The Sands Family from County Down perform 'Here I am Amongst You'.
From Mayobridge in County Down, Irish folk group The Sands Family are Tommy, Ben, Colum and Anne.
Tommy Sands, the main songwriter for the band, tells Ciarán Mac Mathúna that they have been playing music since they were children. Their parents, Mick and Bridie, both came from families of singers, musicians and storytellers. Growing up, there was always music in the house.
There used to be men coming in with fiddles, we didn’t know their names, or the names of the tunes.
The Sands Family often tour around Ireland, but the group has developed a following in Germany, where they play twice a year. Tragically, their brother Eugene 'Dino' Sands died in a car crash when the band was touring Germany in November 1975.
The Sands Family band members are multi-instrumentalists. They play a wide repertoire of songs, as well as performing their own material.
We try to write some songs in the traditional idiom.
The Sands Family perform ‘Here I am Amongst You’, which they learned at a Fleadh Cheoil from traditional singer Len Graham and the fiddler, lilter and singer Joe Holmes. During this performance, all four band members sing, while Anne plays the bodhrán and Tommy the guitar.
This episode of ‘More Humours of Donnybrook’ was broadcast on 24 June 1980.
‘The Humours of Donnbyrook’ is a series of traditional Irish music programmes presented by Ciarán Mac Mathúna and produced by Peter Canning.
'More Humours of Donnybrook' was first broadcast on 20 December 1978. The first programme in the second series was broadcast on 27 May 1980. The first programme in the third series was broadcast on 14 October 1981.
