Paddy Moloney

Speaker 30:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons, we've had to shorten the music.

Speaker 30:08

The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen ninety nine, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:31

My castaway this week is a musician. Over the past thirty-five years, he and the group he leads have become the world's principal ambassadors of Irish music. Enormously popular in their own right, they've added to their appeal by attracting other famous names to appear with them: Mick Jagger, Van Morrison, Tom Jones, and The Cause, for example. He himself comes from a Dublin household that was always full of music. From that simple beginning, he's woven a path through folk, skiffle, classical, and pop music to create the unique position he holds today. The world is one big musical theatre, he says, and I want to get out there and play with them all. He is the chief of the chieftains, Paddy Maloney. And you have Paddy, and you do, from China to LA and the Vatican in between. You once gave a private concert for the Pope, didn't you?

Paddy Moloney1:20

We did indeed. He was in Ireland in 1979. We were the opening act. Yeah, before he came, we did a twenty minute warm up. Down he came in his helicopter. But there was one point three million people there.

Presenter1:32

And how did he, the Pope, react to your music?

Paddy Moloney1:34

He loved it and and invited us um six months later to the Vatican and we gave a private you know, he has his private audience there and we were up sitting beside him and playing away every so often. And he liked it. He loved it. And yeah, at that time we only had twelve albums, you know, out of our thirty five that we have now. And he had all twelve of them.

Presenter1:42

Bare

Presenter1:45

And he likes

Presenter1:52

Is it true or is it apocryphal that he said now I know why Saint Patrick went to Ireland?

Paddy Moloney1:57

That's true. Yes, he did. Yes. He had something for everybody. You know, he had something different to say. Wonderful. And he held on to my hand all the time. He could feel that charisma is incredible, man.

Presenter1:58

It's there!

Presenter2:03

Wonderful.

Presenter2:06

Incredible.

Presenter2:07

So that's the Pope. Then of course you've performed on your tin whistle, I think, in front of the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra to show them how to do it. A hundred and thirty members of an orchestra and yet there you are on your tin whistle.

Paddy Moloney2:08

And

Paddy Moloney2:17

Dash was amazing, far and away was a film.

Presenter2:20

Okay, but

Paddy Moloney2:20

And I had been sort of going over it on the scores and listening and trying to decide, you know, this is not going to work. So before we started to record, I said, John, do you mind if uh I just play it my way? And he put his big arms around me and he says I was hoping you'd say that.

Presenter2:35

But it takes guts. I think I don't know whether there's an Irish word for it, but I mean it was settled for chutzpah. I mean just to stand up with a tin whistle in front of the LA Symphony Orchestra.

Paddy Moloney2:37

Hello

Paddy Moloney2:38

Sure.

Paddy Moloney2:40

Did that just be a

Paddy Moloney2:43

It was indeed to be with John Williams and he he saying to them, Look, I'm watching Paddy, you watch me and he conducting away. But we've done we've done it with them. Uh we've given a couple of concerts at the uh Hollywood Bowl with the same orchestra.

Presenter2:58

And the tin whistle came into its own, I know, in China as well, where it was able to sound rather Chinese. It's kind of chameleon-like, your Irish music. What do you think it is about Irish traditional music that makes it able to move in and with so many other cultures?

Paddy Moloney3:04

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney3:06

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney3:14

Within the structure of the melodies, there's a tremendous variety of different kind you know different melodies. Apart from the reels, jigs and the hornpipe and the stuff you get up and dance with, you know, you have these great airs, these great tunes about events that took place, similar to China. In fact, it's amazing that our guide over there, I used to take him aside and said, Look, I want you to sing me something from your hometown. And he'd sing and he'd go off into one of these West of Ireland what we call the shannons, the old style of singing. And that to me was touched my heart, you know, and I love that.

Presenter3:47

Is it true that all music can do that, or is it something particular, something special about Irish?

