seamus dubhghaill

Promoting Irish Culture and History from Little Rock, Arkansas, USA

Tag Archives: Cornet (brass instrument)


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Birth of Peadar Ó Dubhda, Translator & Teacher of Irish Language

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Peadar Ó Dubhda, novelist, playwright, musician, teacher and translator of the Irish language, is born in Dundalk, County Louth on June 29, 1881. He is the author of many plays, stories and manuscripts over the years and in his youth is a noted high jumper competing at local events.

Ó Dubhda leaves the local primary school at the age of twelve with only the most basic of an education, but when he goes to work as a delivery boy driving around the roads of North Louth on his horse and cart, he always has his O’Growney grammar book at his side, perfecting his knowledge of the Irish language. As a youth he joins the local brass band, where he is taught the cornet, but such is the depth of his intellect and his love for music he is an accomplished violinist, flautist and pianist in a very short time.

From his youth stretching into early manhood Ó Dubhda’s love of the Irish language is evident. He helps found a Gaelic League branch in Dundalk and perfects his use of the language by visiting Gaeltacht areas in the west of Ireland and Omeath. He is awarded a certificate to teach Irish by the Patrick Pearse and is a teacher in St. Mary’s College in Dundalk for over 20 years from 1915.

Ó Dubhda leaves teaching when he is offered his own children’s hour on Radio Éireann, a programme that lasts for over 30 years and through which a generation of Irish youth come to know and love his stories.

Ó Dubhda’s major work is the translation of the entire Douay version of the bible into Irish. The work takes twelve years and involves the deciphering of over three million words. The work is presented to the Irish nation in 1955 and is held in the National Museum of Ireland.

In 1950 Ó Dubhda is presented with the Papal medal, Pro Ecclessia el Pontifice by Pope Pius XII, to mark his 50th year as a member of his St. Malachy’s choir and one of his most prized possessions is a personal letter from Pope John XXIII praising him for his work for the church.

Peadar Ó Dubhda is just a month shy of his 90th birthday when he passes away in the loving care of his nieces in their Park Drive home on May 26, 1971. He is buried in Dundalk and his funeral is attended by President Éamon De Valera.


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Death of Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore, Composer & Bandmaster

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Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore, Irish-born American composer and bandmaster, dies in St. Louis, Missouri, on September 24, 1892. He lives and works in the United States after 1848. While serving in the Union Army during the American Civil War, Gilmore writes the lyrics to the song When Johnny Comes Marching Home, the tune taken from the old Irish antiwar folk song, Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye. This is published under the name Louis Lambert.

Gilmore is born in Ballygar, County Galway, on December 25, 1829. He starts his music career at age fifteen and spends time in Canada with an English band. Already a fine cornet player, he settles in Boston, Massachusetts in 1848, becoming leader of the Suffolk, Boston Brigade, and Salem bands in swift succession. He also works in the Boston music store of John P. Ordway and founds Ordway’s Aeolians, a group of blackface minstrels. With the Salem Band, Gilmore performs at the 1857 inauguration of President James Buchanan.

In 1858, Gilmore founds “Gilmore’s Band,” and at the outset of the American Civil War the band enlists with the 24th Massachusetts Volunteers, accompanying General Ambrose Burnside to North Carolina. After the temporary discharge of bands from the field, Governor John Albion Andrew of Massachusetts entrusts Gilmore with the task of re-organizing military music-making. General Nathaniel P. Banks creates him Bandmaster-general.

When the war ends, Gilmore is asked to organize a celebration, which takes place in New Orleans. That success emboldens him to undertake two major music festivals in Boston, the National Peace Jubilee in 1869 and the World’s Peace Jubilee and International Musical Festival in 1872. These feature monster orchestras of massed bands with the finest singers and instrumentalists, including the only American appearance by “waltz king” Johann Strauss II, and cements Gilmore’s reputation as the leading musical figure of the age. Coliseums are erected for the occasions, holding 60- and 120,000 persons. Grateful Bostonians present Gilmore with medals and cash, but in 1873 he moves to New York City, as bandmaster of the 22nd Regiment. Gilmore takes this band on acclaimed tours of Europe.

On September 24, 1892, back in the United States preparing an 1892 musical celebration of the quadricentennial anniversary of Christopher Columbus‘ voyage of discovery, Gilmore collapses and dies in St. Louis. He is buried in Calvary Cemetery, Queens, New York, where his wife is later interred.

In many ways Gilmore can be seen as the principal figure in 19th-century American music. He holds the first “Promenade Concert in America” in 1855, the forerunner to today’s Boston Pops. He sets up “Gilmore’s Concert Garden,” which becomes Madison Square Garden. He is the Musical Director of the Nation in effect, leading the festivities for the 1876 Centennial celebrations in Philadelphia and the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in 1886. In 1888 he starts the tradition of seeing in the New Year in Times Square.

Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore is inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970.