“To everybody who has helped me or shown concern about my missing instruments, I give my heartiest thanks. On Monday I got an email from SAS to tell me……THEY’D FOUND MY INSTRUMENTS!!! They were rushed to Dublin & delivered to my door yesterday evening!! I can’t tell you how it feels to have them back. I have a permanent smile on my face – and so do they. Thanks to Providence & all kind people who gave their time & energy!”
Please see this message posted today 11th July 2022 from Andy Irvine’s facebook page, if anyone knows a way to help locate these instrument please get in touch:
“Flying to Denmark ten days ago to play at a Festival, my two Sobell instruments, a guitar-bouzouki & a mandola, probably valued in excess of €16,000, failed to arrive & have not been traced yet. The chaos at airports is such that they may be in Dublin, Frankfurt or Copenhagen. I have a suspicion that they never left Dublin & I wonder if anybody knows someone there, working as a baggage handler, who has access to misplaced baggage & might look for my missing instruments?”
We’re celebrating the 80th birthday of the incomparable Andy Irvine with a performance from the 2018 RTÉ Radio 1 Folk Awards, as Lifetime Achievement Award winner Andy brings the show to a memorable finish with a rousing performance of My Heart’s Tonight In Ireland – watch above.
Tickets to see Andy Irvine and friends cost €45 (including booking fee), and will go on general sale this Thursday, March 17th at 10am.
Andy Irvine will mark his 80th birthday with a show at Vicar Street Dublin on Monday, June 20th this year.
The veteran musician will perform alongside special guests Paul Brady, Dónal Lunny, Paddy Glackin, John Doyle, Mike McGoldrick, Bruce Molsky, Rens Van Der Zalm, Chrysoula K, Nikola Parov and Ágnes Herczku.
Multi-instrumentalist and trad/folk singer-songwriter Andy Irvine has maintained his highly individual performing skills throughout his over 50-year career.
Having been been hailed as “a tradition in himself”, Andy has been at the helm of legendary bands like Sweeney’s Men in the mid 60s, to the enormous success of Planxty in the 70s. Irvine and Lunny recently revisited their self-titled debut album for the Hot Press Up Close and Personal series.
Following Planxty, Irvine joined fellow trad outfits Patrick Street, Mozaik, LAPD and recently Usher’s Island. Andy has been a world music pioneer and an icon for traditional music and musicians in his time.
As a soloist, the performer fills the role of the archetypal troubadour with a show and a travelling lifestyle that reflect his lifelong influence, Woody Guthrie. His repertoire consists of Irish traditional songs, dexterous Balkan dance tunes and a compelling canon of his own self-penned songs.
During the various Covid-19 lockdowns in Ireland, the folk legend finally managed to compile the material together for his own Woody Guthrie album and recorded the results.
“I’d been planning to do a Woody Guthrie album for four years now, care to remember,” he told Hot Press late last year, smiling. “I got it together and I recorded everything, and now it awaits other people’s inputs. He’s my first and main influence. I’ll have to relearn all this material I’ve recorded, but I’m looking forward to it.”
“I’ve booked Vicar Street in June to celebrate my 80th birthday, because 10 years ago I played two gigs there for my 70th birthday with a couple of bands,” Irvine added. “Sweeney’s Man, Mosaik, and LAPD with Paddy Glackin and Liam O’Flynn. That gig was a great success. We put it together on a CD and on a DVD, and I don’t see why I shouldn’t do it again for my 80th. Then I’d be looking forward to my 90th!”
Tickets €45 (including booking fee) on general sale Thursday 17th March at 10am.
Revisit Andy Irvine’s 2021 Hot Press interview here.
Andy Irvine News 