KERRY RECORDS LAUNCHES ITS THIRD YEAR OF
“AN IRISH CHRISTMAS”
WITH MORE THAN A FEW PLEASANT SURPRISES

As everyone knows who has been to one, Kerry Records’ An Irish Christmas, now in its third year, has been an overwhelming success. With glorious music, dance, and plenty of Irish soul it has been the one proven antidote to the doldrums generally inspired in this country by all the commercial tinsel of mall and shopping center in our towns and cities.

An Irish Christmas reminds us once again of the true meaning and humanity of Christmas, the truly festive nature of the holiday.

Last Saturday was the first installment in the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza, There will be additional shows on December 1 at the Annenberg Theater in Palms Springs, on December 2 at the Irvine Barkeley Theatre, Decembeer 7 at El Camino College, and , finally, California Center for the Arts on December 8, 2007. Each show will be a little different, with different performers, but they will all come out of the enormous talent pool amassed by Margaret O’Carroll, and that us enough of a guarantee that all will be first rate.

Last Saturday night there were the usual favorites from previous shows, consummate singer-actress Marian Tomas Griffin, the remarkable Kathleen Keane, with her heart-stopping exploits in step dancing while simultaneously playing the fiddle, Patrick D’arcy on Uileann pipes (unlike the Scottish variety, as the old saw goes, because the player can drink while playing), Andy Reilly on bodhran, and an ensemble of step dancers that seems to grow more beautiful and accomplished each year, all choreographed by Andrea Willoughby. There is talk that in some of the succeeding shows David Munnelly, the Irish button accordionist will be present, and if you’ve never seen him perform, you’ll be genuinely astonished.

Not content with the success and exhuberance of past shows, Miss O’Carroll, consistent with her plan to eschew the sentimentality of leprechauns and the like, so long the staple of other Irish endeavors of the past by less visionary producers, has emphasized aspects of seannos and seanchas, the old traditions of story telling and singing. There is dancing on the half-door, songs about the wren boys, and best of all a genuine seanchai in the person of Tomaseen Foley, who tells a warm and witty story about Irish generosity around this time of the year. How he does this in the enormous barn of a theater like the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza and hold the enormous capacity audience in the palm of his hand is beyond the powers of this reviewer to explain, but hold them he does and his presence alone is worth the price of admission.

In a way, that’s what An Irish Christmas in its various manifestations has always been about, Irish generosity and charm, and once again it is served up in heaping portions.

-Aidan Rafferty, 2007