Doors open at 5pm for this 9th Annual Celtic Benefit, a benefit as always for Children’s Mercy Hospital.

Entertainment for the 2009 event includes:

  • Bob Reeder
  • Flannigan’s Right Hook
  • Ellis Island
  • Pipes and Drums of Ararat Shrine
  • Rob Gavin

More details will be posted closer to the event, but put the date in your calendar for now.

Last year, from the Annual Celtic Benefit, along with the Wellies Race in Weston, booths at festivals, and donations, the Harp & Shamrock Club raised almost $12,000 for the Hearing Aid Fund of Children’s Mercy Hospital. Kids are waiting for hearing aids and you can help them on Friday night, November 6, 2009.

The next H&S Club meeting is Friday, July 17, 2009 at The Office in Gladstone, Missouri at 8pm.

I’ve been on Ireland’s east coast - and for those of you who think Ireland only has a west, you can see some pictures of it I’ve been posting (with amazing patience) on Bicyclistic.

More pictures of Ireland will follow, and updates to Irish KC will resume, once I return to Dublin and its super duper internet highway later today.

Of course you’d know all this if you followed me on Twitter

The 2009 Coors Light Midwest Gaelic Classic begins at noon in Swope Park at the Wizards’ Training Facility by 63rd & Lewis, and continues until 6:30pm.

Admission is FREE.

One of Ireland’s national games regularly played in front of crowds of 80,000 in its home country, Gaelic Football is a non-stop action-packed sport which to new eyes looks something like a mixture of soccer, basketball, and rugby. A round ball is caught and kicked and punched by 15-player teams trying to score pints (over the bar) and goals (under the bar).

Teams from the cities of Little Rock, Arkansas and Minnesota’s Twin Cities are joining 2 teams from the host city in a schedule of 4 games:

Match #1: Noon - KCGAC-Green vs Twin Cities GFC(Minn/StPaul)
Match #2: 1:30pm - Little Rock GAA vs KCGAC-Navy

Consolation Match 3:15pm - Loser match #1 vs Loser match #2

Championship 4:45pm - Winner match #1 vs Winner match #2

There’ll be food and vendors, and stuff for the kids, and whatever the heat the games will be played - if it’s too hot for you then you can cool yourself down in the sprinkler.

It’s a great opportunity to learn about your Irish heritage - an ancient Irish sport - and to support Irish culture in Kansas City.

The KCGAC is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to good sportsmanship and furthering Gaelic Games in Kansas City

This event is posted on the Kansas City Irish events calendar.

Big news this.

The Pogues are so big and so influential on so much of the Irish music that you hear in Kansas City and the Midwest that I’ve written about them loads of times - so there’s really no need for me to do it again (see below for previous pieces), or to use it as an excuse to trot out some tired Shane MacGowan jokes.

The Pogues, like Count John Mc Cormack, Van Morrison, and The Dubliners, before them, gave us a genre of Irish music that has been imitated in every city with a sniff of Irishness about it. A curse in other words. Except for the existence of the original.

There are no negatives. Go.

Just Some of the Earlier Posts on The Pogues:
   • Blogue Mahone: Best Irish Music Blog Ever
   • The Pogues, They Started Radio Stations
   • The 27th Greatest Song Never To Reach Number One
   • Shane MacGowan & Christy Moore Sing Spancil Hill
   • Mike Webber Reviews The Pogues
   • December 25th: Shane MacGowan’s Birthday
   • Dirty Old Town by The Pogues
   • Shane MacGowan on Kirsty MacColl
   • How Do You Pronounce “Pogues”

Tickets
Tickets go on sale this Friday, June 26, 2009 at 10am to the general public, though TicketMaster are doing their internet presale on Thursday from 10am to 10pm. The official Pogues site is advertising tickets for all venues on this tour going on presale at 3pm tomorrow, Tuesday, to their internet community

Tickets start at $45 for what’s classed as an all ages show. As this could be history you might want to bring somebody young. Or somebody old come to think of it.

Coors Light Live Concert Series
This gig in The Pogues Fall Shows, 2009 - NW X W X SW Tour (see what they did there?) is presented as a Coors Light Live Concert Series show.

Irish Events Calendar
This event is posted on the Kansas City Irish events calendar - and of course it’s over on the far right sidebar of every single page on IrishKC because it’s considered to be among the events that are Irish Highlights in KC.

Pogues USA Tour
Dates are now posted for the fall 2009 USA Tour by The Pogues

Do you remember me telling you what the Irish dish coddle is? Well this is its bloggy equivalent in a magazine style - starring “two Manuels, one Sweary and a lovely homemade Flann”.

You’ll know these writers from the last several years if you’ve been reading blogs out of Ireland at all - and you really should be if you’re interested in whatever Ireland is rather than just saying you’re interested in Ireland.

Whenever I made coddle in Kansas City I couldn’t help but notice that the locals talked about it - a lot - but never actually indulged in it. Well I suggest you at least try this bloggy coddle - for some real Irish flavours.

Coddle as a blog?

