Introduction: Why McDermott & Carolan?
As I cast back in search of a memory of my earliest foray into composition, I have difficulty placing an exact point at which I started writing music. Much of my study of the two composers I will discuss here is laced with ambiguity, both in terms of the historical record, and with regards to interpreting the changing and overlapping meanings of their works. In Western classical music, there is a tendency to celebrate composers themselves, and their artistic works, personalities, and acts loom large, to some extent eclipsing the players. How many of us have ideas about Bach or Mozart, but barely a passing familiarity with their actual works? In Irish traditional music, the opposite is often more likely to be true. It is the players to whom are attributed the artistic genius, and because the composers of the music are usually unknown, the creative process of actually making the music takes a back seat to that of interpreting and playing it. Therefore it is not surprising that I find myself at a complicated intersection of ideas and questions as I consider the writing of music within this idiom.
My father makes wooden flutes of the style commonly played in Irish music (transverse "simple system" flutes with a conical bore like those played in orchestras prior to the latter half of the 19th century), and I have always been lucky to be surrounded by an extensive community of musicians. At some point in my mid-twenties I began writing music; more or less within the idiom of traditional (or “trad”) Irish tunes. I don’t remember deciding that I wanted to be a "composer", but at some point I began subconsciously identifying as someone who wrote music. Along the way I started thinking about the process by which particular pieces are absorbed into the shared repertoire of the tradition in which I had grown up. The more I thought about it, the more interesting it became: These “old” traditional tunes all come from somewhere, and yet their composers are for the most part unknown. Even when they are remembered, they are not always identified, especially when they are played in a live setting. It is worth noting here that my use of the word “tune” is somewhat particular to Irish and other forms of traditional music. It differentiates instrumental music from songs, and refers specifically to short melodies, often of thirty-two bars in length, in a variety of time signatures. Historically these would usually have been played for dancing, and since at least the 18th century they have been extensively collected in published books of written music that constitute a good deal of the physical record of Irish music.
In preparing for my senior capstone project, I knew that I wanted to consider the question of composition within Irish music. As the project evolved, it became clear that more than one approach would be needed in order to synthesize an understanding of my questions regarding composition. In addition to an embodied performance experience, I needed a theoretical model through which to dissect the disparate performance philosophies that presented themselves in my study of Irish music. Taking Richard Schechner’s lead on the idea that Performance Studies is most at home at the intersection of scholarship and art-making, my thesis and capstone will encompass both this written work and a live performance piece informed by the same research.
Towards that end, I will examine the cultural and historical context of two very different composers, and use this experience as a lens through which to investigate my own creative process as a writer of music. Through an exploration of the lives and extant works of Turlough O'Carolan (1670-1738), and Josie McDermott (1925-1992), I hope to better understand my own place within this tradition. Grounding the work in a study of performance, I will examine questions of authenticity, “Irishness,” and the evolution of the Irish music tradition and show how these performed identities shape, empower, and situate individuals within this history.
As I looked for research that addressed composition within Irish music, I became increasingly aware of the lack of substantive work in this area. Performance theory often focuses primarily on acting and theatrical traditions. Musicology is usually more concerned with describing and cataloguing traditional pieces or styles than with music to whom a composer can be attributed. In a recent conversation with friend and colleague Tes Slominski, she summed up what others have confirmed is “…pretty much a blank spot in the published literature” (Slominski 2016). As vexing as this is in one sense, it leaves questions about the role of composition within Irish music well open for study and analysis, and it seems to me that work in this area is of great potential value to the field.
In seeking composers whose work to study, I knew that I wanted several different perspectives in addition to my own experience of tune writing, and at some point I settled on the notion of looking at music from two different periods. During the 20th century, a great body of Irish music was composed, and while names like Vincent Broderick, Jr. Crehan, Liz Carroll, and Tommy Peoples are all but unknown outside of the Irish music world, they loom large within the lore of this form of music. To juxtapose the more "modern" Irish music of the 20th century, I wanted to look further back, and Turlough O'Carolan (who lived from 1670-1738, and is perhaps Ireland's most well-known composer), seemed an obvious choice. For a more recent composer, I eventually settled on Josie McDermott. Born in 1925, McDermott (pictured at right) belongs to the previously mentioned group of 20th century composers, whose tunes are now part of the common repertoire found in Irish music sessions.
In striving to understand the paths by which newly composed music has found its way into the Irish tradition, I turn to performance studies and performance theory as a means to examine the myriad ways in which Irish music is expressed. Spanning many years and geographies, this tradition consistently defies easy explanation or analysis, especially in the present time, when there are musicians of so many backgrounds, nationalities, and ethnicities who participate in the social music-making that embodies this form. As an emerging field that is still defining itself (and is often resistant to the very idea of being defined), performance studies has some frameworks that are key to how I wish to address my study of composition within Irish music. In "Performance Theory," Richard Schechner writes, “ ‘Pure’ academicians are uncomfortable with performance studies because it is artlike, blurring the distinction not only between ‘art’ and ‘life’ but between ‘scholarship’ and ‘art making’ ” (ix). One aspect of performance theory asserts that many kinds of human activity are, in fact “performative;” that is to say they afford people a chance to perform certain identities and establish social roles within society. Under this definition, everything from a concert, to a religious ritual, to a sporting event is a type of performance.
This broader definition of what it means to perform is useful within the context of traditional art forms, where communal music without a clear boundary between performer and audience is commonplace. A music session in an Irish pub serves a good example: over the course of an evening, many of those present are actively participating in either the session itself, a bit of dancing, or a solo or group song. There is no stage to frame or delimit the action, and the musicians form a tight circle of chairs facing inwards towards each other. There is often no obvious devision between musicians and bystanders, and anyone may interject a joke or story into the conversational flow of the evening. In this context, constructions of self-identity within the community are important, and in service of my application of performance theory to this paradigm, I will postulate that performed identities are as important in a social setting as in a more formal one.
As for the format and purpose of this site, I will begin by examining the lives and artistic work of our two composers. I will then attempt to understand and explain something of the different contexts in which both men wrote music, and look at how the interpretation of their works have changed over time. Next, I will pose some theories about the transmission and absorption of their works, examining the how and why of new music being accepted into the tradition. Along the way, I will discuss the folk revival period of the 1970s and 80s, and the emerging culture of Irish music sessions both in Ireland and abroad. I will further borrow some theoretical models from performance studies to illuminate how perceptions of authenticity allow individuals to position themselves within a community. Finally, in service of the live performance of my thesis, I will apply these ideas to my own music and creative process so as to better understand any common themes that might connect my experience to those of these artists.