By: Jeff Meade

Theresa Flanagan Murtaugh at the mike.

"We've started something tonight that's going to just get bigger and better," Paul Murtaugh told his audience over well over 500 concert-goers.

His wife, Theresa Flanagan Murtaugh, put it another way: "Just wait 'til next year ... when we've got Bono!"

OK, Bono isn't really going to play under the tent at the Murtaughs' house in Media. (But if anyone could talk Bono into it, the Murtaughs could.)

As it is, Friday night's concert featured The Three Irish Tenors, and if anyone missed U2, they didn't say so. Actually, the standing O at the end spoke volumes: They loved it.

They loved, too, the auction, which included this pretty great prize: a week at the County Mayo farm of Irish-American Chamber president Bill McLaughlin.

And everyone felt pretty good about the reason for the show. It was a benefit for two great schools: LaSalle Academy, a Kensington-based independent school to address the needs of underprivileged kids, and Drexel Neumann Academy in Chester, Delaware County, an independent Catholic grade school sponsored by Neumann College .

It was a blazingly hot night, with fans going full-bore throughout the Murtaughs' big top.

The Tenors had something for everyone—a mostly Irish repertoire featuring a stunning version of "Danny Boy" and a sing-along version of "When Irish Eyes are Smiling," but also including a bit of the classical. All performed with style, and under trying circumstances. (It was really hot up on that stage.)

At the end, Irish eyes were smiling indeed.

See for yourself.

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