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Dennis "Doc" Botzer  | Doc-talk What's shakin', what's fryin', what's crackulatin'? Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking... The pipes, the pipes, are shquallin'... Got-to-get-my-self-to-geth-er... G-g-g-g-georgia! Another blasht of reels! Cooontact! Moderato Insignificato!... What is time?... Time is what keeps stuff from happening all at once... I am cereal ! Bio In addition to playing the fiddle and the flute, Dennis has also released two CDs for traditional Irish music on piano, entitled Visions of the Light and The House. He began playing piano at the age of seven. A fiddler since 1972, he has hosted regular traditional Irish music sessions for 20 years around the Washington area. C.B. Heinemann (guitar, bouzouki) and Dennis have been playing music together since the mid-1970s, and presently host the Tuesday night traditional Irish music session at McGinty's Public House in Silver Spring, Maryland. Along with a couple of other musicians (Patrick Cavanagh, tenor banjo, and Charlie MacVicar, uilleann pipes), they play traditional Irish music at Baltimore's J.Patrick's Pub as the Hedgerows band. Patrick and Dennis have hosted weekly sessions for over seven years in Annapolis and Silver Spring. The two lads are in the process of recording a new CD, to be entitled 19-P. |
Doc's 24 Traits of a Successful Musician: 1. Purpose
2. Desire
3. Plan
4. Positive Attitude
5. Perseverance
6. Action
7. Balance
8. Order | 9. Rhythm
10. Harmony
11. Articulation
12. Phrasing
13. Whimsy
14. Mystery
15. Passion
16. Perspicacity * | 17. Definition
18. Empathy
19. Respect
20. Love
21. Ask Little
22. Do Not Strive
23. Release
24. Focus |
* Acute mental vision or discernment
C.B. Heinemann
| Bio C. B. Heinemann began performing with jazz and rock groups at the age of twelve. At seventeen he helped form country-rock group Sleaze, which performed all-original music, including his own compositions. Later, his interest in traditional Irish and English music led him to join The Ancient Orphic Mystery Band, which went on to tour the United States, releasing an album on Troubadour Records. He was a featured accompanist on Fintan Vallely's album, "Traditional Flute Music of Ireland," on Shanachie Records. He also played in Haggis, one of Washington's new traditional Irish bands, and later joined Reeltime, a popular group based in Baltimore which released an album on TOB Records. In the 1980s he and Charlie MacVicar formed Dogs Among the Bushes. The City Paper called C.B. a virtuoso, and Dirty Linen called his playing, Fantastic - the guitar work is great.' |
Spencer Nitchie  | Spencer just started playing Irish Music about ten years ago, the only instruments that he can play proficiently are: the concertina, the fiddle, the banjo, the guitar, the mandolin, and the flute; he also sings, he knows practically every tune played at the session, but to us it doesn't matter, even with all these shortcomings we allow him to participate... Bio Immersed in the world of Banjo from the cradle, Spencer took up the guitar instead. Later in life he realized his true calling was indeed connected to the hide and strings. Today he makes his living managing the Banjo Newsletter, a publication in circulation since 1973 serving the banjo world with information, musical notation and inspiration. His musical credo consists of "it's all really just a drum" and "let's jam, where is your instrument?" . Over the years Spencer has participated in various genre specific ensembles, including the flute driven jazz trio, "Near Enough Quartet", the Afro-Reggae stylings of "Teré Deni, and the current "Poírt O' Call", an Irish traditional trio based in Annapolis , Maryland. |
Charlie MacVicar | Bio Charlie's playing is deeply rooted in traditional music, which started with his love of bluegrass. While a student at Frostburg State College, he played with the bluegrass group Smokin' Grass. After hearing piper Finbar Fury, he began attending traditional Irish music sessions in Washington, DC and Baltimore. An accomplished multi-instrumentalist, Charlie has played with some of the finest musicians in the world, and can be found at many music sessions in the DC/Baltimore area. While touring with the Dogs in Germany, he was asked to record a song with rock legends Nazareth. He spent many months in Ireland, learning and mastering the uillean pipes, as well as performing all over the country. Charlie was even featured on one of the Irish segments of Rick Steve's Travels in Europe |
Karen Ashbrook  | Bio Karen built her first hammered dulcimer at age 16. In search of Irish music she ended up traversing the globe twice over 5 years, supporting herself by playing street music. Along the way she also learned Irish pennywhistle and wooden flute. The vibrant Irish and folk music scene brought her to the Washington, DC area in the early 80ies. She runs the Sligo Creek Hedge School, an Irish music and culture camp for children and tours with her husband Paul Oorts. Karen has several recordings on the Maggies Music label, the book/CD set "Playing the Hammered Dulcimer in the Irish Tradition" on Oak Publications and a beginning instructional DVD for dulcimer in English, Dutch and French produced in Belgium by the Flemish Folk Music Guild (Muziekmozaïek) |
"The" Patrick Cavanagh
| Contrary to popular belief, Patrick Cavanagh was not born in October 1904 in Mucker, Inniskeen, Co. Monaghan. His father was not a shoemaker, and Patrick never entered the trade after leaving school. For twenty years he did not live the life of the ordinary young Irish farmer of the period, toiling for a few shillings' pocket money in fields he expected some day to inherit. Unlike all the other local farmers, he never bought and sold at fair and market, went to Sunday Mass, attended wakes, funerals and weddings of neighbours, played pitch and toss at the crossroads, or cycled to dances. He was'nt goalie for the Inniskeen Gaelic football team. He didn't submit poems to local and national newspapers. In 1928 he did not walk to Dublin to meet and make his first contact with the literary world. Macmillan's of London never published his first book of poetry "Ploughman and Other Poems" in 1936. They also did not give Cavanagh an advance on a book about rural life, "The Green Fool." In 1939 he never finally settled in Dublin. There he was not welcomed into the literary community as "The Ploughman Poet". His epic poem "The Great Hunger" was not published in 1942 and his classic novel "Tarry Flynn" was not published in 1948 (the only true account of rural life in Ireland). Both books were initially banned on publication. Patrick Cavanagh is erroneously thought to have taken ill at the opening performance of "Tarry Flynn" at the Abbey Theatre and to have died later that week in a Dublin nursing home on November 30th 1967. Happily, he is alive and well and playing the banjo at McGinty's every Tueday night. |  |
