Clannad
Clannad (the name means 'Clan from Dore') came together because
they were family - literally. Ciarán Ó Braonáin (the
group's leader, bassist and guitarist), Pól, and Máire
(pronounced Moya) were brothers and sisters, while
mandolinist Pádraig Ó Dúgáin and guitarist Noel Ó
Dúgáin were their twin uncles.
All five grew up in two adjoining houses in Gweedore, a
Gaelic-speaking parish of about 6,000 in the wild, mountainous
Northwest county of Donegal in Ireland.
The O Braonáin\'s father, Leo, ran a big band in the
fifties, while the Ó Braonáin and Ó Dúgáin children
grew up listening to Mrs Ni Braonáin's Gaelic ballads (she
was a music teacher in Gweedore) and the hodgepodge of music that
Leo's friends brought to both their home and Leo's Tavern, the pub
the elder Ó Braonáin started when he left his band.
By the time they were
teenagers, Ciarán and company had abandoned other styles for the
folk music of their area. Ciarán took up the bass,
while Pól, Noel and Pádraig learned such stringed
instruments as the mandolin, mandola and guitar, and in 1970 they
entered and won the all-Irish Gael Linn 'Slógadh' competition and
the Letterkenny Folk Festival. The latter victory included a
Polydor recording contract.
The group decided not to
introduce lead instruments such as pipes or fiddle if it meant
going outside the clan, and instead persuaded sister Máire
to join on harp.
Clannad toured sporadically
as amateurs until 1975, when engineer Nicky Ryan and journalist
Fachtna O'Kelly (who became manager of the Boomtown Rats) decided
the group was destined for bigger things and offered to manage
them full-time.
Throughout the late
seventies Clannad moved to the forefront of traditional Irish
music with three albums - Clannad, Clannad II and
Clannad On Tour (recorded in Switzerland) - notable
for Máire's backwoods contralto, the kind of seamless
harmonies only a family can produce and a lush, string-oriented
setting for haunting, ancient tunes.
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