Traditional Irish music to be performed at Museum of the American Revolution

From Thursday, Dec. 26, through Monday, Dec. 30, traditional Irish music will be performed at the Museum of the American Revolution's Cross Keys Café from 2 to 4 p.m.

The special programming ties into the museum's exhibit "Cost of Revolution: The Life and Death of an Irish Soldier," which is on view through March 2020. Access to the exhibit is included with general museum admission ($13-$25).

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The performance schedule, courtesy of the museum, is below. While enjoying the music, attendees will be able to purchase food and drink. Then after the show, the audience is invited to walk to the Irish pub The Plough & the Stars, located a few blocks away at 123 Chestnut St. for happy hour. 

Thursday, Dec. 26: Songs of the Irish Diaspora

Featuring John McGillian on accordion and Darin Kelly on guitar

The program will feature songs that reflect on the Irish immigrant experience, from the songs celebrating their new adopted homeland to the wistful remembrances of the land and people they left behind, and of course those raucous, familiar anthems often heard in pubs. These songs – some familiar and some not – will be interspersed with lively jigs and reels that still echo anywhere in the world there are Irish. 

Friday, Dec. 27: Traditional Irish Fiddle Tunes

Featuring Caitlin Warbelow on fiddle and Darin Kelly on guitar

Listen to and learn about some of the most prominent regional fiddle styles and hear a variety of tune types played by fiddles since the time of the American Revolution.

Saturday, Dec. 28: A Traditional Irish Music Experience

Featuring John McGillian on accordion, Patrick O’Neill on flute and Darin Kelly on guitar

Being a musical people, the Irish have commemorated both their grandest and most trying times through songs and instrumental tunes. Truly, to know the experience of the Irish and their place in the political and social struggles of the last three centuries is to know and share their music. This session will include a rousing collection of jigs, reels and songs that will allow all listeners to feel at least a little Irish. 

Sunday Dec. 29: The Harp as Ireland’s National Symbol

Featuring Ellen Formanek Tepper on harp

This program will feature a solo performer on the clairseach, or Celtic harp, widely considered to be not only the instrument most identified with the origins of traditional music in Ireland, but also as Ireland’s national symbol. Harpist Ellen Formanek Tepper will engage audiences with tunes and discussion of the harp itself and its history.

Monday, Dec. 30: Rebels, Soldiers and War

Featuring Tim Britton on pipes, Patrick O’Neill on flute/whistle and Darin Kelly on bodhrán/guitar

Through instrumental music and song, listeners will be guided through the experiences of the Irish in time of war from stirrings of rebellion in the late 1700s through the Irish Uprising in the early 1900s, in songs which have become so closely identified with the Irish struggle for freedom that one of them, "The Soldier’s Song," was adopted as the national anthem of the Republic of Ireland.

Sounds of the Irish Revolution

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