Watery rashers? Boiled sausages? Onions that induce heart-attacks? It’s an eccentric, contrary mess of satisfying meatiness, and doesn’t that echo beautifully as an aspiration for a motley mob of moderately funny Irish writers? A fire under our collective arse, a peppery pout, and the unfortunate glimpse of vegetable … this is Coddle Pot

Following the launch of Culch.ie and the expansion and magazinification of Bock The Robber, the birth of Coddle Pot is making 2009 a very interesting year in Irish blog world.

Other Stuff Genuinely Related:
   • Dublin Coddle Vegan Irish Sausages
   • Review of Irish Blog Awards 2008
   • Bangers Are Not What The Irish Call Sausages (Sausages Are)
   • The Irish Blogging Scene - December ‘08

This is the entrance to Deerfield, a rather splendid home that before Irish independence was the official residence of the Chief Secretary, but since then has been a little slice of America in a park of over 1,700 acres that Lord Chesterfield left for the people of Dublin to litter.

Deerfield is in the Phoenix Park in Dublin, and if you take the wrong turn at the Phoenix Monument on Chesterfield Avenue in the Park, you’d end up in the President of Ireland’s place, Áras an Uachtaráin. But thanks to this photo you won’t do that now, will you?

You may recall that I’ve written about Deerfield before. Or you may not.

June 16 is called Bloomsday after the character Bloom, and because that was the date in 1904 in Dublin that Ulysses is set - although it was written some time later and published in 1922.

It was celebrated in Kansas City on Saturday gone, at the Plaza Library. As Nancy Shawver of Bloomsday Books said on Twitter, following the event:

Thanks to all who joined in our annual Bloomsday party — what fun! Special kudos to Sylvia Stoner & her crew of fantastic actors. YES!

And the more astute of you will have spotted Steve Paul of the Kansas City Star on twitter during the event:

Backstage w:Bloomsday Players, rehearsal, ‘Ulysses’ play. 30 mins to curtain. Joyce’ s bawdy text. Just handed more lines.
6:45 PM Jun 13th from mobile web

Bloomsday: In the bar. ‘Flood, gush, flow, joygush.’ The language…..’could a swim duck?’
7:16 PM Jun 13th from mobile web

Bloomsday: Nothing like hearing Molly Bloom’s soliloquy again. Four Mollys share the role this year on Plaza Lib stage. Yes yes yes.
8:35 PM Jun 13th from mobile web

Anyway, Saturday was Kansas City - I also noticed there were events in New York and Boston among other places celebrating Bloomsday on Saturday - but today, the actual official Bloomsday, is a Dublin day, for Ulysses is a Dublin book.

If you want to get an idea of the impact of the day in Ireland and on Irish people (including cynics and critics), do a search on Twitter for “Bloomsday” today - though bear in mind Dublin is 6 hours ahead of KC.

If you want to join in Kansas City today with some food as eaten by Ireland’s most famous literary character in Dublin before the Rising, here’s an excerpt from the book to give you some ideas:

Mr. Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls. He liked thick giblet soup, nutty gizzards, a stuffed roast heart, liver slices fried with crustcrumbs, fried hencod’s roes. Most of all he liked grilled mutton kidneys which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine

Enjoy.

Paintings were all priced relatively low in the last year while I was searching for a studio. Now that I’m established in a place to work I no longer need to keep prices that low.

The abstract paintings are featured on the far right hand side of the page of Irish Paintings.

It is the sale of paintings from this site that keeps IrishKC in operation. Or not, as the case may be.

Here’s a few band that fans of Irish music in Kansas City should be familiar with. They’re all playing the Kansas City Celtic Festival this weekend:

  • The Elders - Friday 8:30pm
  • The Young Dubliners - Saturday 8:30pm
  • The Shortleaf Band - Saturday 1:30pm & 4:15pm
  • The Kelihans - Saturday 2:15pm
  • Tullamore - Friday 7pm, Saturday 6pm
  • Kelly - Sunday 3pm
  • Bob Reeder - Saturday 4:30pm, Sunday 11:30am
  • Flannigan’s Right Hook - Sunday 2pm
  • Connacht Town - Saturday 3:30pm

And the following bands are not exactly unknown to play Irish music:

  • Tartannic - Friday 6pm, Saturday 1:15pm & 7pm, Sunday 1pm
  • Mother Grove - Friday 7:15pm, Saturday 3:15pm, Sunday 12:15pm
  • The Glenfinnan Band - Saturday 2:30pm & 5:30pm

3-Day Outdoor Festival
This weekend sees a 3-day outdoor festival of Celtic music for Kansas City, when the 2009 Kansas City Scottish highland Games & Celtic Festival takes place at the E.H. Young Park in Riverside, Missouri on Friday, June 12 6pm - 11pm; Saturday, June 13, 9am - 11pm; and Sunday 9am - 4pm.

Pipes, Fiddles, Drums & Harp
You’ve also got the Tullintrain Pipe Band, the Antioch Middle School Fiddlers, Omaha Pipes & Drums, and a whole bunch of stuff on the Clarsach - which some people will tell you is an Irish harp.

