Declan Sinnott

Vickie and I will play Coughlans in Douglas Street in Cork on April 18. The time is 8.30 and it’s 15 euros in.

I haven’t played the venue or even seen anybody else play there but I’m told it’s a great gig. I’m told over and over in fact. Everyone seems to love it. It’s small and intimate, holds 60 something people.

Just my speed.

Hi all, there is some confusion about one of the gigs we’re doing in Scotland next week. Vickie and I will definitely be playing at….
The Glad Cafe
1006A
Pollokshaws Rd
Glasgow
G41 2HG

on March 16th
We’re on stage at 8.00.
Come one come all

Hi all,
Here’s a link to my first official video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LIxx9Ouumik&playnext=1&list=PLShTQSeDlHXij9YKIvCBgXBNvn1NtKoGn&feature=results_main.

It was filmed by a company called Storm Light. Editing was by Shaun O Connor. Many thanks to all involved, great work.
The filming was done on Garretstown beach and by Opera lane in Cork city. It was a new experience for me and one I really enjoyed.
The scene at the beginning and the end is of a fire in the ocean. This came about by accident. We wanted a campfire at night, so at around 4.30 the crew lit a fire on the beach. The tide was coming in faster than we thought, so a second fire was lit further up the beach. “Was lit” means I did none of the heavy lifting! Then we noticed that the water had come in around the fire without extinguishing it. It looked beautiful so we filmed it until it went out (the last shot).
The footage in Opera lane includes me sitting on my guitar case playing. So a guy comes up and says ” There must be a recession if you’re busking”. The forest scenes are from near Ballinspittle.
I sat in with Shaun O Connor at the end and really enjoyed being part of the “putting it all to bed” process. My infatuation with the camera and with all things visual continues unabated and as soon as I can I will come up with a video of my own making. My friend Donagh Long’s video has allowed me to think it can be done.
Anyway, enjoy Sun shine in and let me know what you think.

Here are some gigs I’ll be doing in March in the UK. Vickie will be singing with me as usual.

13th March

Malones

90 Shiprow

Aberdeen

Ab11 5bz

Tel: 01224 565557

14th March

Malones

14 Forrest Road,

Edinburgh

EH1 2QN

Tel: 0131 226 5954

Tickets available in person from Malones and Tickets Scotland, Rose Street, Edinburgh.

15th March

Coatbridge St Patrick’s Festival

St Patricks Hall

1 Saint John Street

Coatbridge

ML5 3HB

Tel:01236 606808

16th March

Coatbridge St Patrick’s Day Festival Main Stage

20 min set in the afternoon on outdoor stage.

17^th March

(St. Patrick’s Day Celebrations),

The Duchess, Stonebow House,

The Stonebow, YORK.  Tel: 01904 641413.

Tickets available on line at www.theduchessyork.co.uk

Deckie and Vickie gigs – January 2013

Thurs. 10        St. John’s Theatre & Arts Centre, The Square, Listowel, Co. Kerry  
Doors: 7.30pm Adm. €15/12 concession

Fri. 11             INEC Acoustic Club, Gleneagle Hotel, Muckross Rd., Killarney, Co. Kerry
  Doors 8.30pm  Adm. €15 / Members and Hotel Residents €10     

Sat. 12            Waves Café & Wine Bar, Main Street, Ballycotton, Co. Cork
Doors 9pm Adm. €20    

Sat. 26           The Chapel Sessions, St. George’s Church, St. Mary’s Close, Carrick-on-Shannon, Co. Leitrim
Doors 8pm Ticket Price: €18/€16 conc

On December 8 I play a gig at the Triskel. Vickie Keating will be singing with me as usual. Vickie also works as receptionist there.

The Triskel is an unusual venue, in fact it’s a good deal more than a venue. It’s a cinema and art gallery as well. It has a cafe and houses Cork’s only independent CD/record shop.

In case you don’t know shops that sell CDs are becoming an endangered species. I completely accept that our ways of buying and listening to music have changed and will continue to change. Spotify seems to be leading us towards not owning music anymore, rather having access to a huge library. 50 years ago the single was the most popular way to buy music and you could go to a store and ask to hear the new singles. We’re kind of going back there with iTunes. It’s hard to see what happens to the music business next. One of the problems we may face is that music will become so cheap to own/listen to that people who make music can’t make a living from creating it. This may lead us back to music being an amateur pastime. Music has not been a profession for all that long. The days of albums like “Thriller” selling gazillions of copies are probably gone. I’ve thought for a long time that the one thing that’s sacred and irreplaceable is the live performance. Holograms anyone! As far as I know you can go to a fairly convincing Michael Jackson gig now.