Paddy Moloney3:52

I think in folk music that if you go back far enough you'll find even with our music there's a common bond there. Like for instance a couple of weeks ago I was recording the Bulgarian Singers and the story behind the song was how they dress up on St Stephen's Day. Like we call them the Wren Boys. They had a different name for it. But it was the same idea. They'd go knock on your door and you'd give them something and they would pass it on to the poor people. And that was exactly because they disguised themselves in straw hats and blackened their face so nobody knew who they were. So there was no embarrassment. And it's the same idea.

Speaker 24:14

They

Presenter4:28

So

Presenter4:29

Th so the truth is that that music is a common language in i i in a way that you have truly proved, isn't it?

Paddy Moloney4:35

Absolutely. I mean, it's the beginning of all music, folk music. That's how it all started. From the great masters, you know, to Beethoven to Mozart to Benjamin Britton and and Vaughan Williams, and they all sort of pulled on on folk themes.

Presenter4:50

Tell me about your first record.

Paddy Moloney4:52

Yeah, the trip to China was just brilliant. I mean the first band to play on the Great Wall of China, but we recorded and filmed everything. But one of the great things I wanted to do was to team up with the Chinese musicians. It was very funny, the first meeting that, you know, we were in a room and nobody could break down that barrier of how to get to meet. And then I heard them singing in Do Re Mi Faso, La Tito, Tony Ksalfa, which was my system. So I said, that's okay, fan me, let's me, fas all right. And I started saying, oh great, you know, more Chinese tea. And so every concert there was a 20-minute jam session.

Presenter5:55

I cast away in The Chieftains and full of joy from their album The Chieftains in China. You don't just play The Tin Whistle, of course, Paddy, you play the Ilian pipes or the Elbow pipes.

Speaker 26:02

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney6:02

Uh

Speaker 26:02

Put

Paddy Moloney6:05

Pray.

Presenter6:06

Will I offend you if I say they're a bit like bagpipes?

Paddy Moloney6:08

On the Arab the Arab bipartes are a little more sophisticated than the ones that we gave to discards years ago.

Presenter6:14

A little sweeter in sound, too.

Paddy Moloney6:15

A bit of sweeter in the sound, and it has more notes on the chanter to go on. So it can be a fully chromatic instrument to play with orchestras, which sometimes I do.

Presenter6:20

Go on.

Presenter6:24

Octaves, I think it's got this.

Paddy Moloney6:25

It's two full octaves, yeah. And and um it's it's an amazing instrument, but it's tuned slightly flatter than what you hear on a piano. But to me, much more pleasing to the human ear, yeah.

Presenter6:26

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter6:31

Yeah

Presenter6:36

And then as well as that in the Chieftains, what have you got? You've got a couple of fiddlers.

Paddy Moloney6:40

Fiddler is a flute, a wooden flute, uh and the bower on the percussion instrument is um it's a one-sided drum. It's like a

Presenter6:48

It's like a big tambourine, isn't it?

Paddy Moloney6:50

It's a tambourine, yes, and and uh and you play it with a stick and and or with your hand and with your finger. Uh you'll find them in many, many countries. Uh oh Derek Bell, ding-dong bell as I call him. Derek is uh our harper uh but uh he also plays the chumpon, the timpan, which is uh from the fourth century. Uh it's a kind of a dulcimer, hammered dulcimer. And uh Martin Fay sometimes rattles the old uh beef bones, you know, just a pair of bones.

Presenter7:17

But essentially you're an instrumental band, although one of you does sing sometimes.

Paddy Moloney7:20

That's right.

Paddy Moloney7:22

Yeah, Kevin sings the odd song.

Presenter7:24

Yes. But but basically when you do the odd song it's because you've invited a a guest in and I've mentioned some of them but you know we can add other names to that that distinguished list. Elvis Costello, Eric Clapton, Joni Mitchell, Sineado Connor.

Paddy Moloney7:32

Distinguished list

Paddy Moloney7:34

Ruth clapped.

Presenter7:36

It's become a kind of cult thing to do, to sing, to be a guest of the chieftains.

Paddy Moloney7:39

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney7:40

Right.

Presenter7:42

But how did you begin in the first place? I mean, do you kind of write Dear Mick Jagger? I was wondering if you'd like to make a record with us.

