THE LONE PIPER

IF YOU thought multi-tasking was a label reserved for Pentium processors then you haven t encountered Paddy Moloney. And what does he go and do (when he s lounging on his sofa, no doubt, twiddling his thumbs)? He records a soundtrack album for a six-hour American TV series on the Irish in America. Oh, and then while the kettle s boiling, he just pops out and starts up a brand new record label called Unisphere. Just for kicks, mind.
Long Journey Home is the name of the ship he s been steering of late, and as we ve come to expect from him, it s got a guest list as illustrious as the Dorothy Chandler pavilion on Oscar night: Van Morrison (long since back on speaking terms with the band after their brief, eh, imbroglio), Siniad O Connor, Mary Black, Elvis Costello, Liam O Maonlam, and wait for it, Vince Gill. What you might call typical lateral thinking ` la Paddy Moloney. No chasm is too wide, no bridge is too far.
The TV project all began about 10 years ago, Paddy explains, and I was approached about two years ago. Then about a year ago it started to get really serious and I spent a hell of a summer, from last July to September working non-stop on it.
It s a curious mix, Long Journey Home. Part low-key traditional song ( Skibbereen , for example, is given a remarkable treatment by Siniad O Connor which stands in sharp contrast to Liam Neeson s rendition of the same song in Michael Collins), part sweeping orchestral manoeuvres that would make the hair stand on the neck of a corpse (witness the Famine Theme with the Irish Film Orchestra), and part Top 20 anthemic heartbeat courtesy of Elvis Costello s rendering of the title tune, it s got something for everyone, although shaved of the visuals, it can come across just a tad disconnected betimes.
Moloney refused to be shackled by the series content though, and went so far as to enlist the talents of a Canadian gospel choir to accompany Van on a beautifully elegiac version of Shenendoah .
To me this is single stuff, he says with that characteristically impish grin. I went to Montreal to get this amazing women s black gospel choir. We had such fun doing it. They came in and said a prayer first of all, and then I directed them to do their own thing, not to follow Van around all the way. In two hours it was done. Marvellous.
Moloney then scouted around until he found Vince Gill who lies down with the remarkable bedfellows of The Bar Of Armagh and The Streets Of Laredo . An unlikely liaison, but one that Paddy Moloney felt more than comfortable with.
The Bard and The Streets are the same tune! he explains. So I couldn t resist pairing them up. It s things like that that I get a real kick out of!
One of the standouts of the album is the sublime An Raibh Tz Ag An gCarraig? , sung like a native by a wonderful female vocalist called Sissel, whom Moloney encountered in Scandinavia.
We ve just done a couple of charity concerts in Scandinavia for the children of Bolivia, he says, with this girl, Sissel and if you go to see the film Titanic you ll hear her singing some fantastic Celtic -sounding things all through the soundtrack. Anyway, Sissel, who s from Oslo, sings in Irish in this most beautiful voice. She s a household name in Scandinavia and she s sung with the Three Tenors too. So that s a real treat.
Long Journey Home has the privilege of being the first release on Unisphere, the record label which Moloney has set up in partnership with the Chieftains management team of Steve Macklam and Sam Feldman. Their aim is to record the best of traditional and world music, with a projected 12-album roster to be compiled over the next three years. Moloney is eerily nonplussed by what would be a major new business (as well as creative) venture to less seasoned souls than he.
I wasn t really thinking about this myself, he smiles and suddenly they (Macklam and Feldman) sprung this on me and said Now, sign there! . Mind you, I did run a record label years ago (Claddagh Records) so I suppose I m not a total novice.
As with everything else on Moloney s agenda, Unisphere occupies a clearly defined space of its own in some corner of his brain, despite its relatively abrupt genesis.
I have already put together a programme in my mind of the kind of records I want to do, he reveals. Canada, for example, is a country that has so much going on, musically. If you think of the population of Canada and the population of the USA, it s just incredible that there s so much going on in all fields: from Ciline Dion to Alanis Morrisette and all that s happening in Nova Scotia. There s a family called Leahy who toured Canada with us last year and I think they re going to hit the roof any one of these days. I d love to have them on the roster.
It s Nova Scotia that s beckoning most loudly right now, though.
I went to Halifax, Nova Scotia for two weeks in October, he adds, and I got 12 different groups into the studio over 15 days! The talent there is amazing. Now, I did spread my wings a little bit. I went to Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Toronto, Newfoundland and further afield even. We haven t decided yet what to call it, but we hope to have it ready for release in May of this year.
Above all, Moloney s determined that Unisphere won t be limited by any stringent job description.
I m interested in almost anything that s good, he says. It s like bringing the world together with a lot of these projects. But it won t stop if a young Irish band turns up because there s great creativity within rock, or any other genre of music for that matter. The last thing I want to do is to limit it.
Besides scouting for recording artists, Moloney sees Unisphere Records occupying a crucial role in sharing experiences of the peaks and troughs of the legal side of the music business.
I ll give as much advice as I can from the 35 years experience that I have, he remarks, so that young musicians can shortcut at least some of the pitfalls that I ve encountered. Even signing copies of my contract to young people and saying Here s 75 pages, now have a read of that and come back to me .
Moloney doesn t claim to have all the answers yet, however.
Oh, not at all! he declares with a grin that belies some less than wholesome experiences in the thick of the business. I can still fall into the pitfalls too, I mean, it s such a crooked business. But it s intriguing, and I m not as uptight about things. If something goes wrong, I m more likely to say ah, something else ll come up next week .
Now, most folks appetites would be more than sated by these activities, and happy to put the feet up for a siesta at this stage. Not our Paddy, though. He s off to LA for the official launch of the TV series. After that, it s the Big Apple where they ll uncork a couple of magnums to christen the album Long Journey Home.
And, as usual, Paddy Moloney will be keeping only the best company at this gig. Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman, Pierce Brosnan, Mel Gibson, Bob Dylan, Liam Neeson and Angelica Huston are just some of the names that ve found their way onto the guest list for that little black tie affair.
Furthermore, that s only the half of it. After the tux has been put away, he s back to his pet project, one that s occupied more than a share of his attention over the past few years. It s his much-vaunted women s album, which he hopes to release next year, countless schedules permitting of course.
Yes, that s still going on, he smiles. I was trying to get Monserrat Caballe a couple of weeks ago but she was ill so the recording date fell through. I ve got Brenda Fricker reading a Yeats poem and she s absolutely wonderful. I ve got Siniad O Connor and Joan Osbourne and Loreena McKennitt. And I ve got this wonderful Chinese singer who wrote the words in Chinese and I wrote the music. I did the same with a Japanese singer who s married to Ryuichi Sakamoto, and then I ve got the Rankin family too. I m still waiting on Joni Mitchell and Sheryl Crow, and maybe Bonnie Raitt too.
Ultimately, though, The Chieftains are still Paddy Moloney s first home and they ll always return to base despite all the collaborative efforts. He laughs at the old chestnut that declares Guinness and The Chieftains as Ireland s two greatest exports, but he must surely admit that there s a grain of truth in it?
Well, you know, we do a lot of gigs, he acknowledges, and some of them are the kind of functions where you really do feel that you re representing the country. This might be attending a UNICEF function, for example, and it s always a great honour, for sure.
As for the possibility of a live concert to promote Long Journey Home, Moloney s a touch uncertain, for a change.
It s something I d really love to do, alright, he nods, but there s nothing firm in the offing yet. I ll let Hot Press know if we manage to pull it off, though! n