Gaelic Day at Johnny’s!

I’m excited to announce the upcoming convergence of two of my favorite things: Gaelic culture and Johnny’s Gone Fishing, the iconic Carrboro coffeehouse! On November 1st, which is the approximate start of the Celtic New Year, Johnny’s will be hosting a celebration of Gaelic music, language and dance.

I’ll be starting things off with a Gaelic song session: a free mini-workshop for anyone who’d like to try some Gaelic singing. We’ll learn the choruses to a few simple work songs, and I’ll stick around and chat with anyone who’s interested in getting more involved with Gaelic singing in the Triangle.

Next will be a session with Dr. Michael Newton, who will teach participants short Gaelic phrases, some of which will be taken from his latest book, The Naughty Little Book of Gaelic: All the Scottish Gaelic You Need to Curse, Swear, Drink, Smoke, and Fool Around. Even Alex Salmond, the Scottish Prime Minister, owns a copy, and Diana Gabaldon, author of the best-selling Outlander series, has been tweeting about what a great resource it is!

We’ll round off the night with a session of Scottish and Cape Breton music, led by Alison Arnold (of the NCSU Irish Session), Patricia Hornick, and Tyler Johnson, author of Tales from the Red Book of Tunes. I will give a Cape Breton dance demo, and I’m hoping a few other dancers may show up to join in with their own steps. Bring an instrument and come play some tunes!

The festivities will start around 5:00 pm, and there will be lots of yummy food and drinks available, including the ethnically unrelated but still delicious Capp’s APizza truck. Hope to see you there!