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Picture: John Loughran, Aghyaran Fleadh Cheoil (late 1970s), from the Northern Fiddler Collection. Photo by Eamonn O’Doherty
By Rónán Galvin
For several decades before his untimely passing in 1987, Pomeroy fiddle player, lilter and singer John Loughran sought out older players in Co. Tyrone, many of whom had put the fiddle to one side. John single-handedly re-ignited the music of fiddle players Peter Turbit and John McKeown among others and absorbed their style and repertoire. He was a vital conduit for a raft of younger players who emerged in the 1970s including Ciarán Kelly and Ben Gunn who features here in a duet with John. Restricted from touching his father’s fiddle that hung by the fire and blinded due to an accident as a boy – only whetted his appetite for music. Despite his impairment John had an extraordinary geographic knowledge of his hinterland, a sharp wit and unique delivery in lilt and song. These recordings provide us with a window into an environment and expression in rural Tyrone that has all but disappeared.
Dermot McLaughlin was one of the younger generation inspired by John Loughran and it is fitting that two of the Loughran tracks in this playlist were recorded by Dermot in the early 1980s. A Derry native, Dermot was born just in time to hear many of the older generation of Donegal fiddle players such as John Doherty and Francie Dearg Ó Beirn while he developed close playing duets with others including Con Cassidy and James Byrne. One of the finest exponents of the Donegal fiddle tradition, Dermot is equally at home with compositions of James Scott Skinner and William Marshall as well as his rich Donegal repertoire. He is highly regarded as a fiddle teacher and a strong source of encouragement and inspiration for the younger generation of fiddle players in Donegal. Dermot was central to the formation and development of Cairdeas na bhFidléirí in the 1980s and to their various commercial releases including ‘The Brass Fiddle’ and CD’s featuring Con Cassidy and Vincent Campbell among others.
*For further information, there is a transcribed interview with John Loughran in ‘The Northern Fiddler’ [1979]
ITMA is grateful to Ciarán Kelly and Ben Gunn for their insight into the life and music of John Loughran
This project is possible thanks to funding from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.