Paddy Moloney7:48

I did say that. I mean, we've always been kind of musicians, musicians. Like way back in 68, John Peel on his Night Ride programme, the programme to listen to, was playing The Stones and the Beatles. And in the middle, you know, out comes this track from the Chieftains. I had something funny going on here. But then I went to London, like in the 60s, and Brian Jones, the late Brian, went to his flat in Eden Square one time, and the other Stones were there. And they were playing The Chieftains. I couldn't believe this. And making tracks with other musicians, like Mike Oldfield, and Art Garfunkel, and people like The Eagles and Don Hendy. I wanted to bring all those tapes and put them all in one album. And it was so difficult, I said, forget about it.

Presenter8:31

Mm-hmm.

Presenter8:34

Well it's the div the organization of all of those people to get them in the right place, in the same place as you at the same time.

Paddy Moloney8:36

Lamb

Paddy Moloney8:39

That's what I did eventually, you know, it came up with what we what I call chieftain and fran chieftains in friend.

Presenter8:44

But it means, of course, that you have to work uh with a lot of people without too much rehearsal because you're all busy people.

Paddy Moloney8:50

Right.

Presenter8:50

Tell me about performing with Van Morrison. Is that always a a predictable business? she asked.

Paddy Moloney8:56

A book to be written. I mean Van we've known forever, I I think, you know, and he's a great friend. Sort of a love-hate sort of relationship. I mean, he plays terrible tricks on me, there's no doubt. But uh one great song that he was doing, uh Ragdon Road, and uh he he uh

Paddy Moloney9:15

He was going into one of these long you know what the American Indians would do or what the West of Ireland Shanno singers which is very traditional, very old, very Irish. But we didn't know where when to fade away and I said, Brian, if we do this again, you wouldn't give me the nod or as I my expression was give me the billy. Oh, yeah, oh the billy, okay, yeah, yeah, give me the billy when you're going to come down and we just finish off together on the same time in the same note.

Speaker 29:42

Oh no!

Paddy Moloney9:44

And so when he came up towards the end of it, he was singing away, Billy Billy, he shouts.

Paddy Moloney9:53

Of course we ruined the take, you know. Except I still have that take, it's rather unique and brilliant, you know.

Presenter9:58

Wonderful. Tell me about your second record.

Paddy Moloney9:59

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney10:02

Yeah, I remember, you know, if I was out from school with a small ailment and a slight sore throat, I was dying to get downstairs and play my own wind-up gramophone. And one of my favourite ones was the West of Ireland singer herself, Margaret Brook Sheridan. She used to do a great version of I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls, the Balf opera. He came from Dublin, of course, in the 18th century. But her performance of this, you know, used to touch me so much. It was so beautiful.

Speaker 210:12

Hmm.

Speaker 210:35

I had a rejoice so great to find.

Speaker 210:43

Oh, I am Sister L.

Speaker 210:51

What I always ordered, which is

Speaker 211:00

So that you will love to meet the same. So that you will love to me. He will love the meeting.

Presenter11:21

Margaret Sheridan singing I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls and that was recorded in nineteen twenty nine. Um memories for you just a bit after that, I think, Paddy, uh of the wind up gramophone and the hoolies at home. Always a Saturday night or every night?

Paddy Moloney11:30

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney11:35

Saturday and Sundays, um, because there was the work had to go on during the week, but on on Saturday night, you know, and I was allowed to stay up of course, you know, I was only six, seven, but I remember it so vividly, and uh I remember this little drum they got me, uh a cardboard drum, and uh I used to play like mad along with it, you know.

Presenter11:54

When did you get your first whistle?

Paddy Moloney11:56

When I was about six my mother bought me a tin whistle for one shilling and ninepence in in the old days, and I taught myself how to play. Unfortunately I started with the right hand on top and uh instead of on the bottom. And it was a strange thing, but I played away for a couple of years that way and and then when I started with the pipes I had to switch over.

Presenter12:07

Okay.

Presenter12:14

And you taught yourself the piano as well?

Paddy Moloney12:16

I yeah, the black notes on the piano were just the ones for me and I don't know. I just went for F sharp, you know, on the on the piano and using all the black notes. But uh I did go to the School of Music and do did all the other swings.

