’ (2006), ‘Still Feels Good’ (2007), ‘Greatest Hits Volume 1’ (2008) and ‘Unstoppable’ (2009). After Lyric Street closed in 2010, Rascal Flatts moved to the independent Big Machine Records, releasing ’Nothing Like This’ in November 2010.

If you want stats then here they are: Rascal Flatts' studio albums have accounted for twenty-six single releases, all of which have charted within the top 20 or higher on the Billboard Hot Country Songs charts, including eleven number ones. The band's longest-lasting number one, a cover of Marcus Hummon's ‘Bless the Broken Road’, spent five weeks in that position in early 2005. However I want to go back to one single again which I think is exceptional in its lyrics and music –‘My Wish’.

This has everything - quality music, lyrics and just a downright great song!

Look at the verse lyrics-

“I hope you never look back, but ya never forget,

All the ones who love you, in the place you left,

I hope you always forgive, and you never regret,

And you help somebody every chance you get,

Oh, you find God's grace, in every mistake,

And you always give more than you take.”

Then look at the chorus-

“But more than anything, yeah, and more than anything,

My wish, for you, is that this life becomes all that you want it to,

Your dreams stay big, and your worries stay small,

You never need to carry more than you can hold,

And while you're out there getting where you're getting to,

I hope you know somebody loves you, and wants the same things too,

Yeah, this is my wish.”

Have a listen to this song and tell me I’m wrong. Guess what, I don’t think so!

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