Gregorium Uproarium from Merrijig Creek by Fintan Vallely, Caoimhín Vallely, Sheena Vallely, Brian Morrissey

Set 6: Gregorium Uproarium.
This emerged in 1977 out of listening to John Coltrane’s exploration of melody. Its opening lament and slow reel ‘Ómós Tadhg MacSweeney’ are dedicated to the prolific West Cork painter Tadhg MacSweeney. He shared fixer-upper rooms with myself and other artists in an 18th- century, former tenement house owned by the philanthropic architect Uinseann Mac Eoin at 5 Henrietta Street, in Dublin in the 1970s. Tadhg’s dedication to his art, and his subtle, enabling encouragement to others in the house, nudged me back to playing after a drop-off in the early seventies, and indeed, when my mother visited once, gave her the bug to take up painting herself, something she stuck with for the next thirty years. Tadhg’s sisters Bríd and Máire, in the family home on an organic farm at Cill na Martra, had a house open to artists and craftspeople too - a hospitality greatly appreciated by us all. The optimistic enthusiasm emanating from both there and Henrietta Street was also to be greatly inspirational to sculptor Pat Bracken who went on to make spectacular puppets for Macnas in Galway, to film-maker Trish McAdam, and to graphic artist Gerry Sandford who for many years designed London’s Time-Out magazine and, later, The Sunday Tribune newspaper in Dublin. Dancer Tony Rudenko and a photographer were there too, and, later, sculptor Gabby Dowling and actor Eamonn Hunt. This music set was played by me at gigs in Ireland, Italy and America with guitarist tunesmith Mark Simos, now a song-writing prof. with Berklee College, Boston. He worked out the linking riffs, and we recorded it on The Starry Lane to Monaghan in 1992, an album remastered as Back to the Starry Lane in 2021. The tunes which follow are the germ of the first, the related ‘Raithneach a Bhean Bheag’ and variations on the reel ‘The Musical Priest’.

Tracklist

6.	Gregorium Uproarium	5:01

Credits

from Merrijig Creek, track released January 1, 2021
Fintan, Caoimhín and Brian

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