BRIAN CONWAY

by Earle Hitchner

In From Shore to Shore, a widely praised 1993 film documentary focusing on
Irish traditional music in New York City, fiddler Brian Conway acknowledged
that some have labeled him a musical conservative. But as First
Through the Gate brilliantly demonstrates, he's really a musical conservationist,
preserving and passing along the best of the past while melding it with the
talent and imagination of the present.

"You need change and variety and growth in Irish traditional music, but not
at the expense of abandoning its roots," Brian explains. "To be your own
player while staying within certain boundaries is more of a challenge than to
erase all boundaries. Those boundaries can be hard to define, but when
you're brought up with them, they become second nature, and you can also
recognize when they're being broken or set aside."

From James "Lad" O'Beirne (1911-1980), an exceptional, underappreciated
Sligo fiddler who moved to New York City in 1928 and later visited the
Conway home on two occasions, Brian directly absorbed "the idea of not forgetting
what the tune should sound like. You can embellish, but not to the
point where the melody becomes subordinate to style. Otherwise, the tune
will morph in every generation of players to the point where it may be significantly
different from what the composer intended." That's not rigidity. That's
respect. It permeates Brian's long-awaited, stunning solo debut here, and has
been ingrained in him from the moment he expressed interest in playing Irish
traditional music.

Born in the Bronx, New York, on June 16, 1961, Brian was encouraged
early on in music by his parents, both from County Tyrone. His father, Jim,
emigrated from Plumbridge; his mother, Rose, came from Newtownstewart,
and together they raised five children: Sean, Brian, Rose, Paul, and James.
"My mother played the classical violin when she was younger, and my father
played the violin around the house and was a good Ulster player," Brian says.

"He didn't play in a real strong traditional style, so he was aware of his shortcomings
in that regard and had wanted his sons to play in a traditional style.
I was 10, my brother Sean was 11, and we both went to fiddle lessons."
(Younger sister Rose would also pursue fiddling, and in 1985 she appeared
on Cherish the Ladies for Shanachie Records.)

The instructor to whom Brian and Sean went initially was another Bronx
resident, Martin Mulvihill (1923-1987), a fiddler from Ballygoughlin,
County Limerick, and one of the most renowned teachers of Irish traditional
music in America. Brian's tutelage, however, started shakily in early 1972.
"My first lesson was an outright disaster," he says. "My brother Sean had a
clue. I didn't. I couldn't even play one string at a time. The first three
months, I was overwhelmed and discouraged, but still making some progress.
Sean was doing really well. My father took me aside and told me he'd
thought that I'd be the one who would be advancing. I was motivated by the
disappointment I heard in his voice to not let him down, and I just lit a fire
under myself to do better. Within weeks, the fiddling took hold for me."
Another teacher-student relationship, the kind forever altering the course and
outlook of any impressionable child's life, developed shortly thereafter.
Brian's father reconnected with an old friend in the South Bronx, Martin
Wynne (1913-1998), a fiddler from Bunnanaddan, County Sligo, who had
been taught by Philip O'Beirne, father of Lad O'Beirne and instructor of
Sligo legend Michael Coleman. A great admirer of the Sligo fiddling style,
Jim Conway persuaded Martin to tutor his son.

"I started to have lessons with Martin through the mail," Brian says. "He was
a very shy, reclusive person back then, and he sent me the crossbowing on
the second part of 'The Mason's Apron,' and right after that, he allowed us to
visit his house in the Bronx. We befriended him, and he basically became a
member of the family."

For a time, Brian had two exceptional teachers: Martin Mulvihill and Martin
Wynne. "Both had no ego," Brian says. "Neither one minded that I was going to
the other for lessons. In fact, Martin Mulvihill was ecstatic when he found out
that my father was a friend of Martin Wynne. It was the best of both worlds."
In 1973, just a year and a half after he took up the fiddle, Brian won his first
All-Ireland title at Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann in Listowel, County Kerry. He
was 12 years old, and the adjudicator, Chieftains' fiddler Seán Keane, praised
his approach to playing. The next year, Brian won his second All-Ireland
championship, and in 1986 he won the All-Ireland senior fiddle title, becoming
only the fourth American to achieve this feat.

From his high-school to his early college years, Brian soaked up the informal
musicmaking at his parents' home on Friday nights, when button accordionist
Dave Collins, flutist Gus Collins (no relation), and fiddlers Martin
Wynne, Andy McGann, Paddy Reynolds, Louis Quinn, Tom Connolly, and
Vincent Harrison would drop by. They all influenced his fiddling. "I had
more older friends than most kids my age," he admits. Other traditional
musicians who shaped his style and repertoire included fiddlers Paddy
Glackin, James Kelly, and Seán Maguire, who "adds a playfulness and sense
of humor to his music," Brian points out.

What he received from Martin Wynne was much more than mere tunes and
tutelage. "He gave me a deep love for the music and a sense of humility, something
you can't get from a teacher in a sterile setting," Brian remembers. "He
also told these wonderful stories of musicians he knew and places he'd been. I'd
hear how other fiddlers played certain tunes, going all the way back to the
1930s, giving me insight early on that you can approach a tune in many different
ways. I'm lucky in that as an American, I had as good an environment to
learn in as anybody living in Ireland. I had Martin Wynne almost every Friday
night, plus Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas."

What Brian received from Andy McGann, who was born in Harlem and had
gotten tips in fiddling from Michael Coleman himself, was a keen appreciation
of pace and musicality. "Andy is one of my idols," Brian says. "My
father first took me to see him play at a feis, where I fell in love with his
playing. Later, still under age, I'd sip a Coke at a pub where Andy was playing
and just watch him. When he took a break, I'd ask him about something
he did in his fiddling, and we became friends. It was by watching and listening
to Andy that I began to understand the challenge of making music sound
lively at a moderate tempo. I think he's better than anyone else on this planet
at doing that."

