Farewell to "The Bard of Armagh"
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Published: Aug 2, 2007

Tommy Makem 
 In Ireland in 2003. From the Makem Web site.

"Tommy Makem was my hero and the reason I wanted to perform," says Tyrone-born musician Gerry Timlin, co-owner of Ambler's Shanachie Pub and Restaurant, who in June visited the man known as "The Godfather of Irish Music" and "the Bard of Armagh" for the last time at his home in Dover, NH.  Makem, 74, died Wednesday, August 1 and, after a three-day wake, was buried August 9 in Dover. He had been diagnosed with lung cancer in May 2006.

Timlin has shared the stage with Makem and The Clancy Brothers many times and Makem became his mentor when Timlin arrived in the US with his guitar, a beautiful singing voice, and irreverent humor in the 1970s.

"I loved his wit, his commitment, and his bravery. He came to the US and made a path for the rest of us and with the Clancy's carved out a course for us to follow," says TImlin, who was in Ireland when Makem died. "He created new venues for us and helped us all make a living doing the one thing we all loved. Without him the world of music will never be the same."

Makem was "the consummate performer," says Timlin. In fact, Makem died with gigs on his schedule stretching into November.  Though a solo performer, for much of his career, this banjo-playing baritone performed with friends Liam, Tom, and Paddy Clancy. He’d come to New York from Ireland with Liam, and  they initially both embarked on acting careers until fate and their love for music drew them together for the magic that was the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem.

Many people were introduced to Irish music by Makem and the Clancys and, at least among the listening public, they are perhaps known best for what every Irish performer thinks of as the crowd-pleasers, the drinking songs like The Jug of Punch, Irish Rover, and Finnigan’s Wake. But Makem was a trad musician at heart. "He sang all kinds of folk music," says Timlin. His mother, Sarah, was a renowned folk singer who collected traditional Irish folk tunes that might have otherwise been lost.

Traditional purists have tended to be dismissive of the way The Clancys and Tommy Makem popularized Irish roots tunes, but in recent years, many have come to recognize that their rise and that of the Chieftains--during the nascent folk era in the US--helped create a resurgence in popular interest in Ireland’s own musical history which, at the time, seemed to be heading the way of the thatched roof.

As one trad musician wrote on a message board after Makem's death, “I listened to Tommy, and the Clancy Brothers -- kinda hard to separate them, even though he hasn't played with the band for years -- for a lot of my childhood, dismissed them in my late teens as hokey and cliche, then ultimately realized how much they've all meant to the music."

Makem meant everything to Timlin's music--and his life. " I was proud to say he was my friend and I will miss him sadly every day," he says. " 'Onward and upward' he would say and so 'Onward and Upward Tommy.'"

Here's what others have to say about Makem. First, Liam Clancy, who first made note of Tommy's passing on his message board:

"He was a friend and partner-in-song for over fifty years. We shared a great hunk of our lives together. We were a hell of a team. Tommy was a man of high integrity, honesty, and, at the end, courage. Our paths diverged at times but our friendship never waned. He was my brother every bit as much as my blood brothers."

Irish President Mary McAleese:

'In life, Tommy brought happiness and joy to hundreds of thousands of fans the world over. Always the consummate musician, he was also a superb ambassador for the country, and one of whom we will always be proud."

Singer-songwriter Eugene Byrne, quoted in the Dover newspaper Foster's Daily Democrat:

"Not one of us who play a note of Irish music on a guitar today would be playing if it wasn't for Tommy Makem, along with the Clancys. He gave us pride in our country and our culture. Bono (U2's lead singer) was influenced by him. Michael Flatley's new show, Celtic Tiger, has Four Green Fields in it."

From Marianne MacDonald, host of the local radio show, "Come West Along the Road" (Sundays from noon to 1 p.m. on WTMR-800 AM):

"One of the bright twinkling stars from the constellation of Irish music faded today.  We've lost the great Tommy Makem.  I was fortunate to have seen him at Appel Farms, the Guinness Fleadh and, years ago, at the Holmdel Arts Center when my mother dragged me to my first Irish Festival."

