A short and funny video …

John Millington Synge ((1871-1909), poète, écrivain et accessoirement musicien, était aussi photographe. Issu de la bourgeoisie protestante irlandaise, il passa une partie de sa vie à voyager pour étudier les arts et la littérature.

En 1897, malade, il décide de vivre entre Paris et Inis Meàn, dans les îles d’Aran. Il y effectue un véritable travail d’ethnologue, sillonnant la campagne avec son appareil-photo, collectant récits et chansons à chacun de ses passages.

En 1907, il publie son livre Les Iles d’Aran, illustré par Jack Butler Yeats. Les photos prises par Synge dans les îles d’Aran entre 1898 et 1902 ne seront rassemblées et publiées qu’en 1971 dans un recueil intitulé My Wallet of Photographs aux éditions Dolmen Press.

Synge was 27 when he went to the Aran Islands for the first time in l898, armed with l9th-century contemporary technology: a typewriter and a second-hand camera called a Klito he had bought from another visitor in Kilronan. Recovering from an operation for Hodgkin’s disease and a frustrated love affair, he was open, vulnerable and receptive. The images he took, record everyday island life – the women at the spinning wheels, the men gathering seaweed or hauling their currachs – but they also chronicle a dramatic news event, one of the last evictions on the island of an old woman turned out of her house after 30 years.

In his pictures of people, there’s an intimacy, a familiarity in the attitude towards the camera, a sense of ease in facing a friendly rather than an intruding lens. The photographs were used by Jack Yeats for his illustrations for a series of articles Synge wrote for the Manchester Guardian in June and July 1905 and the original sketch of the family on Inis Oírr now hangs in the Niland Gallery in Sligo.

“These photographs are important because they are among the first to portray the cultural revival in Ireland at the turn of the century and are among the most visual statements of Irishness from a cultural national perspective,” says Walsh, who first came across the photographs on a visit to Inis Meáin two years ago. “Synge was someone who believed that here was a reservoir of pure unadulterated Irishness, much more rooted and organic and, in a way, like an alternative lifestyle that came from the people and the elemental forces that surround them.” Other photographers of the time, he argues, did not have the same empathy, did not speak Irish, and were transients passing through with a camera, or scientists clinically recording what they perceived as a primitive way of life.

Synge was a close observer of nature and an accomplished musician who had ways of engaging with islanders and entertaining them. He could also be inconspicuous when he wanted to, and the portrait of the family on Inis Oírr, the man moving away from the woman and child, has a kind of epic grandeur, almost cinematic in its formality and setting.

He noticed details of island dress, “the local air of beauty”: the flannel trousers, the veists or báiníns, the pampooties, cowhide shoes and, of course, the red petticoats and indigo stockings “on the powerful legs” of the women. He certainly didn’t write about white cabled Aran sweaters, which did not exist then, and the idea of drowned fishermen being identified by their knitted jumpers was a later, mythical invention. Early visitors to the island were always impressed by the colour and unity of the dress, and the contrast between the farmers on Aran and those of their counterparts in Wicklow in their top hats, suits and boots could not be more striking.

Seamus Heaney, né en 1939 en Irlande du Nord, a fêté lundi dernier ses 70 ans en compagnie du pays tout entier. L’Irlande, pays des poètes, a mis à l’honneur, lundi 13 avril, celui qui a consacré sa vie à la poésie – et a reçu le prix Nobel de littérature 1995 pour l’ensemble de son œuvre.

Elevé dans le milieu rural du nord de l’Irlande, il poursuit ses études à l’université de Belfast. Ce clivage entre racines gaéliques et culture britannique marquera profondément son œuvre.

Je vous joins une petite vidéo illustrant un de ses poèmes.

Juillet 2009: le groupe irlandais mythique joue à Croke Park à Dublin ses plus gros succès et ses nouveaux titres. Retour “à la maison” pour les Irlandais dans LE temple du football gaélique, un des sports les plus populaires en Irlande.

J’ai personnellement visité Croke Park et un stade de 80,000 places, c’est quand même impressionnant !

C’est quand même  le quatrième plus grand stade d’Europe, après le Camp Nou à Barcelone, Wembley en Angleterre et San Siro à Milan !

Hits like Linger, Dreams and Zombie made them one of the most successful Irish bands of the ’90s, with success on both sides of the Atlantic.

Now, Limerick band The Cranberries are to reform after a six-year hiatus.

In a statement on their website on Friday, the group said they would be both touring and recording new material.

They said they “couldn’t be happier to announce the news”.

Dates in North America are expected before the end of the year, with concerts in Ireland and the rest of Europe to follow in 2010.

Before their break in 2003, the band had become one of the biggest Irish bands of recent times.

Their debut album Everybody Else is Doing It, So Why Can’t We? and its follow-up No Need to Argue were multi-million selling records.

The announcement coincides with the release of new material by lead singer, Dolores O’Riordan.

She said on the band’s website: “I’ve decided to reunite with my former band members in The Cranberries and we will be writing new songs and performing tracks off my new album as well as our greatest hits during the shows. I’d love to see you out there.”

Did you know them ?

Do you like their songs ?

Which one is your favourite ?

Enjoy !

The Script are a three-piece Irish pop rock band from Dublin . Their multi-platinum selling debut album The Script was released in August 2008. The band members are Danny O’Donoghue (lead vocals and keyboard), Mark Sheehan (guitar and vocals) and Glen Power (drums and vocals).

Their debut single “We Cry” received “Single of the Week” on RTÉ 2FM, Today FM and by Jo Whiley on BBC Radio 1, and was Kevin Hughes’ tune of the week on GCap Media’s The One Network show Music Control We Cry was released on the 24th of April 2008 and entered the UK Singles Chart at number thirty before rising and peaking at number 15 the next week giving the band their first top twenty single. The track also performed well on the Irish Singles Chart by reaching the top ten, peaking at number nine giving them their first top ten single in their home country.

Their second single, “The Man Who Can’t Be Moved,” was released on the 25th of July 2008. This single proved to be their international breakthrough hit and their most successful single to date. After debuting at number 30 on the UK Singles Chart, it rose twenty seven places to land at number three, making it their first top three single in the UK. It has spent twenty one weeks in the Top 40 to date. The song performed well on the Irish Singles Chart.

Enjoy their song and sing along !

Article en construction,

Videos and links coming soon …  

As the Six-Nation Rugby tournament is starting off this week-end here are a selection if the anthems you will hear (and be able to sing, thanks to the lyrics for some of them)

The British Anthem (sung by the English squad) :

The Scottish Anthem , “Flower of Scotland” (not the pipe version …)

The Welsh national anthem (Land of my fathers). It is sung in Welsh but you’ll get a translation in English thanks to this video :

The Irish National Anthem sung in Croke Park :

La version sous-titrée en Gaëlique + Ireland’s Call qui est l’hymne pour toute l’île (rappel : contrairement au football, l’équipe de rugby a toujours compté dans ses rangs des joueurs nord-irlandais et des joueurs de la République.)

An irish Christmas by The Irish Rovers, just because I love Ireland (and its music too)

Frank Sinatra for a jazzy feeling :