First of all, Dublin is a grand city and, even if you don't follow this guide, you will be sure to have a great time. But if one of the reasons you are going is the music, this might help. If you get off the plane and expect to saunter into the nearest smoky pub for Guinness and music, and expect to find some seasoned Irish musicians dishing out great craic to a room filled with beer and conversation, you will be disappointed. It doesn't work that way. Dublin is a tourist town so there are a few rules that need to be followed.
The first rule is never enter a pub advertising live Irish music and expect to find any. You may find a couple paid musicians sitting around playing guitars and singing Danny Boy or Wild Mountain Thyme but in our experience that was about all. The second rule is never go anywhere the average Dubliner tells you to go. They will send you to the very pubs we just warned you about. Unless you luck into a Dubliner who's into the tradition (and there are quite a few), you won't get any scoop by asking the woman at the front desk or the waiter in restaurant. We spent about a day discovering this and were getting quite discouraged until we went to Capel Street in search of James Kelly's haunts. There we happened upon a traditional music store, listened to the conversation and figured out who to ask. Then we posed the question, "Where can one find a seisiún around here?" The first place out of the storeowner's mouth was a place we just warned you about. So we pressed on, "No, a REAL seisiún."
Eventually, he told us of a place a few blocks away called M. Hughes, which has seisiúns three nights a week. When we arrived, some 30-something suits were unwinding at the end of the day, competing to see who could do the best Al Pacino impression from 'Scarface'. Around 8:00 or so, a young couple, Padraig and Aoife, walked in, instruments in hand, and had a pint. After some chit-chat, they started playing. It was easy to tell that Padraig was a serious student of the box and Aoife, an accomplished fiddle player. Ian, a polite skinheaded fellow from Northern Ireland asked if he could join in and added a very tasteful bodhran style to the mix. Mark soon recognized a reel and offered some light mandolin in the background. A while later, a gentleman from London produced his flute and the craic was complete. To top it all off, a set dancing troupe strolled in and sent the place into a frenzy with some hearty stomping and twirling. Though we were thrilled at this development, some of the musicians were a little annoyed by the dancers' constant goading: "C'mon! Give us another tune, eh?" The management rewarded the musicians with a steady flow of pints, and at the end of the evening, everyone was offered a giant plate of quartered sandwiches for their effort.
Following up on a tip from a friendly fellow named Ciarran whom we met at Hughes, we went to the Cobblestone the following evening. The "Cobble" is a little off the beaten path and into the seamier side of town, so take the usual precautions -- i.e. hire a cab, or go in a group. We want to be careful not to overstate this because we never felt threatened in our strolls through Dublin, and police presence is formidable. However, locals that we met told us that we were very lucky and that walking off the beaten path (especially with instruments) was not particularly safe. But we digress.
You can't get much closer to 'the drop' in Dublin than the Cobble. It has an ancient, lived-in feel and the seisiún is led by some real vets who play some of the tightest sets you'll ever hear. When Ciarran arrived, he noticed Mark playing at a 'respectful distance' from the group and promptly advised him to go ahead and move in. Musicians in a Dublin seisiún will never ask you to join them. They're kind of shy and expect you to walk up and take your place. Apparently, there's a greater danger of offending the musicians by being overly deferential. The music was great -- an old fiddler from New York and his apprentice, a piper, a lightning banjo player, and a straightforward guitar accompanist produced some mighty sounds that night. The guitar player was gracious enough to allow Mark to introduce some different backgrounds to several tune sets, but this was a group that had a well-worn groove, and mostly he contented himself to listen and learn. Ciarran introduced Wendy to some trad musician friends who were taking the night off from playing. The evening ended with an old ballad sung a cappella by an older man that several people had been waiting to hear all night. The whole place was silent for this.
That Saturday we caught the beginning of another fine seisiún at Noone's, just a couple hundred yards west of "The Cobble". Like the Cobble milieu, this is a veteran group, and the playing was phenomenal. The lineup included fiddle, flute and guitar. Having learned his lesson, Mark marched right up, introduced himself and asked if he could join in, promising to play only tunes he knew well. The group also allowed us to tape the sets, which was a real break because their repertoire was unlike any we'd heard. From there we had to rush over to the Faculty Club where Mark had to participate in the farewell party for the conference he had attended that week. After the folks had been lubricated with a round or two, the music began. The organizer of the conference led us in some traditional Irish tunes, like "The Parting Glass" and one of his colleagues led a couple of sets on the tin whistle, but the flavor quickly turned international with Portuguese, Canadian, and English songs in the mix. We were fortunate to get acquainted with the bartender, Dave, who happened to be a craicin' bodhran player. He invited us to a Sunday afternoon seisiún at the Portobello Bar.
The Portobello is one of the few good seisiúns we found north of the Liffey, and one of the most well attended. In all, there were three banjo players, two fiddlers, two accordion players (brothers), and a singer. This was an eclectic bunch, mostly unacquainted with one another. This made set building tricky, both in terms of finding commonalties in known tunes and setting a pace everyone could live with. Graham, a fantastic banjo player, explained that the regulars were out that particular Sunday. Graham invited several of us to his house for sandwiches and playing. Dave and Alan, an accomplished fiddle player from Northmeade, and Karen, Alan's girlfriend and a singer, joined us for what turned out to be a very special afternoon of camaraderie and playing. Alan played a unique style that included crans that hammered up instead of the usual down -- a real treat. We played and sang all afternoon. Graham has a real fondness for Allison Krauss and played a very soulful version of her song "Now That I've Found You". We were surprised to find that the beer of choice was Budweiser. Can you believe that?
As the sun sank, Graham had to shuttle off to a gig, so Dave suggested we head over to a place called "Rumm's" on the southwest side of the city. Rumm's definitely has a contemporary feel and the crowd, as well as the players, reflected a 30-something demographic. There we had the good fortune of hearing Joe Dunne -- an accomplished mandola player and gifted songwriter who led the seisiún. Alan let loose with some fiery playing that showcased the innovations of a new generation of Irish fiddling. At 11:30, always closing time in Dublin, the bar closed and Dave took us to another place whose name neither of us can remember, for an after-hours jam. Next door we could hear the faint throb of a technobeat, and Alan had us in hysterics with his impressions of the scene next door as he returned from there with a round of drinks. The sets were passionate and the craic was grand, with an easy feeling that is usually reserved for old friends.
So, that concludes our little adventure in the Dublin seisiún scene. We'll leave you with a couple pieces of advice:
Slan,
Mark and Wendy, the seisiún spies.