From Ed Ward of the Milwaukee Irish Fest:

"I spoke to him about two weeks ago, the day after he returned from Ireland. We talked for about a half an hour about his trip, how wonderful it was to see the parade of people who came to visit him in the hotel, relatives, old friends, the archbishop. He said he was very sad when he boarded a plane to leave Ireland, clearly knowing he would not see it again."

"He desperately wanted to make it to Milwaukee this year so we discussed plans on what we would do as it was evident he would not be able to perform. But he planned to be there anyway. We are going ahead with these plans and Tommy's slots will be billed as "Remembering Tommy Makem" and will be led by his nephews Tom and Jimmy Sweeney, Brian Doherty, Kevin Evans and Eugene Byrne and other close friends. The Makem and Spain Brothers will also be in Milwaukee so it should be a special celebration of Tommy's life and love for the music of Ireland."

From Ira Goldman, editor and publisher of the Trad Music News:

"Just about anything and everything that can, and should, be said about Tommy Makem's music has been said since his death last Wednesday evening. The great and the not so great have been crowding the Tasker Funeral Home in Dover NH for his wake since yesterday and Thursday morning we will fill to overflowing St, Mary's Church in that lovely New England village Tommy called home for decades.

Most people know Tommy as a balladeer and partner of the Clancy Brothers and especially of Liam Clancy. Many know him as the composer of fine songs, some of which have become standards of Irish music. Some of us have had the joy of knowing him as a fine 'sean nos" singer and traditional musician on the banjo and whistle. His musicology as well as his music made him a true treasure of Irish Traditional Music.

Some of us have been blessed to have the invaluable, immeasurable, and lasting delight of knowing Tommy Makem as a person and as a friend. In the some 25 years I knew Tommy I never heard an unkind or angry word pass his lips. His countless acts of warmth and kindness will never be forgotten. For example, Tommy recorded a wonderful song, as delightful for "grownups" as for children, called "Waltzing with Bears." When he was told two wee boys in Co. Carlow (aged 5 and 6) were learning the song from his cassette tape so they could entertain their Yank friend at Christmas, Tommy wrote each of them a note congratulating them for learning the song and thanking them for learning it from him.

And there was once a quiet, sunny afternoon in the empty bar of the hotel by the Sligo railroad station when Tommy played piano and let a Yank friend sing with him (much to the dismay of Liam Clancy who had to listen).

There are not enough tears to truly mark your passing, Tommy. There will always be the memories and the music and the love.

Slan, old friend.

Ar dheis De go raibh a anam uasal."

 

 

* * *

We have tracked down three wonderful YouTube videos for you to remember him by.