Presenter12:19

Press Y.

Presenter12:29

So you're not entirely self-taught, but you were in the beginning.

Paddy Moloney12:32

Mostly. I I would almost say I'm, you know, more self-taught than anybody else. And I don't know why Trinity gave me a Doctor of Music. I just was an honorary Doctor. This irritated Derek Bell so much. He went there for years. Then I get, you know, given this Doctor of Music.

Presenter12:48

You get the title, please. But you were always quite a little lad and still are. And you weren't you a mascot for the band?

Paddy Moloney12:52

Oh yeah.

Paddy Moloney12:53

And

Paddy Moloney12:56

Yes, there was down in the country when I went down for my holidays, that three months to me was heaven. There was the Bally Finn pipe band and they'd bring me around and and they'd go uh w on one of these fundraisers in the little towns like Bur and Mount Melick and uh Portliche and places like that. And in the middle of the square in the town they'd put down the big drum and put me sitting up on it and I'd play my inin pipes and the money would roll in. Did you get to keep any of them? Oh no gosh, no. I mean I was I was so honoured to be brought for tea, like ham, cooked ham and and tomatoes, you know, and lettuce. And that was a big deal for me, you know.

Presenter13:24

Did you get to keep any of them?

Presenter13:35

And you were you were your mummy's boy?

Presenter13:39

And I dare say she would never have dreamt that you would have made your living at it. It was simply not what you did, was it?

Paddy Moloney13:44

Not at all. Uh that wasn't the kind of thing. I mean it was a pastime. She'd bring me to competitions and to music festivals and uh open air things in the summer and play and she was as proud as pointed. That was it. And then, you know, th it was the job after that and I went towards accountancy and and I started to study and but I was studying at night'cause I went out to work when I was sixteen years of age, but Christmas would come and the parties and then of course it the studies would go out the door again until the following September. So I only ever got halfway. But in the job I was doing I was actually doing accountancy work and bookkeeping and all that sort of stuff.

Presenter14:17

Hmm.

Presenter14:19

So you learned how to be neat and tidy.

Paddy Moloney14:21

Oh, the discipline was incredible, you know.

Presenter14:23

And to organise, because of course that's very important in the world.

Paddy Moloney14:25

Very important, yeah. Because I after when I went from that job I went into uh managing a record company. But all the time my mother was, you know, she used to say to Rita, my wife, you know, terrible thing about Pat, you know, never got himself a decent job. Now this is when the when I'd gone full-time professional, you see, and she thought about I'm having to travel and travel, this is a shocking you know, and she was really concerned, but I think the penny dropped when she when she went to Trinity and saw me with the cap and gown and all the the works and all that. I was accepted.

Presenter14:56

Record number three.

Paddy Moloney14:57

Yeah, these house parties were just brilliant. Uh there was no communication, people just got to hear it word and mouth and they'd all arrive, maybe fifty people, into this small cottage, you know. And I can still see my grandmother sitting up on this wooden churn and she was singing this song and still here and see her. At that time this song was called Little Maid from Malabar, but that wasn't quite accepted in in the United States and it became the coast of Malabar.

Speaker 215:24

Far away

Speaker 215:28

Across the ocean.

Speaker 215:33

Under me.

Speaker 215:37

An Indian star

Speaker 215:42

Dwells a dark lonely day

Presenter15:51

Raikuda with the Chieftains and the Coast of Malabar. Now, you formed the Chieftains, Paddy, when you were about twenty five years old, but you didn't turn professional until you were thirty eight, after I think you'd beaten the Rolling Stones and led Zeppelin to the title of Band of the Year. You're a cautious soul, Paddy, I think.

Paddy Moloney16:09

I was, you know, in the midst of running the AB the record label, there was offers coming in from everywhere because around 1970 there was a group called Jigga Jig and they played a couple of reels that we'd play and put drums and guitars to it and it became a number one hit. So people were after us and I said, no, no, that's not the way I want to do it. If I have to take the rest of my life, it'll happen my way as the song goes.

Presenter16:27

Who knows?

