Danny Doyle
Irish folk singer whose hit record The Rare Auld Times knocked Abba off the top of the Irish charts
DANNY DOYLE, who has died aged 79, was one of the great balladeers who popularised folk song in Ireland; he was noted for his heartfelt delivery and singalong choruses, which resulted in a string of hits through the 1960s and 1970s.
These included Step It Out Mary, Whiskey On a Sunday, Streets Of London and, most famously, The Rare Auld Times,a poignant lament by Pete St John yearning for the Dublin of his childhood. Doyle’s version knocked Abba’s Take a Chance On Me off the top of the Irish hit parade in 1978 and remained in the charts for 11 weeks.
Its nostalgic sentiment had particular resonance for Doyle, who was born in Dublin on April 28 1940 but who had little thought of a musical career when he left school at 14. His first exposure to folk music occurred during a spell working as a general help at Dublin’s Pike Theatre, where he met various travelling musicians and felt a connection with the traditional songs of the city’s street singers.
Learning guitar, he drew inspiration from the ballad groups the Clancy Brothers and the Dubliners, who were beginning to enjoy international popularity.
It led him to England, where he spent two years finding his own musical voice singing and playing guitar around the nascent British folk club scene. On his return to Ireland his brother Michael became his manager and, exaggerating his impact across the Irish Sea, promoted him as a prodigal son returning home in triumph.
The ploy worked: with his engaging personality, flair for comedy, velvety voice and instinct for delivering emotional story songs, Doyle became a popular live act and was signed by the Associated Ballroom Agency. In 1966 he recorded his first single, Step It Out Mary, reputedly written on a cement bag by a Kerry man, Sean Mccarthy, while working on a building site in London.
The song – about a suicide pact between two lovers after the girl’s father insists she marry a rich countryman rather than the soldier she loves – is now a staple of raucous bar bands playing it at breakneck speed, but Doyle’s mournful rendition and sensitivity hit a nerve with audiences. It reached No 4 in the Irish charts and launched Doyle into the forefront of the ballad boom where, along with the Clancys, the Dubliners and Johnny Mcevoy, he played a significant role in the upsurge of folk music in Ireland.
Doyle had an even bigger hit in 1968 with Whiskey On a Sunday, a Glyn Hughes song about the Jamaican entertainer Seth Davey, who would perform for theatre queues in Liverpool at the end of the 19th century, and whose act involved “dancing dolls”, which he would make jig around as he sang and tapped out the rhythm on a plank of wood.
In 1972 Doyle made a surprise move, joining forces with the singer Irene Mccoubrey, known as Maxi, to form a new showband, Music Box, playing Irish interpretations of American country songs.
Catering for the huge appeal of sentimental country music in Ireland at the time, showbands could attract large audiences and earn big money touring the so-called “ballrooms of romance” in rural areas. Yet Music Box were not entirely successful, and Maxi’s desire to move in a pop direction caused friction with Doyle; after three years the band split.
By the mid-1970s he was solo again; he found there was still an appetite for his gentle approach to easy-listening ballads, resulting in further hits like A Daisy a Day, Somewhere Somebody’s Waiting, Old Dublin Town – and The Rare Auld Times. But as tastes changed with the explosion of younger, more rock-influenced artists, it proved to be his last hit, and in 1983 he moved to the US.
There he cemented his reputation as a showman, singer and storyteller. He toured Australia, where his sister Geraldine had become a wellknown comedienne. In 2002 they collaborated on the album Emigrant Eyes, a mixture of funny and sad songs, featuring the pianist Bill Whelan, who composed music for the Riverdance stage show and also served as producer on some of Doyle’s records.
Doyle made 25 albums, his last major appearance coming in 2016, when he devised and performed in a show in Philadelphia for the centenary of the Easter Rising.
Danny Doyle is survived by his wife Taffy, with whom he lived in Virginia.