Nightnoise unofficial site

Radio programme tribute to Mícheál Ó'Domhnaill

WNYC’s New Sound has re-aired a programme on Mícheál that was first broadcast in 2006.

Apart from tracks from The Bothy Band, Puck Fair and the Portland album he did with Kevin Burke, it contains that rarest of rare things: a recording of Nightnoise live in concert. It was recorded in 1989, when Billy Oskay was still in the group, and features a brief interview with the four followed by a set in which they play After Five, Nollaig, At The Races, Nightnoise, and The Cricket’s Wicket. The set starts about 26 minutes in and runs for about 18 minutes.

Considering you can get bootlegs of the likes of Bob Dylan going back to the 1960s, it’s hard to believe nobody ever snuck a tape recorder into a Nightnoise gig. Maybe Nightnoise fans are above that sort of thing. I do know that some radio stations have recordings (Spain’s national radio RNE 3 has a recording from a Valladolid concert dating from the Billy Oskay period – more on that later).

And Ireland’s national TV, RTE, has recordings of them when they moved back to Ireland, with fiddlers and even a cellist filing in the strings side of the equation (Johnny Cunningham had decided to stay in the US), but who knows if we’ll ever get to see that footage.

Meantime, check out the WNYC programme