Presenter16:32

But why not? Why weren't you ambitious for that, as it were?

Paddy Moloney16:35

Well that would have been selling uh to me selling out. I mean it would have when I say selling out, it wouldn't be the sound that I wanted to create, it wouldn't be the way the approach that I wanted to go. Like I I'd put music first, that's the most important thing, and then after that for whom I'd like to play, the people and what they want to hear. And then thirdly, of course, if we can make a living out of it, all the better.

Presenter16:55

But you you weren't playing in pubs, you know, there was none of that. You you'd avoided all of that, hadn't you?

Paddy Moloney16:57

None of that.

Paddy Moloney16:59

Yeah, you know, I I had a a dream, a bigger dream for the band. You know, my dream was to get this great folk art played in all the countries on the the big stages throughout the world.

Presenter17:09

Because of course going back before all of that, y before the formation of the chieftains, you'd started performing seriously as a young man at at the Abbey Theatre, hadn't you?

Paddy Moloney17:19

Yes, there was a couple of occasions. Like for instance, I put music together for a pantomime that took place there. I was also associated with another composer, Sean O'Reilla, and he did some great music for a documentary called Misha Era, I Am Ireland, and mostly traditional arrangement of traditional tunes for orchestra, and it really caught my imagination. I thought it was brilliant and

Presenter17:38

One

Presenter17:42

And he he kind of formed a a sort of folksy chamber orchestra that you were part of.

Paddy Moloney17:46

That's right, and and I used to work with him on that. We actually sat down and decided who was you know, who we'd like in the in that in that particular group. He thought really cool because he was c quite new to the he had it in him, but he was just coming into playing traditional Irish music himself.

Speaker 217:54

Hmm.

Presenter18:01

So when did you decide you wanted to branch out from all of that and choose the sounds you wanted? Because the instruments we listed earlier are are what you chose. That was the sound you wanted to hear or something.

Paddy Moloney18:08

Eric

Paddy Moloney18:09

Sure.

Paddy Moloney18:10

What did you hear? Well I was actually doing it myself. I had different combinations. I had trios, I had quartets, uh occasions to do maybe uh documentary music. So I'd put together a group, you know, and do this kind of thing. So I was a bit of a rebel and uh a lot of the purists were sort of out with the big sticks, you know. I mean they're all good friends and what took them a few years themselves to get around to doing the same thing.

Presenter18:34

Next piece of music, number four.

Paddy Moloney18:36

You know, uh talk about the purists and all, but I I think I went too far when I put together a skiffle group because I loved Lonnie Donnigan. I was into jazz and all that kind of stuff. So I had this group called the Three Squares. I used a washboard with three red squares sort of painted on it and sometimes the ukulele. But the song, you know, that really turned me onto it was Lonnie Donaghan. We used to sing this and set ourselves putting on the style.

Speaker 219:02

Putting on the agony, putting on the side.

Paddy Moloney19:03

Looking on the agony

Speaker 219:07

That's what all the young folks are doing all the while.

Paddy Moloney19:07

Ah

Speaker 219:12

And as I look around me, I'm sometimes apt to smile Seeing all the young folks are putting on the star

Presenter19:26

Larney Donegan putting on the style and and memories, you say, Paddy Maloney, of being in the back shed

Paddy Moloney19:30

Actually, on a Sunday morning after Mass a whole bunch of us used to go back to my house, uh in the the shed at the back of the house and uh we'd play poker and when all the money, a few shillings were gone, um we'd strike up a a session.

Presenter19:46

Now you don't just manage, produce, and play in this group. You you compose uh and arrange. How does a man who is in the main self taught, as you've said, how do you do that?

Paddy Moloney19:56

You know, you had more sick bags than aeroplanes that you could ever believe. They're stuck everywhere. But, you know, when you're on an aeroplane on a long journey to Australia, someplace, you can't ring the bell to get off or take a rest. So out comes the sick bags and bits of paper and I'd like to make it all the way. And you write all it, you write the music on it. I'd write it all out, and the thought would come into my mind and develop it. Like I did one for The Horse one time, Ballad of the Irish Horse, and I wrote 16 bars. But from that, I developed a whole.

