Quick Stop

Your next stop on this little Irish pub crawl is The Danny Mann Inn in Killarney.

Tim O'Riordan and Diarmuid Grainger of Natural Gas are incredibly talented and put on a great show.

I chose this particular piece to film because Tim rocks the house with an unusual instrument -- the bodhrán. Why unusual when you see a lot of them in trad sessions and they're sold in every gift shop across Ireland as children's toys? Well... just like the penny whistle, it's simple to learn to play simple music on them. And, just like the penny whistle, it's possible to raise the difficulty and quality of the music played if the musician is really talented.

Just ask Wes, bodhrán players catch a lot of grief, and are not looked upon kindly by other trad musicians... until you find one that's great. That's Tim:



Tim is at the Danny Mann every Monday night, and he is frequently joined by at least one other member of Natural Gas. (On my last visit he was accompanied by fiddler Vince Morrison. Diarmuid this time added pipes, penny whistle and vocals. Pretty freakin' awesome!) It's on my personal "must see" list for Killarney night life.

Hope you enjoy!