Entertainment

Trad: Life accordion to Kilkenny box player Mick McAuley

Mick McAuley, from Callan in Co Kilkenny, played on Sting's show The Last Ship
Mick McAuley, from Callan in Co Kilkenny, played on Sting's show The Last Ship Mick McAuley, from Callan in Co Kilkenny, played on Sting's show The Last Ship

WHEN you start off learning the most basic traditional Irish tunes on the instrument of your choice, you probably wouldn’t dream that in years to come, you would end up playing with rock royalty on the Great White Way, as New York's Broadway is known.

But that his what happened to Kilkenny box player Mick McAuley, best known as the accordionist with Irish American trad royalty Solas, and, as is the nature of traditional music, a driving force in various trad duos and trios.

The musical McAuley DNA goes a long way back.

“I grew up in Kilkenny as part of a musical family, the second youngest in a family of six who all played music," he told me on Skype from his home in Kilkenny.

"Before I can remember, music was part of our life because the older ones were already going to fleadhanna cheoil and concerts.

“My dad encouraged us all to play something different. I think it was an attempt to reduce any competitiveness between siblings! I can see the logic of it now, and I always joke, all the good instruments were gone by the time it was my turn

When Mick first started, he used to listen to everything that Joe Burke did and to Paddy Cahill who had a crisp, accurate, rhythmic way of playing – role models he says he was lucky to have.

"As I went on, I'd say Jackie Daly had more influence on me than anybody – there is a madness to his playing, it made me always laugh in the best possible way. It just made me smile, and the devilment of his playing really gripped me.

"There was so much fun about his playing and Jackie was such a nice guy and meeting him really spurred me on. That's the most important thing at the end of the day. It's dance music, and it's there to put a smile on someone's face – the listener and the people you're playing with.

As a teenager, Mick played professionally before then deciding to get some sort of qualification. So he went to London to study aircraft engineering, being trained by British Airways. However, after a few years, the call of the music became too great.

In 1997 he joined the Irish-American trad supergroup Solas with whom he has has just finished a nine-week spring tour. Solas are a band who, I suggest, found a new lease of life with the Shamrock City album.

"That was a shot in the arm." agrees Mick. "It gave us endless energy because the creative process was so different. For the first time we had a themed album; here was a story that we wanted to tell about Michael Conway who left Ireland for the copper mines in Bute, Montana.

"We wanted the album to connect with all emigrant experiences, from people everywhere in the world. It's the first time I felt the need to write for an album. It was a departure for the band and for me personally as a musician and a writer. It lit a fire under my a**e to get started!"

The Callan-born McAuley says his next project is an album of songs but just out is Highs and Bellows, an album of mostly instrumental music with just guitarist Colm Ó Caoimh. It's a pared-down sound that Mick likes

"When you have bigger personnel or a more meticulously produced project, there's a much larger process involved in bringing that to fruition. That's not what I was interested in and thankfully nor was Colm. We were both attracted by the idea of going in, a little rehearsal and picking the tunes – the majority of which I've been playing for a long time. We would just sit and play and hoped that that spontinaity would work and that it would be good enough not to mess about with or overdub.

Hopefully the energy we were looking for comes across.

Last year Mick joined up with Sting to play on his autobiographical show, The Last Ship. Needless to say, he thought it was brilliant.

"It was so different from anything I'd done before. My experience of theatre was this amateur thing called a scoraíocht with Comhaltas!" he laughs.

"On The Last Ship, I was only involved in the music side. I was always a Police fan, and a Sting fan after that so I was delighted to get the call. Stepping into it was all different, all new. This thing that is musical theatre, whether on Broadway, off-Broadway or a million miles away, it's still an artwork and you have to be in the room to share that experience. I found that quite addictive.

"I'd love do get back into a theatre – that's on my radar and I'll work towards that. You have great actors who are great singers and how lucky was I to be given an amazing score by Sting and Rob Mathes?"

I'm sure the feeling was mutual!