St. Patrick’s Day Tunes and Craic!

By
Gwen Orel
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Irish Cupcakes at Zaro’s (How Jirish can you get)

How It’s New York:  All over the city, everybody’s Irish!  “Twas Only an Irishman’s Dream,” about a homesick Irishman imagining a green Broadway, was written by Al Dubin— who was Jewish, Mick Moloney points out in If It Wasn’t for the Irish and the Jews.
How It’s Irish:  All of the counties and societies are marching, loads of groups, and loads and loads of Aran sweaters are to be seen up and down the avenue.

St. Patrick’s Day is happening all day long!  I wrote a list of suggestions for St. Patrick’s Day for Speakeasy, the Wall Street Journal’s Culture Blog– you’ve missed Irish breakfast (though you can still get go for it tomorrow).  But you could still see a play or catch some tunes!

And tomorrow you could take the literary cure at Swift Hibernian Lounge, and hear Colum McCann and others read from favorite works.
 
Here’s an excerpt of musical sugtgestions– read the rest here!  There are a bunch of great plays running (I’m seeing Eugene O’Neill’s A Moon for the Misbegotten tonight, saw Gatz last night).  And loads of places to get a nice pint, too.  Will I go to Swift?  or the Half King?  Or somewhere else entirely?

 4.  Hear some tunes.

You could beg, borrow or steal a ticket to the Chieftain’s “Voice of Ages” concert atCarnegie Hall, where they’ll be joined by the Low Anthem, in the evening. Before that, you could go to Lucille’s Bar & Grill at B.B. King’s and catch Streams of Whiskey, a Pogues tribute band, at 4 p.m., heading downstairs  to catch Black 47 at 7 p.m. (doors open at 5 p.m.).    At Connolly’s Bar on W. 45th st, there’s music all day, beginning at 1 p.m. from Jameson’s Revenge, Shilelagh Law and Moonshiner Band.
You can hear music on a boat from singer-songwriter, the ethereal Ashley Davis:  ”a floating concert hall,” leaving from Fulton Ferry Landing at 8 p.m..
If you’re in the mood for more trad, you’ve got your choice:
At the Wren,  Ivan Goff (pipes), Dylan Foley (fiddle) and Séan Earnest (accompaniment) at the Wren, 344 Bowery, play from 1 p.m.-4 p.m..
At 6 p.m., you could catch Bernadette Fee (fiddle) , John Redmond, Matt Stapleton (guitar&vocals), Lisa de la Mare Farber (bagpiper), Ed Shevlin (tenor drummer)  & two time world champion stepdancer Shane Kelly at the Half King.
And there are also sessions (or seisúns) galore (go leor):
There’s a big Irish community in Sunnyside, Queens.  At Murphy’s Pub (4820 Skillman Ave,), Martin Daly (guitar, vocals) will play.

At O’Neill’s, one of the most popular spots good players lurk, Bernadette Fee will lead a seisiún.    Both at 9 p.m. 

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