The Chieftains are celebrating their 50th anniversary with a star-studded new album featuring Paolo Nutini, Imelda May and The Civil Wars. Paddy Moloney talks to Alan Corr about a half century of making music.
“The New York Times had The Chieftains, The Rolling Stones and The Beach Boys on the front page of their arts section a few weeks ago”, says Paddy Moloney. “We’ve beaten The Stones to the half century because Keith Richards was asked about The Chieftains recently and he said ‘those cats are a year older than we are. They play this medieval music and then they throw Satisfaction into the middle of it.’”
Moloney allows himsefl a small laugh. That benediction from both the NY Times and Keef is a nice way to mark The Chieftains’ half century as trad trailblazers and respected musical ambassadors. That’s 50 years of collaborations (The Stones, Sting, The Muppets, Paul McCartney), film soundtracks (Braveheart, Barry Lyndon), six Grammys (and an Oscar), and jigging away at the very centre of the action is Pádraig Ó Maoldomhnaigh, the last man standing from the original line-up of The Chieftains.
He is, as ever, in impish and chipper form when we meet. At a sprightly 73, he’s still crisscrossing the world, still recording stately music of great beauty, and still namedropping for Ireland. The next day he’s off on tour in support of Voice of Ages, a new album of collaborations to mark the band’s golden anniversary. “I’m going out to play in Santa Barbara tomorrow, starting up a five-week tour. A killer!” he laughs again. “There are a lot of things happening. We’re taking part in a show for the American-Irish Fund too and they’re presenting us with a lifetime achievement award, which is fantastic.”
Voice of Ages is quite a party. Under the watchful eyes of veteran producer T Bone Burnett, The Chieftains have recorded with a slew of modern artists, including Bon Iver, The Civil Wars, The Low Anthem, Paolo Nutini (as you’ve never heard him before) and The Decemberists. Ireland is well represented with turns from Lisa Hannigan (a great version of My Lagan Love) and Imelda May, who belts out a marvellous Carolina Rua.
The album seems to be an exercise in reaffirming the connection between Irish trad and American folk but does Moloney actually know all these artists or do his younger, hipper friends advise him on whom to collaborate with? “Hahaha! Well if you can call T Bone hip!” he laughs. “Well, I was trying to figure out what we could do to mark our 50 years together, maybe pick some tracks we’d one already but do them in a different way, that type of thing. What I found with these new artists is that they all have great melodies. These are songs that will last. This album is all about storytelling and also having the laugh.”
The Chieftains certainly sound like they’re having a laugh with Imelda May in the studio. “That was our first time meeting her and you’d want to see the DVD that goes along with the album!” Paddy says. “The carry on is something terrible! After we finished recording there was a bit of a party in the studio, we let our hair down. Imelda was great because she tries to add to a song if it’s not her own and, of course, she plays the bodhrán.”
Recording Down In The Willlow Garden with Justin Vernon, aka Bon Iver, wasn’t quite as easy. “It was down to the wire with that one”, Paddy says. “He was on tour in Europe at the time we wanted to record and he said don’t go and make the album without me. We got him on the 19th of November last year, I had the band ready, and we mixed it down in Brian Masterson’s place, we finished at 12 o’clock and at five o’clock the next morning I was on the plane to LA to master it so we recorded in one day and mastered it the next.”
That’s the kind of playing and recording on the hoof that Moloney and his fellow Chieftains, Matt Molloy, Seán Keane and Kevin Conneff, have become well used to over the past half century. Their list of collaborations, as diverse as it is impressive, includes Luciano Pavarotti, The Rolling Stones, Ultravox, Van Morrison, Mark Knopfler, Ry Cooder, Elvis Costello, Roger Daltrey, Tom Jones, Sinéad O’Connor, Madonna and, best of all, The Muppets.
That’s some achievement for Moloney, who began life in 1938 in Donnycarney on the northside of Dublin. His mother bought him a tin whistle when he was six and at the age of eight he started to learn the uilleann pipes. In the late 1950s, he met Seán Ó Riada and joined his group Ceoltóirí Chualann in the early 1960s. Together with Garech de Brun of Luggala, he founded Claddagh Records in 1959. In 1968, he became a producer for the label and supervised the recording of 45 albums.
Moloney had formed The Chieftains in 1962, drawing from the ranks of the top folk musicians in Ireland but it wasn't until 1975 that they began playing together full-time. Since then, they have become Ireland’s longest-serving musical ambassadors, called upon to add extra gravitas to state events like last year’s visit by The Queen or to add extra solemnity to a performance of Roger Waters’ The Wall in Berlin.
The Chieftains were also the first western band to perform on another wall, The Great Wall of China, but perhaps not even a big thinker like Paddy Moloney could have foreseen a time when the music of The Chieftains would be beamed live from space. However, it happened last year when he hooked up with the International Space Station to hear Irish-American astronaut Cady Coleman play Moloney’s borrowed tin whistle and Matt Molloy’s flute, spinning many, many miles above earth. The track, The Chieftains in Orbit, has made it to the new album and all the proceeds from the song go to a childrens’ choir in Haiti.
A half century together has not passed without some internal friction. Just like his old mates The Stones, it has not always been harmonious in the ranks of The Chieftains. How does Paddy avoid similar conflct within his band? “Well I don’t”, he says. “There have been upheavals and sometimes little disagreements but Matt Molloy, as he says, acts the mammy and tries to smooth things over.”
Paddy still lives in the Wicklow hills with this wife Rita. His daughter Aideen, who is an actress in New York, has just completed another successful theatre run and his eldest son is busy teaching special needs children in Bray. “The family is great at the moment”, Paddy says. “My dear wife Rita will continue gardening but I won’t see anyone now as I’m off in this tour.”
50 years on and Voice of Ages finds The Chieftains still ruling Irish traditional music with a light touch and a brilliant history. However, with 13 different arists featured, including one singing from space, the album was a logistical nightmare to put together. “To be honest I was 50/50 about this new project”, says Paddy. “I wasn’t sure until I started to hear some of the songs. It was always doubtful that we were going to get all these people because they were all doing their own thing. I couldn’t say to any of the lads, ‘look, it’s happening on that day’ so they had to trust me.”
But there was one very big name that just couldn’t make Voice of Ages – Adele. “The Civil Wars came to Ireland and we spent the day down at Glendalough and we had a great time. They were supporting Adele on her English tour at the time and she was going to appear on the album. Sadly it never happened but that would have been a great one to get, wouldn’t it? The song I would have done with her is My Love it Like a Red, Red Rose.”
Maybe next time but what about a certain other female pop star? Is there ever any danger of The Chieftains collaborating with Lady Gaga? Paddy laughs and says: “If she plays her cards right we might work with her!”
Alan Corr