Presenter20:11

And you write all it you write the music on it.

Paddy Moloney20:23

a series of of uh counter melodies and and different styles of playing that piece of music you know

Presenter20:28

But how do you write it down? I mean, I can t see and you hear it in your head. You keep touching your head.

Paddy Moloney20:31

In my pocket here, I mean just pieces of paper like that that has uh has little lullabies, you know, in the look hiding in Doreen on the other side of it as well. So uh this that'll spark off something and from that I'll start to develop it and develop it.

Presenter20:39

Let me have a look how you did.

Presenter20:42

Do you

Presenter20:46

But it's, you know, D D R S.

Paddy Moloney20:48

Yeah, so so, yeah.

Presenter20:51

But who translates this? How?

Paddy Moloney20:52

Well, eventually what what I do is ring our old ding-dong bell, Derek, and uh I'll play him, maybe on the piano, the black notes of the piano, I'll play it all out for him and I can see the sounds that I want and how that melody should be.

Presenter21:01

Yeah.

Presenter21:05

Why do you say see and not here?

Paddy Moloney21:07

Mm.

Paddy Moloney21:08

I can actually see it out there first and then write it down. But it's not something that sort of beep beep pop up and pops into your head as quickly as I can actually see a tune that I want to hear and I see the story behind what it is, you know, not the notes, but I can see the story, I can see the person, I can see the emotion, I can see the feel for what it's going to be eventually. And it starts to pop out, you know, and then all of a sudden you have a tune. Mr. Echo. Yeah, mentioning old Ding Dog, Derek, he's a master of all four families of instruments and he's also a concert pianist. And John Field was a Dubliner, 18th century, came from Fishambal Street in Dublin. And he was the inventor of the nocturne. Before Chopin, before anybody, it was John Field nocturne. And Field, strangely enough, when he went about doing something that he thought was Irish, it turned out to be kind of Scottish. So this is a rondo from John Field. It's on Derek's album, Derrick Bell Plays It Himself.

Presenter21:19

But what do you see when you see it?

Presenter21:38

Yeah.

Speaker 221:50

Yeah.

Presenter22:48

Derek Bell, playing part of John Field's Rondo Ecoce from his album Derrick Bell, plays with himself. Now, your colleague Derek says that some of let me quote him some of your our collaborators have been a success, some were eccentric. Do you think he's right?

Paddy Moloney23:05

Well, everybody I think that we associate with I mean, it would take Derek to to say something like that because he himself is a total eccentric.

Presenter23:14

What he seems to be hinting at there is something that, as you know, your critics have accused you of, which is kind of deserting your roots and going for these very lucrative booking lucrative big names and putting out these C D s with and guests. Do you think you've done enough? Do you think you've overdone it?

Paddy Moloney23:22

Going for

Speaker 223:26

Uh

Paddy Moloney23:29

Uh

Paddy Moloney23:33

No, I mean that's total nonsense. I mean we've ever worked 35 albums. We've we've have uh twenty-five of them are solid traditional Irish music albums. And when I rang up Mick and Sting, you know, would you like to do uh a song? And they said great, what do you want us to do? They didn't come along and say, Oh, it has to be my song with my band, which is great. You know, they came to us and I proposed a song and we did it that way.

Presenter23:41

Albums

Speaker 223:41

Uh

Presenter23:51

Hmm, which is

Presenter23:56

There's a deal of trust, therefore, involved. I mean, it isn't something that you can just sort of ring up your mates and book'em in. It they've got to h trust you because there's both you know, not just your reputation, but their reputation is on the line.

Paddy Moloney23:58

I mean, it isn't something that you

Paddy Moloney24:01

In book

Paddy Moloney24:02

No.

Paddy Moloney24:07

There it be

Paddy Moloney24:09

Absolutely, and I wouldn't want to embarrass them, not even at the recording, mean bringing them in front of the band. So there's a lot of preparation, a lot of work goes into it.

Presenter24:16

And do you have to persuade them in the end sometimes to do things they wouldn't necessarily want to do?

Paddy Moloney24:17

After the sword.