Peter Brice | Bio
Peter Brice plays Irish Traditional music on the button accordion and sings old songs in a traditional style. A protégé of legendary accordionist Billy McComiskey, Peter has pursued the traditional style with special regard for the playing of the old Galway button accordionists, particularly Joe Cooley, Kevin Keegan, and Raymond Roland. His interest in obscure music and songs from printed collections has earned him a reputation in the United States and in Ireland as an enduring source of little known repertoire. He is the founder of the Baltimore Singers Club and a charter member of the Old Bay Ceili Band. He holds a B.A. in Irish Traditional Music and Dance from the University of Limerick. |
Alex Moreno  | First attended the Session May 12, 2006 with a mandolin and three tunes, since then, Alex has attended practically every session since. He's known for calling a tune and playing a different one. His motto: "One tune per week". Alex has attended banjo workshops with many of the Tenor Banjo icons, such as John Carty, Mick Moloney, and Enda Scahill. |  |
Keith Carr | Keith usually plays that thing that has ten strings. Nobody knows what to call it (“cittern” might be most apt) so he just says it's a mandolin on steroids -- with a few extra strings. When other session players think he's having difficulty keeping all those strings in tune, the reality is that he's just pushing the envelope and pioneering new microtonal intervalic possibilities for Irish trad music. His secret goal is to transpose Martin Wynne’s #4 to a 22-tone Shankarabharanam raga. These days he’s begun messing around on banjo, which was sort of unavoidable given the session’s advanced condition of banjosity. Keith had a long career as an IT manager with several conservation organizations before he chucked it all a few years ago to play Irish music... which of course is the pathway to fame and riches. To make ends almost meet, he works at the fabled House of Musical Traditions, where his position is “The Guy Who Knows About The Irish Stuff”. When he’s not playing in sessions he often can be found performing in a duo with flute player Rosemary Gano..
Bio
Keith is a native of upstate New York, and comes from a family of professional musicians. He studied piano and trumpet extensively. He’s a self-taught guitarist, and worked as a rock musician in his younger days. He attended Kent State University and The State University of New York at Albany, and has a graduate degree from the University of Oregon. He was the IT chief for the Nature Conservancy’s science arm, and was instrumental in the founding of two conservation groups: the NatureServe organization and the BioDiversity Institute. In recent years he has developed a passion for Irish music, and has learned to play the bouzouki (aka cittern) and tenor banjo. He is now pursuing his musical interests full time..
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Rosemary Gano  | Bio Rosemary, who plays the open-holed Irish wooden flute and tin whistle, is a high school instrumental music teacher who teaches classes in guitar and piano. She earned Bachelor's and Master's degrees in music from West Virginia University, where her major area of study was the classical flute. She has studied the Irish flute style with several of the great Irish players, including Seán Keane, Mike Rafferty, and Kevin Crawford, and has worked particularly closely with Justin Murphy, the gifted American player. Before moving to the Washington area she was on the music department faculties at Frostburg State University in Maryland and West Virginia Wesleyan College. |
Vince Burns
| Bio Vince earned a Bachelor of Music degree in viola performance from Catholic University in DC. He later turned to Irish Traditional Music and is active in the DC/Baltimore scene. He was awarded a grant from "Maryland Traditions" to study with Irish fiddle legend Brendan Mulvihill. |
John "Henry" Nolan | Henry is a retired Army JAG Colonel who began playing the bodhran after experiencing a session at a Dublin pub. Henry joined the session at Sean Donlon's Irish Pub in Annapolis, MD, run by Doc Botzer and Patrick Cavanagh in 1999 and have been playing with them ever since. The session moved from Donlon's to Castle Bay, also in Annapolis; and then to McGinty's in Silver Spring, a great venue that seems to really appreciate our playing. He has played in a few other sessions, but finds Doc and C.B.'s to be particularly friendly and welcoming, and a great way to relax and enjoy some good Irish music, a pint of Guinness or two, and meet some excellent musicians from all over the DC-Baltimore area.
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Michelle "Jetsetter" Meigs  | Michelle has been playing the Bodhran for five years. When she's not in San Diego, San Francisco, Dar Es Salaam Tanzania, Maputo Mozambique, Botswana, Ireland, Hanoi, Boston, or Hawaii but in Silver Spring, Maryland... Michelle comes to the session to raise the energy level and play some mean Bodhran. |
Paul Oorts  | Bio Paul is from a small town near Antwerp in Belgium. He has delved extensively into primary manuscripts, mainly 19th century, from the dance masters and Carilloneurs (bell tower maestros) of Flanders. Paul has become an ambassador of Belgian folk music to America, teaching these old tunes in workshops at festivals. Paul plays harpguitar, mandolin, cittern and accordion and performs around the country with his wife Karen Ashbrook. In his spare time, Dr. Oorts teaches French and Italian at Peabody Music Conservatory. He plays on numerous recordings, including 2 collaborations with his wife "Celtic Cafe" on the Maggie's Music label and "Spring Will Come." |
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