Charles Fanning was a traditional Irish harper in the second half of the 18th century. Because he was still active in 1792, I ought to try and say something about what he was doing during my “Long 19th Century” study period (1792 – 1909).
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This is a project to try and find out about Irish harpers who were continuing to play in the inherited tradition from 1790 through to about 1910.
These people (mostly men) learned from teachers who themselves had learned from teachers and so on in a lineage of tradition back through the 18th century harpers. They played on floor-standing wire-strung traditional Irish harps, using the traditional Irish harp playing techniques and style.
Walker
Walker was an amateur self-taught player of the traditional wire-strung Irish harp in the mid 19th century. This post is to draw together references to him and to try and say something useful.
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John McMullan
John McMullan (or McMullen) was a traditional Irish harper in the early to mid 19th century. This post is to gather the few references we have, to try and say something useful about his life and music.
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Blakeley
Blakeley was a traditional Irish harper at some point in the mid 19th century. So far I have only one reference to him. This post is to discuss what we know, and to put down a “marker” for Blakeley, so that if more information comes to light we can add it at the bottom.
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Rose Mooney
Rose Mooney was a traditional Irish harper in the second half of the 18th century. She was still alive after 1792 which means that, as part of my Long 19th Century project, I have to try and say something useful about what she was doing from then onwards.
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Kate Martin
Kate Martin was a traditional Irish harper in the 18th century. We have only a few references to her, and they are all retrospective. Some of them imply or state that she was still alive at the beginning of our Long 19th Century study period, but I think this is not reliable information. This post is to discuss the information we have to see if we can say anything useful about Kate Martin from 1792 onwards.
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Dominic O’Donnell
Dominic O’Donnell was a traditional Irish harper who was alive and active towards the end of the 18th century and apparently into the beginning of the 19th century. We have very little information about him. This post is to gather together the different references to see if we can say anything useful about what he was doing during our Long 19th Century study period (1792 onwards).
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Michael McCloskey
Michael McCloskey was a traditional harper in the first half of the 19th century, about 200 years ago. This post is to gather the records of his life, times and music.
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Richard McCloskey
I have one single reference to a harper in Belfast called Richard McCloskey. I am not sure if he is real or not. This post is to discuss the reference. If in the future we discover any other references, we can add them as comments to this post.
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Mary Kellett of Cornashesk, patron of traditional harp music
I am not usually paying much attention to the patrons of the traditional harpers, because it is enough work for me to simply track down the harpers themselves, who they were and what they were doing.
However I want to try and pin down Mary Kellett of Cornashesk, because she is mentioned in an anecdote from Patrick Byrne in the early 19th century, and we need to date the anecdote, so as to fit it in to Patrick Byrne’s life story.
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