Paddy Moloney24:20

It can happen. Oh, you can see it. I can see it. That's exactly right. The likes of Bonnie Raid, for instance, on Tears of Stone, our latest album, Bonnie was being very careful because she wanted to be sure she could do it. And I was certain she could, you know. But it went back and forward for months. Different other songs came up, and eventually she came back to the song. Okay, I think you're right. You know, I do a storm a cree, which means it's the Gaelic, you know, for the love of my heart, you know. And but what she I won't be able to put that traditional sort of

Speaker 224:54

Uh

Paddy Moloney24:55

Because I sent her recordings of traditional Irish singers. I said, I don't want you to do that, darling. I want you to give me your interpretation of our songs. The songs have been done adequately, brilliantly by our own musicians and singers. My challenge and a challenge to you as well was to go out there and get them to come and sing our stuff.

Speaker 224:55

Mm.

Presenter25:15

So it's got to be good, it's got to be professional, and it's got to it's got to take off, it's got to be a happening, hasn't it?

Paddy Moloney25:17

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney25:21

It's got to be a happening and every track that I do is is a happening. It's an event. Like people like Bonnie, when she came to Dublin to record with us, she wasn't just into the studio and then gone and we'd never see you again. It was out the night before, into the studio, two or three takes. By the way, I always go for take one. That's always the take. Oh yeah, I'm I'm always so confident that's the one. And then the follow then she stayed for a week. So these associations go on forever.

Speaker 225:40

Yeah.

Presenter25:43

Yeah.

Presenter25:49

Next piece of music

Paddy Moloney25:51

Um Monster at Cabea, ah she's such a wonderful voice and wonderful lady and talk about collaborations and we can all do collaborations but I think the best collaboration I think ever was Monster at Cabea and Freddie Mercury uh singing this song Barcelona.

Speaker 226:08

It was the first time that we made

Speaker 226:12

That's all that's happening.

Speaker 226:15

Check that forget

Speaker 226:18

That you stepped into the room the injury

Speaker 226:29

There are you people in all the slides.

Presenter26:36

Montserrat Caballe and Freddie Mercury and Barcelona.

Presenter26:40

Can you ever, Paddy, just go into a pub in Ireland and, you know, order a pint or three of the Velvet Nectar and lean back and relax? Or do people always say, oh, come on, Paddy, give us a tune?

Paddy Moloney26:51

Uh I miss terribly um you know friends that I I'm still friends but since I went full-time professional, uh people I would have played at with twenty, twenty, thirty years ago, um they'd be a little bit nervous about you know sitting down and playing and I miss that so much but but I still get the odd occasion, you know, and and or I invite them up to the house for a New Year's Eve party. I do have these strange friends.

Presenter27:14

And can you do it?

Paddy Moloney27:15

And then oh, I just go all night, you know, at seven in the morning.

Presenter27:18

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney27:19

Eventually what happens is, you know, you start to play so much that the vibration of the chanter, the chanter being the chanter of the pipes, it just starts to take off on its own. And, you know, it's it's it's and then what's in your head and what's in you want to feel and it's just doing it and it's just jumping there, it's jumping mad, you know, it's incredible.

Presenter27:40

Now that's truly Irish. Forgive me, but the pipes that play themselves.

Paddy Moloney27:43

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney27:51

Yes, Mozart always had great admiration for the great Mozart and his compositions. Now he had a great friend called Michael Kelly, by the way, who was a Dublin composer but mostly a singer. And the first performance of The Marriage of Figaro, he was the guy that sang. But himself and Mozart, they were great friends and they used to go out at night playing billiards and drinking and whatever else came along. One of his concertos, the horn concerto in E-flat, to me is a rip-off of an Irish jig called The Piper's Chair. And I'm sure it was Michael Kelly who gave him the Piper's Chair, because if you listen to the jig, you know, the diddly diddle, do you want me to play around with it?

Presenter28:43

Yes, give me a whistle of the Piper's J.

Paddy Moloney28:47

Alright.

Presenter28:48

But Piper's chair on the whistle coming.

Paddy Moloney28:49

They're on the whistle.

Speaker 228:56

Sappa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa

Speaker 229:18

Yeah.

