An Chonair Bar Session

An Chonair Bar in Dingle has long been a venue for traditional Irish music. A new session has been added every Monday at 9 pm. The location is Spa Road on the way out of town towards Conor Pass.
















The leading musician is piper Con Durham and he is usually joined by various musician friends. I attended the session last Monday and I must say it was fabulous. The atmosphere was warm and cosy with an open fire and the music was great.










We had Con on the pipes, two fiddles, guitar, banjo, penny whistle, harmonica and mandolin.

The customers were very engaged and there were several bursts of spontaneous dancing to the lively music.



Myself with Con

Bank Holiday Session

Finbarr, Lucinda, Con and Matt

June bank holiday weekend is always a lively time in Dingle and with the great weather we have been having there are lots of people in town. On such occasions it is not unusual to have visiting musicians drop in to the sessions.

At our regular weekly session with Con Durham and Tommy O’Sullivan at Marina Inn last night we were joined by the well-known fiddle player Matt Cranitch. He has a wonderful Sliabh Luachra style and he gave our session a great lift. Matt is the author of The Irish Fiddle Book, one of the most comprehensive instructional texts available to students of the fiddle. He is a member of the group Sliabh Notes together with Tommy O’Sullivan and Donal Murphy.

The Sliabh Luachra style of playing Irish music comes from a loosely defined area in North West Cork, North East of Kerry and the Southern tip of Limerick. It is a very lively style and the music includes lots of polkas and slides. I grew up with this kind of music in our house since my grandfather was a fiddle player from that area.

Kieran Jordan

We were also joined by Boston Irish dancer Kieran Jordan. Kieran is very much a woman by the way and not a man as you would expect from the name. She has a lovely Sean Nós style of dancing. She danced a jig to the great enjoyment of the audience and then was asked to dance again. To everyone’s delight she hopped up on a table and let fly with a reel. Read more about Kieran and see clips of her dancing on her website.


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Dingle Traditional Irish Music Sliabh Luachra