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Sleeve Notes
There was an air of excitement in Manhattan's Carnegie Hall on the evening of November 3, 1962. The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem, Ireland's leading musical exports, were giving a concert. A capacity audience gathered to hear the four singing actors trot out their songs of love, their songs of patriotism, of childhood and of drinking. This EP preserves some of the finest moments from that concert.
This was the fourth time the singers from County Tipperary and County Armagh had appeared at Carnegie Hall in recent years. As their popularity grows by leaps, bounds and ballads, there seems to be no end to the variety of places in which they sing. Tom, Liam and Pat Clancy and Tommy Makem have been heard in concerts in a dozen cities and campuses. They have appeared on the Ed Sullivan TV show, as guests of Adlai Stevenson at the United Nations party, at festivals, at Playboy Clubs and a score of nightclubs around the country. When relaxing, they take their ease — with songs, of course — at two Greenwich Village bistros, the White Horse Tavern and the Limelight.
Always, they sing with spirit, always with a touch of nostalgia for their homeland, with more than a touch of love for the rich and many-faceted folk culture of Ireland. As the laughter and cheers in the recording indicate, there was a strong feeling of Irish nationalism among the audience at Carnegie Hall that night. And few singers could feed that bold and colourful nationalistic hunger better than the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem. Bill Lee on bass and Bruce Langhorne on guitar are their accompanists.
The four tracks here are from the LP "The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem in Person at Carnegie Hall" (BP 233209/SBP 233209*).