The combination of his father's encouragement and unerring ear for Irish
music, his mother's selflessness in transporting him to lessons and hosting the
Friday night house sessions, Martin Wynne's attention to detail and formal
instruction that deepened into friendship, Dave Collins's support and inspiration,
and Andy McGann's example and mentorship provided Brian with the
strongest of musical foundations on which to build. And build he did.
At age 16, he was invited by Limerick-born singer and multi-instrumentalist
Mick Moloney to appear on Irish Traditional Instrumental Music From the
East Coast of America, Volume 1 (Rounder, 1977; reissued on CD as
Traditional Irish Music in America: The East Coast in 2001). Brian recorded a pair
of reels as a solo and joined fellow New York fiddler Tony DeMarco for
another pair of reels, where "the tightness of the playing is comparable to
Andy McGann and Paddy Reynolds at their best," Moloney notes.

That latter track was a foretaste of a full album by the two fiddlers, The Apple in
Winter (Green Linnet, 1981; reissued on CD in 2000), capturing New York City's
Sligo fiddling sound at its most impressive. "I was 15 when I started playing
with Tony," Brian recalls. "He was one of the people who started coming regularly
to the house on Friday nights. One of those Friday nights, [Green Linnet's]
Wendy Newton visited and liked what she heard, and we wound up recording
the album over a weekend in Connecticut. We were ready, too. Most of the
tunes we had learned from each other and from Martin Wynne."

The respect Brian and Tony had for the musicians who inspired them was
plainly visible in the two vintage black-and-white photos they included on the
LP's back cover and in the CD booklet. One was of the Paddy Killoran Traditional
Irish Music Club in 1958, with Martin Wynne standing in the
back, and the other shot was of fiddlers Andy McGann, Lad O'Beirne, Louis
Quinn, and Ed Reavy sitting with other performers.

In 1983, Brian was invited by famed Galway button accordionist Joe Burke to
play with him on a pair of hornpipes for The Tailor's Choice (Green Linnet). On
that album, Burke referred to Brian as "one of the best fiddlers of his generation,"
a reputation he strengthened eight years later on another album, My Love
Is in America (Green Linnet), featuring 16 U. S.-resident Irish fiddlers who convened
for a historic 1990 concert at Boston College. Aside from their solos,
Brian and Tony DeMarco joined 76-year-old Martin Wynne on a pair of reels,
the first of which, fittingly enough, was called "Lad O'Beirne's."

Among other recordings on which Brian appears are the Garryowen Ceili
Band's From the Shores of America (Ceile, 1976), The Rights of Man: The Concert
for Joseph Doherty (Green Linnet, 1991), Dan Milner and Bob Conroy's Irish in
America (Folk-Legacy, 2001), Julee Glaub's Fields Faraway (2001), and the solo
debut scheduled for 2002 by young Brooklyn-born fiddler Patrick Mangan.
Winner of All-Ireland junior titles in 1994 and 1999, Mangan is proof positive
of another formidable Conway talent, teaching. (Maeve Flanagan, Rose's
daughter, is also a prize pupil of his, winning an All-Ireland junior fiddle title
in 2001.) Brian and Patrick collaborate on three tracks here, including, with
Andy McGann, two that underscore the remarkable mentoring chain linking
Coleman, McGann, Conway, and Mangan, all Sligo-style fiddlers in New
York City. But "you're not listening to Michael Coleman in the 1920s on this
CD, nor Andy McGann in the 1970s," Brian insists. "You're hearing something
that's a logical musical progression from that. My playing is not a copycat
of Andy's, and Pat's is not a copycat of mine."

Begun in 1997, First Through the Gate was recorded piecemeal-an approach
that Brian, who works as a lawyer in the Westchester County district attorney's
office in White Plains, N.Y., found comfortable and fruitful. "It's better
than just bashing it out all in one short period," he says. "This way, I get to
reconsider what I've done so that it passes muster. I have to say I'm very
happy with how it turned out and with the contributions of all the other
musicians. Andy, for example, was a rock in the studio and just nailed the
three tracks he's on."

Besides McGann and Mangan, those other musicians-pianist Felix Dolan,
guitarists Mark Simos and John Doyle, bodhrán and bones player Myron
Bretholz, cittern player Pat Kilbride-wisely keep Brian's own fiddling front
and center on the remaining tracks. Typical of the album is his playing of the
reels "The Spike Island Lasses / Tom Moylan's Frolics," an exemplary blend
of technique and passion, done at a tempo reflecting the truism that if you
drive too fast, you'll miss a lot of the scenery along the way.

Nothing is missed or missing in Brian Conway's fiddling. From hop jigs,
hornpipes, and highlands to the slow air "Were You at the Rock?" he performs
with a skill, grace, and force that are steeped in tradition but distinctively
his own. "My father was my first and most important audience," Brian
says, and the crucial motivation Jim Conway (1916-1991) gave his son back
in the early 1970s has blossomed into the extraordinary musicianship heard
on First Through the Gate. That title comes from a line in William Butler
Yeats's popular poem of 1899, "The Fiddler of Dooney." In it, the fiddler
(appropriately from County Sligo) expresses the hope that after he dies, St.
Peter, heaven's gatekeeper, will "call me first through the gate."
If he played as well as Brian does here, he'd be a shoo-in.

-New York, January 2002

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