The Kerryman (South Kerry Edition)
New collection from Éilís ready to set sail
ÉILÍS Ní Chinneide’s new CD ‘So Ends This Day’ is to be launched later this week. Here she explains what motivated her to write songs about the lives of 19th Century whalers, their wives, and a famous rescue of exiled Fenians.
“I wanted originally to write a ballad about the Fenian Rescue of 1876, having had a long interest in the story, which I thought not many people really are aware of.
When I worked, in a previous life, in the National Museum in Dublin a woman called Daisy Phelan came up from Rothe House in Kilkenny with a flag to be made ready for display. It was in dreadful condition and I was given the job of restoring it as a learn-as-you-go experience. That was in 1987 or so; fast forward to 2014 when I first visited New Bedford, Mass, on tour, and on a visit to a local museum during a break in rehearsals I passed a memorial to the 100th anniversary of the Catalpa Rescue in 1876.
All of these things simmered away quietly in my mind until my second visit to the same museum, after which I re-read Peter Stevens’ brilliant book The Voyage of the Catalpa. If I had been a history student I would have been able to write a thesis on that subject by the time I finished reading all I could lay my hands on about that crazy adventure.
In 2018 I was in Texas teaching and afterwards spent a week in the New Bedford Museum of Whaling where I was able to read actual letters from wives to husbands, from brothers to brothers, from fathers to sons, and they really touched me in a way that I had not expected. I was able to get my hands on many books about women in the lives of whalers. It has always struck me how little people, even today, want to hear about how the luxuries they have are actually obtained, and at what human cost.
As to the Catalpa, I was given access to the captain’s log book and that was a thrill! I noticed that Captain George Anthony was fond of signing off his daily entry with the phrase ‘So Ends This day’.
The following January, I brought about 12 books with me to Lanzarote and wrote the songs which ended up on this album. The remaining trad songs sort of revealed themselves to me out of two old songbooks I had bought by chance in a gorgeous second hand bookshop opposite my hotel in New Bedford.
By the time Gerry O’Beirne and I came to finally recording this past January, I knew that Dad’s song about the Lusitania [Ciumhais Charraig Aonair by Caoimhghín Ó Ceinnéide] should fit into the collection.
John Boyle O’Reilly’s life was so extraordinary and inextricably linked to ‘The Gazelle’ whaling ship which rescued him and to ‘The Catalpa’ which rescued the Fremantle prisoners he left behind. I wanted to include a poem of his, ‘Love was True to Me’, and did so because of its simplicity, giving it a simple melody that suited it.
My talented friend Brenda Friel created the artwork and I have included the lyrics, background, bibliography and artwork in an accompanying booklet for those who opt to buy the physical CD.
It’s all done now and will be sailing out into a different world soon - when we get out of the doldrums.
Éilísh’s CD ‘So Ends This Day’ is available from www.eiliskennedymusic.com and from John Benny’s Pub in Dingle, of course. A limited number of vinyl records are also available.