Gaelic Games
The Kansas City Gaelic Athletic Club (KCGAC) will be there on both days doing demonstrations, and I think on Sunday they’ll be having a scrimmage. Gaelic Games in this context is Irish Galeic Games i.e. Hurling and Gaelic Football. I’m not aware of there being any demonstration by anyone at the festival of the Scottish game of shinty. Ask.

Celtic Festival Features
You also have the Highland Games which are fascinating, sword fights, kilt demonstrations, weaving, stroy-telling, piping, historical re-enactors, maille armoury, Highland Dancing, National Dancing, Parade of Tartans, genealogy, childrens activities & events, and free Scottish Gaelic lessons. In other words, it’s a festival, a Celtic festival.

Tickets
Tickets at the gate are $15 on Friday & Saturday, and $10 for the shorter Sunday. Children 12 and under are Free!

More Info
Visit the official website

It features a painting of mine of The Claddagh in Galway, and a question about it as prompted by a very young boy in Ireland. The winner gets a painting of their choice for free from the Prizepool, which includes paintings of a few Irish scenes as well as Kurt Cobain, and the ever popular Fidel Castro.

It’s a very big weekend for Irish events in Kansas City, so I’ll get to talking about some of them some more and in detail a bit later today when I’ve finished with the free painting competition.

Meanwhile you can always amuse yourself by trying to see which Irish Paintings aren’t yet sold, and if you can buy them before they are!

Because of the current exchange rate, US dollars are much in demand here so my parents had to go to a couple of banks to obtain American money to send with their card to their grandson in America.

-Do you think his mother will let him have his card, I was asked?

I shrugged. Would a mother prevent her son from receiving a birthday card and present from his Nana & Grandad?

Today my parents received an envelope from my son’s mother. On the outside was their last name, no first names or Mr. or Mrs. Inside was a blank piece of paper wrapped around the US dollars they had sent to their grandson for his birthday.

It can now be added to the pile of books and presents that I’ve been keeping for him for over a year.

See Also: Nobody’s Child #30

On Thursday, June 18 2009, in what is being billed as their only Kansas City appearance, The Fuchsia Band are playing at 7pm in the Irish pub Raglan Road in the P&L district of downtown KC, Missouri.

This gig was originally scheduled for Delahunt’s Cafe & but is now arranged for Raglan Road with the added bonus of having Eddie Delahunt join the Fuchsia Band.

Admission
There is no cover for this gig.

Cafe & is located at 4448 Bell Street and you can make a nuisance of yourself by phoning them at 816-753-3322, but heck it’s a cafe, so why not call in, grab a cup and a pastry, sit yourself down, and then ask your question?

Eddie, the Delahunt fella in question with the cafe, has a website.

The Fuchsia Band are also playing again at the Langston Hughes Theatre on the campus of Lincoln University (820 Chestnut St) in Jefferson City, Missouri -on Wednesday, June 17, 2009, the evening before KC.

The gig for the lads at the same venue last year got a great reception. For tickets or information contact:
Allen Tatman of Paddy Malone’s Irish Pub at 700 W. Main Jeff City, MO 65101. Phone (573) 761-5900 and see Paddy Malone’s Website

On this 2009 USA tour The Fuchsia Band will also be playing Fairfield, Iowa; Urbana, Illinois; Jackson, Mississippi; Monroe, Louisiana; Tuscaloosa, Alabama; New Orleans, Louisiana; Memphis, Tennessee; Little Rock, Arkansas; Fort Collins Irish Festival in Colorado, and this weekend, the Oshkosh Irish Festival.

Dates, times, and details of all these performances can be got at the band’s MySpace page - you’ll need to scroll down a little.

I missed Fuchsia front man, and former part-time Kansas City resident, Máirtin de Cógáin, wearing his drama hat in a play here in Dublin a few months back thanks to a nasty spell of winter, but I’m sure he can tell you about it himself.

This event is posted on the Kansas City Irish events calendar.

See Also:
   • Come My Little Son
   • The Fuchsia Band Played Cafe &
   • Mairtin de Cogain and The Fuchsia Band Win Radio Awards

It’s the reason why the promised latest online sale of new paintings has been delayed. As well as the ongoing burning at the elbow and pains shooting up to the wrist, gripping and lifting is especially difficult. I have dropped kettles of boiling water; I have spilled tea.

While spilling tea might not seem significant to you, it is of epic importance to me.

In short my arm needs rest. There are two activities I do daily that worsen the symptoms; painting, and using the computer. I’m not stopping painting.

So for the next 6 weeks, or longer if necessary, I’ll be touching the computer a lot less.

I won’t completely abandon IrishKC, American Hell, Bicyclistic, and my various twitter accounts and other social media sites, but I will be cutting back significantly on volume and frequency. Irish KC is the most labour-intensive of all the sites I do so it will suffer the most.

That said, I have a perfectly good left arm, so I should manage to at least link to some things as I limp along - or whatever the word is for gimpy-armness, and maybe I’ll use the experience to teach myself to become ambidextrous.

And yes I know that swinging a hurley in the Phoenix Park doesn’t help matters, but that was a once-off and typing this post is causing my arm more pain than that did.