Having someone play music right in front of you is the best for me. I reckon a moderately good bar band on a Saturday night beats almost anything on CD by anyone. I can’t count the amount of times my faith in life/humanity/music/everything has been jump started in this way. I recently picked up a guitar and played a few chords in front of one of my grandchildren to find him staring at me in disbelief. He loves music but had just found out how it was made. Milk doesn’t come from a bottle!

My ability to stay on the subject is not great. It’s such fun to wander and wonder. Oh, I think I’ll go left here, I haven’t  been down this way before. So, The Triskel venue is an old church, possibly the oldest in Cork. I first went there last Christmas to see/hear Handel’s Messiah. It was beautiful. The joy of hearing singers, a choir and an orchestra without mics or sound system. I got in free as well ‘cos I know the receptionist!

My second time there was to play a gig last February in support of the Vita Cortex workers. Christy Moore, Noel Shine, Mary Greene, Mick O’Brien and myself had a great night. I saw Paul Brady there playing solo as part of the Cork Folk Festival. Really enjoyable.

Don’t read anything into me playing a gig in an old church on the feast of the immaculate conception. I’ve been looking forward to this for sometime and intend to have a ball.

Here is a letter I received from Seamus Sherlock. Seamus and his 5 kids and their friends are protecting his farm from being seized by the bank. If you look him up online you’ll get the full story. I very much support Seamus. I’m reminded of this quote “Only after the last tree has been cut down…the last river has been poisoned…the last fish caught, only then will you find that money cannot be eaten.” – Cree Indian Prophesy. We need farmers far more than bankers.

November

18. LIMERICK Belltable

22. WEXFORD Riverbank Hotel

23. WATERFORD Forum

24 NAUL SEAMUS Ennis Centre

30. KILKENNY Cleeres

December

8.   CORK Triskell

10. BALLYMORE EUSTACE Mick Murphys

14. CARRICK-ON-SUIR The Tea Sessions Brewery Lane

28. BALLINCOLLIG White Horse

January 2013

10 LISTOWEL St.Johns Theater

11. KILLARNEY INEC

12 CARRICK ON SHANNON The Chapel Sessions

February 2013

5 Dublin. The Button Factory

7 Belfast. The Black Box

March 2013

7 Slane. Boyles

This is the booking link for my gig in Bush Hall London

http://www.alt-tickets.co.uk/alttickets/event_ate_15492a.html.

So, John and Dick and me are in Pierce Turners record shop. We,re 16, 17, somewhere in there. We don’t have an arse in our trousers. Not a penny or a cigarette between us. We never have. Owning cigarettes is the only guarantee of popularity we know of. We play music together in a band called Perfumed Garden. We don’t have any gear to speak of or gigs to play. We like blues, Hendrix, Savoy Brown. Loud and bluesy in general. Every now and then we get a shout from the priest “Bring your Banjos down on Thursday night”. He’s not so clear on what a guitar is. That means we get to play at the hop in Dun Mhuire. When we play people stop dancing. We don’t care. Ronan sings and Johnny or Paddy plays drums. Well, not actual drums… Biscuit boxes. USA assorted. Good quality biscuit boxes. We have one Amp. Bass and 2 guitars through one amp. Unlisenable racket.

Anyway that day there’s just the 3 of us and Pierce in his shop. John B was in earlier and left his cigarettes and matches on the counter. That’s all we can see. Gold dust. Pierce doesn’t smoke. We talk to Pierce about the idea of us taking one each from the pack. He thinks it’s a very bad idea. John B is older than us and kind of serious, more worldly in some way. We’re not tough. Not at all. Addiction wins out though and we go for it. Sucking away on 3 big long gorgeous cigarettes.

John B comes back (of course). He looks at us, sees the cigarettes, sees the arseless trousers, looks at the cigarette pack, knows everything. He takes the lighting cigarettes one by one from our mouths and stubs them out, puts the pack in his pocket without a word and walks out. Bogart. Pierce is laughing. Pierce is laughing a lot.