Speaker 229:25

Uh

Presenter29:44

Part of Mozart's Horn Concerto played by Dennis Brain with the Philharmonia Orchestra conducted by Herbert von Karrion and accompanied in this studio on the Tin Whistle. What do you imagine, Paddy, you'll do all day on a desert island?

Paddy Moloney29:58

I'd have to have a whistle with me because a whistle would bring back great memories, every tune, and also what I'm going to do in the future. And to me life would be almost complete if I had my mistress with me, my tin whistle.

Presenter30:05

Hmm.

Presenter30:10

You can't have your wife with you.

Paddy Moloney30:13

She described it as my mistress.

Presenter30:16

But obviously you'd miss family and friends and the whole kind of crack of of life.

Paddy Moloney30:18

That kind of

Paddy Moloney30:20

Yeah.

Paddy Moloney30:21

What would

Presenter30:21

What would you miss most though? You know, people obviously, but what have you.

Speaker 230:22

Two

Paddy Moloney30:25

But what if

Presenter30:26

What of your life would you miss most of all as you sat there kind of ruminating about it all?

Paddy Moloney30:31

Yeah, well I I'd say I'd have plenty of time to think about music and songs and tunes and collaborations and all the things that I've been sort of wrapped up in for the last thirty-five, thirty-six years uh and things I want to get at and desperate to do. And and uh but I would miss, you know, going up to the Whitlow Hills where I live and meeting the neighbours, you know, How you Patty, how you going back home again, you know, and and all that simplicity, that lovely way of

Speaker 230:53

Oh yeah.

Paddy Moloney30:58

And non-interference and just living life and I do love all that. I'd love to get back to Ireland, you know, I wouldn't live anywhere else.

Presenter31:05

Last record.

Presenter31:07

Last.

Paddy Moloney31:07

Record, I was blessed I had to do some music for a series called The Long Journey Home, the Irish when they left Ireland from 1830 right up to today. So it was a year's work which I enjoyed so much because it had different had different moods of music and different styles of music in it. But I came up with an anthem, a piece of music for the anthem, and I said this wouldn't be right without the words. And my good friend Elvis Costello sat down and just in 24 hours he had it written out, you know. And we perform this now with orchestra and choir and chieftains and lots of other extra people and it's a great sort of very happy sort of feeling, the anthem from The Long Journey Home.

Speaker 231:52

All as you said all I know, look out below.

Speaker 232:03

Allen's Man Tay O Birth

Presenter32:18

Elvis Costello singing Long Journey Home, accompanied by The Chieftains and the Irish Film Orchestra. Now, if you could only take one of those eight records, Paddy, which one would you take? Oh, that's taking me by surprise there.

Paddy Moloney32:31

I I honestly maybe the Roy Kruider uh coast of Malbar because that links with my family and things that happened today.

Presenter32:38

What about a book as well as the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare?

Paddy Moloney32:42

There's an old Irish textbook, The Book of Leinster, which goes back to the 13th century. It's in you won't the copy of it is in The Hague at the moment in the case of that. But you could get that for me, because it gives great descriptions of Ireland going back so many hundreds of years. And it's just the first reference I've ever seen to the chumpon, one of the instruments that I use. Chumpon is the it's like a hammered dulsemer, it goes back to the fourth century. And instead of the pipes, they used to have armies of chumpon players, guys with their like Derry Kendress in a kilt, which would be a very funny sight.

Speaker 232:50

Oh, I can get that.

Paddy Moloney33:16

And sort of banging these things. And they were terrifying. You know, instead of the pipes, they had this.

Presenter33:23

Uh

Paddy Moloney33:23

And this sound coming over the hill, you could imagine what it'd be like.

Paddy Moloney33:27

Yeah.

Presenter33:28

And your luxury is that tin whistle. I mean, what else, really?

Paddy Moloney33:30

I think that's it, and I'd be happy enough with that, and that would keep me very, very happy.

Presenter33:35

Paddy Maloney, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your desert island is.

Paddy Moloney33:38

I enjoy it immensely.

Speaker 333:47

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co. uk slash radio four.