Julia Clifford (fiddle)
John Clifford (piano accordion)
Reg Hall (piano)
Topic – 12TS311 – 1977
This is the third installment of Topic’s Music from Sliabh Luachra series, and features the playing of husband and wife John and Julia Clifford, accompanied on piano by Reg Hall. It was recorded between 1975 and 1976, and most of the tracks were put down on two separate occasions in London, apart from track 10, which was recorded at Jack Lyons’ Bar, Scartaglin, and track 20, recorded at Dan Connell’s Bar, Knocknagree. The tunes on this album were all familiar to the Cliffords before they left Lisheen, Co. Kerry, with the exception of ‘Tap the Barrel’, a reel they picked up whilst living in Newcastle West, Co. Limerick, between 1953 and 1958. So, unlike The Star of Munster Trio, which consists almost entirely of tunes well-known on the London Irish music scene in the 1970s, this album gives an insight into the repertoire of the Sliabh Luachra region as it was played in the 1930s. As is to be expected, a number of tunes are associated with the Sliabh Luachra fiddle master, Pádraig O’Keeffe, from whom both Julia and her brother, Denis Murphy, learned their music. The production on the album is very basic, and the playing is fresh and unrehearsed, but the casual brilliance of Julia Clifford’s playing is an absolute joy to behold. — Robert Ryan
There’s some pretty in-depth notes by Alan Ward starting on page 28 of his Topic booklet here.
SAMPLE: The aforementioned Tap the Barrel set:
Track listing and more info: https://www.irishtune.info/album/HmrLshn/
Download this out-of-print album:
http://ceolalainn.breqwas.net/download/John%20%26%20Julia%20Clifford.zip
The Music of Sliabh Luachra 