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Micho Russell, 1915-1994 & Bill Ochs, 1946-2016
This video, and the accompanying resources, were released to mark the 30th anniversary of the death of Micho Russell, 19 February 2024.
In the words of Bill Ochs, who made this video in 1993
Micho Russell is one of Ireland’s best loved traditional musicians. His delightful tin whistle playing and genial personality have won him many fans at folk festivals throughout Ireland, Europe and the U.S. In June 1992, Micho visited New York. What follows are excerpts of a concert he gave on June 23 as well as part of an interview the next day with Dr. Mick Moloney of Villanova University.
Bill Ochs also published two commercial CDs of Micho Russell’s music through his Pennywhistler’s Press: Ireland’s whistling ambassador in 1995 and Rarities and old favourites in 2015. He was working on a book about Micho before his death in 2016, and had transcribed all of the tunes from each of the three publications. Reproduced here are his transcriptions of the 8 tunes performed by Micho on the video.
Bill Ochs created two versions of this video, one with subtitles and one without. On watching both of them Micho Russell said “I like the one with the writing”. That subtitled version is available on YouTube.
ITMA has plans to feature Micho Russell in its Portrait of the Artist series towards the end of the year and the transcriptions from Bill Ochs will be a cornerstone of this collection.
With thanks to Margaret Vetare and the Moloney and Russell families for permission to reproduce the material.
Transcribed by Bill Ochs
