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West Training
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We are located in County Sligo,, the
home of Irish Traditional Music in the North West
of Ireland.
Last updated: 24th August 2009
Our Branch
was founded on Friday March 20th 1987
and
was named in memory of Fred Finn, the renowned fiddle player from Killavil,
who died a few months previously.
The
original officers were:
Chairman, Bro. Angelo; Vice Chairman, Seamus Mc
Cormack;
Secretary, Carmel Gunning; Assistant Secretary, Helen
Feeney;
Treasurer, Frances Lee; Assistant Treasurer, Michael
Kelly;
PRO, Carmel Gunning; Auditor, Bríd Nicholson; Delegates
to County Board, Kate Gallagher and Kate Kneafsey,.
Home
FRED
FINN
Drawing by Tom
O’Rourke
Fred Finn (1919-1986)
remains arguably the most significant Sligo fiddle-player
to have emerged from the post-Coleman era.
Born and raised in
Killavil, an area renowned as the birthplace of Michael
Coleman, Fred Finn spent most of his life in his native
Sligo, during which he contributed enormously to the rich
musical tradition of the surrounding locality.
Fred’s father, Michael, a fiddle-playing
contemporary of Coleman, was undoubtedly an early musical
influence, though Fred played frequently with other
notable local fiddlers such as Martin Wynne, Dick and
John Brennan at the music-gatherings which were then
commonplace in rural Ireland.
The late 1950s and early
1960s, in line with the proliferation of the ceili band,
saw Fred Finn play for a period of time with the Glenview
Ceili Band. Later, in 1972, along with the members of the
Coleman Country Ceili Band: Peg McGrath, Alphie-Joe
Dineen and Noel Tansey, he toured the US. The era in
question, too, was a remarkable one in terms of the
particular flowering of the flute tradition of South
Sligo, and it appears that Fred drew much inspiration
from the flowing rhythm of the distinctive
North-Connaught style of flute-playing. The legendary
duet partnership of Fred Finn and Peter Horan, which came
about initially as a result of Ciaran McMathuna’s
‘Job of Journeywork’ RTE recordings in 1959,
has become widely regarded as the finest fiddle/flute
combination of the recording era. Over a span of 27
years, Fred Finn and Peter Horan uniquely encapsulated
the combined rhythmic vigour and flowing sweetness of the
Sligo flute and fiddle traditions, through their playing.
Unfortunately, in the case of Fred Finn, it was only
posthumously that significant recorded material of the
duet would become available with the 1988 issuing by CCE
of the landmark ‘Music of Sligo’ (CL-33), an
album which captured the mastery of the duet, but could
not expect to provide adequate scope to illustrate the
unique solo-playing of both musicians. Fred Finn, despite
the dearth of recorded material to document his unique
style of playing, will forever be remembered in Sligo and
afar, for the sweetness and flowing nature of his
fiddle-playing, and indeed for the friendly and humorous
nature which evidently was such a strong facet of his
personality.
Oisín McDiarmada
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