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I interviewed Tommy about

Submitted by Kevin Connolly (not verified) on Sun, 03/30/2008 - 5:53pm.
I interviewed Tommy about five years ago, and the interview appeared in a number of publications in Ireland. I still have the recorded interview on tape (one of my proudest possessions). Here is the edited transcript aas it appeared in newspapers in Armagh and Wexford: TOMMY MAKEM - KEADY SUPERSTAR! The Tommy Makem International Festival of Song is one of the world’s leading music and poetry festivals, named in honour of a member of Ireland’s world-famous folk group from the 1960s. It has been said that the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem reinvented Irish music, but Tommy Makem simply says: “We didn’t reinvent it, we made it popular. At the Kilkenny Beer Festival in the early sixties they had a ballad singing concert, and there were 700 groups doing the songs that the Clancies and myself sang.” Tommy has obviously come a long way since the days of Canon Pentony’s choir in Keady, County Armagh. “I’ve travelled quite a few miles since then,” he says. “But all that the Canon taught me has stood me in great stead, so I’m glad I paid attention to him.” Naturally, Tommy has many happy memories of growing up in Keady. “Keady was a thriving town in the 1940s and ‘50s, there were all kinds of things going on: singing in people’s houses, showbands singing pop music, pipe bands and ceilidh bands. And the Keady Dramatic Club, which had been going for 125 years when I emigrated to America, used to do all kinds of wonderful stuff. I remember the first operetta HMS Pinafore. All the singers came from Keady, as did most of the orchestra. It was a huge success, and it was all local people doing it.” How many of Tommy’s songs mention Keady, like The Bold O’Donoghue? “They don’t all mention Keady,” he says. “I wrote one called The Bright Eyed Girl From Keady, and then there were the old traditional songs like November Keady Fair and The Banks Of The Callan. But I have written some about Keady, like Keady Is A Sporting Place which nobody has heard yet.” He has never done a song about the Keady Monument? “No,” says Tommy, “but I had aunts and uncles in America who used to sing a song that nobody in Keady had ever heard, Is Keady town where it used to be, is the Monument still there? - But I never wrote a song about the Monument. I should do, as Keady is the hub of the Universe and the Monument is the North Pole! All roads lead to Keady.” Where did Tommy’s song Johnny McEldoo come from? “I collected it in Keady,” he says, “from a fellow called Jimmy Nugent. He did a bit of work for a number of firms like Arthur Lenagh’s drapery, where he was the book-keeper. He also worked in Mone’s bar - I was the barman there for a while, and Jimmy would be in and out. Jimmy taught me Johnny McEldoo, a funny little tongue-twister like Peg Leg Jack, which I got from my mother.” The Tommy Makem International Festival of Song takes place in south Armagh every year, including a ‘keepers of the tradition’ ceremony and a ‘convention of forgotten songs’. Tommy’s mother, Sarah Makem was a renowned song collector who introduced a 1960s radio show called As I Roved Out. “There’s a tremendous amount of songs she saved in the BBC archives,” Tommy says proudly. “One year in the early ‘60s I came home and asked my mother if she had any songs for me, and she kept naming the same songs. So I told her to get herself a copybook and write down a song’s name whenever she thought of it. When I came back on holiday the following year, she had countless pages of songs written down! “A while later, Liam Clancy and myself were in the States searching for songs to record, and I had a whole list of songs that I’d got from my mother. Liam pulled out a page with Red Is The Rose on it. I squared it up a bit and made the lines scan, and we recorded it. It became huge in Ireland - and that song came from my mother!” Did Tommy write the song Isn’t It Grand, Boys, To Be Bloody Well Dead? “No I didn’t,” he says, “it’s an old English music hall song. We learned it here in Ireland, but I suppose it would be lost and gone if we hadn’t kept it alive.” Would he ever think of moving back to Keady? “I don’t know if I could afford to live in Keady,” Tommy says, “it’s very expensive. But I like to go back to it once in a while, and my sister Nancy is still there.” How would Tommy Makem like to be remembered? “About ten years ago I was driving in Donegal when I stopped for a woman who was thumbing a lift. She looked at me and said, ‘I know you!’ ‘Do you?’ says I. ‘I do,’ she says. ‘Well who am I?’ I said. She didn’t know my name, but she said: ‘You’re him that sings!’ And I thought that was a great title. “I’ve enjoyed every minute of singing, and getting involved in my own culture. I’m convinced that there’s a movement towards a uni-culture all over the world: everybody’s going to wear the same clothes, eat the same food, think the same way and play the same music. Everybody’s trying to be American.” Tommy has been a pioneer all his life. But didn’t he do a lot of drinking songs with the Clancy Brothers? “I did, yes,” he says. “People used to say ‘Why are you doing all those drinking songs, when you don’t drink?’ - I always replied to them, ‘Well I’m not a hen, but I like eggs!” When the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem appeared on America’s Ed Sullivan Show they instantly became known as ‘the four most famous Irishmen in the world’. Are U2 worthy successors? “U2 are a rock ‘n’ roll band, they don’t play ‘Irish’ music,” says Tommy. “They wouldn’t say they’re an ‘Irish’ band, though they’re very proud to be Irish. But yes, they are worthy successors to us as the four most famous Irishmen in the world.”
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