Macdara Yeates: Traditional Singing from Dublin

On a rainy November evening in 2024, I found myself at Islington Folk Club to see the inimitable Bob Fox. While I had, thanks to the time and care of some lovely friends, been to any number of singarounds and pub sings by this time, this was my first "folk club" experience and so I choked on my dinner a bit when my friend asked, "So what are you singing tonight?"

"What do you mean? It's a gig?"

"Yeah, at a folk club?"

The traditional UK folk club gig, as I came to learn, typically includes several floor spots - performers from the crowd who sign up, open-mic style, as support for the main event. Usually, it goes like this: the folk club's house band (sometimes house singers) do a set, followed by floor spots, followed by the headliner, followed by an interval before the whole thing repeats again in the second half.

I hadn't planned to do any singing that night, but my friend was undeterred and put us down for a floor spot each and we took our seats.

(get you a friend who doesn't let you get away with being a chicken about things)

The evening's MC was Bernard Puckett, an utter delight of a man (who puts the club's "frankly eccentric" tagline thoroughly through its paces), and his good-natured bantering and boundless charisma alone were worth the price of entry.

(if you ever make it to Islington, make sure ask Bernard to tell you the story of the time Bob Dylan walked into a folk club he was MCing (but maybe bring along the friend you might "accidentally" trip if being chased by zombies or else you will almost certainly be cast in the role of Dylan for at least several minutes of hijinks))

The house band tunes completed, Bernard began calling up floor singers one after the next, all in fine form and clearly in their element, but none more so than a young man who had been sitting quietly in the corner when I arrived.

(he and I wore matching flannels and were approximately the same age, so naturally I'd taken notice of him immediately #InsertLazyJokeAboutWhiteHairAtFolkClubsHere)

A few folks in the crowd seemed to recognize him and cheered enthusiastically has he took the stage, and I very soon understood why.

This man blew the roof off the place. He had a belt like a foghorn, massive and resonant, a wall of sound that filled every inch of the room. The song was clearly, visibly a favorite of his, and he relished every note, each phrase carefully and lovingly crafted, ornaments and hitches artfully arranged.

He was good. He was astoundingly good.

He finished to a well-earned roar of applause, and as I was working steadfastly to scrape my jaw up off of the floor, Bernard frantically got my attention and mouthed "you're up."

So that's how I was introduced to Macdara Yeates.

(Bernard would later thank me in the interval for being a good sport - "I couldn't well put another man after that!" - and you know what, fair play)

Traditional Singing from Dublin is a stunning album from start to finish. Dara is a tremendous singer, of course, and this album is so clearly a labor of love that you can't help but feel it in your bones. The production and occasional instrumental accompaniment are blessedly minimal and make the most of the song (first) and the singing (second). There's a distinct sense that Dara would almost prefer not to be noticed - that his singing of the songs is fully for their own sake, and he's simply the one to sing them - and he's one of those rare singers that manages to pull you into the song as though you're sitting in it beside him. His love of the songs - and through them, of his home of Dublin - shapes every track.

Some familiar songs to me - "Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye," of course - join far more that were new to me, from the mournful "One Starry Night" to his delightful upending of "The Herring Song" (my new favorite version). Dara also pays a lovely tribute to Liam Weldon with a take on "Blue Tar Road" (see also his short documentary on Weldon here - proper recording of "Jinny Joe" when??).

("Irish Navigator" was the song he sang at Islington, and I was very happy to find it here, too)

After the gig, we exchanged compliments and invitations to our respective singarounds and I hopped on the train that night feeling a bit dreamy - this may or may not have been the beginnings of the headcold I woke up with the next morning, but it was at least in part influenced by an awe at the experiences folk music has gifted me with. Most of the people I care about have come into my life via folk music, and those wonderful people are the reason I continue to have experiences like this night at Islington Folk Club (even meeting Dara would have its ripples, culminating months later in an evening spent shutting down two bars with John Francis Flynn and Méabh and Síomha Mulligan in Denver, but that's a story for another post).

Anyway, perhaps it's trite to say, and I'm sure better writers than me have managed it less clumsily, but the connections we make in folk music are nothing short of magical, and as I sit here in Denver listening to "Irish Navigator" a few months later, I'm still a bit in awe of the direction my life has taken. Here's to folk.

Traditional Singing from Dublin is available on Bandcamp.