The man who put the cool into coolfin

In the long run, a lot of people would see Moving Hearts primarily as an instrumental band.

I never thought of it that way, although when Moving Hearts became an instrumental band the experience probably intensified for me in some way because it just opened up the music more.

But wasn't it hard for Christy or Flo or Mick fronting that band to try and compete with the other things that were happening?

I suppose, yeah, quite true. At the same time we did play to people's threshold of acceptance, if you like. There were things we tried to do from time to time that really upset Christy. You know he'd say 'Jesus, I don't know if I can sing at that point if this is going to happen'. So with a bit of grumbling we'd make a concession and put something a bit cooler, or not as strange, in its place. And as often as not it was maybe an improvement.

Looking back on that now, Moving Hearts were identified as a political band. How important were the politics to it?

I think very important. One of the reasons that Moving Hearts came into existence when it did was that the previous year I'd started going on about bass and percussion, But it would have been a huge change for Planxty. But I did want to try and get something to happen. Christy had in the previous couple of years amassed an album's worth and more of songs that wouldn't suit the Planxty context either. But Christy wanted to do these things and he took me up on the idea. It was like, 'what were you talking about?'. I said I was thinking of pipes and sax and a rhythm section and he said 'let's get something together'. And it went from there. So the songs were ones that Christy had been gathering, and they were very political. But I think that we all had to feel committed to what the song was saying or it didn't make any sense at all.

If you were talking to an expert about the way to go about not being successful – they would say put eight fuckers into the one band….

(laughs) Yeah, yeah. Again management, or lack of it, was crucial. Trying to manage ourselves – Keith, being run ragged to manage the band and play in it, certainly didn't help matters. We were a co-op as well and our general attitude or disposition towards the band and each other was so democratic that we were wary of a manager walking in and saying 'this is what you should be doing'. And that didn't do us any favours because we didn't trim our shape enough to become, I suppose, something a manager could handle, a commodity of some sort that you could just book out, tour, etc. We thought the manager should get the same percentage as everybody else. And that was just a very idealistic, very unrealistic attitude to have. So that was another case in point where we struggled for ages to pay off a truck, a van, PA, all that stuff. It was very draining and quite depressing at times to be touring and not having much money and all that.

Basically you were running a small to medium business except every decision had to be made by a board of directors which comprised of whatever it was, eight people.

That's right.

Meetings were long I take it?

Power of veto was a very complicated matter (laughs).

Do you ever resent the fact that Moving Hearts made music that by any standard is of real artistic importance – and yet while all sorts of other artists are getting grants from the Arts Council, there isn't a mechanism in place where the very real difficulties faced by an entity like Moving Hearts are taken on board and dealt with in a way that the band can be allowed to function and operate at a reasonable level of security.

I think we wouldn't have viewed ourselves on that level, if you like.

Money is given to all sorts of people doing all sorts of things which are less vital and less important in national terms.

Yes. Well, I've a feeling if we had tried to get support at that time that it wouldn't have happened – that we wouldn't have got it. I think that's why we never looked.

I know Moving Hearts was a victim of a number of different things, but fundamentally it was a victim of the market.

I think you're right about the prejudices that existed. We've both lived through it. Every expression should be judged on the same level as every other in terms of its validity and aesthetic or cultural contribution, etc. I'm sure there were lots of bands and people who should have been supported, good singers, good players – maybe who couldn't avail of the tax concession to artists, that kind of thing. But I think things have improved a lot. I think they've developed some kind of better rationale.

So you've emerged from all this, Donal Lunny, solo artist but not really a solo artist either.

That's quite right (laughs).

It's an unusual role you have, isn't it?

Yes, I think having been around and having been in the aforementioned ensembles for so long, it's acceptable to people who know me. It might be a bit of a puzzle to people who don't and that's why the band has a name, which is Coolfin. For a while it was being called the Donal Lunny Band. And even though it's a privilege of some sort it's not entirely appropriate.

What's Coolfin?

It's a place name. I think it's in Co. Clare. 'The Lakes of Coolfin' is an old song. I haven't pinpointed exactly where it is, but I know the song well. We considered many possibilities for a name and that one felt easy, that's all.

That's always the best and worst of trying to put something together – trying to find a name you feel will stand the test of time.

Some names are horrible the first time you hear them and then they become completely acceptable! It's as if a name is just something you need at the beginning and it loses its meaning after a while and it becomes the band itself – you know, The Beatles is a classic case in point B-E-A-T-L-E-S – what?? That's so cruddy, yet it's brilliant. I can remember my reaction to it when I saw it first. I thought it was kind of a cheap shot, but very quickly it just became 'here they are'. And then it becomes transparent. It becomes a cipher.

So what about attracting guests onto the album. How did you set about that?

Well since the band started a couple of years ago we had guests at various stages. That was a notion from the outside, to have a core band which would be instrumental and then have guests on that. Why not have different people in? It's more work but it's been brilliant. The first time we went out we had Mairead Brennan and Liam O'Maonlai – that was a Japanese tour and sometime after that we had Brian Kennedy, Paul Brady, Sinead O'Connor. It was just a policy, if you like , that applied when we came to the album. I thought I don't want to make an instrumental album. There should be songs there as well. It was really a matter of who was available at the time. I thought of Marta and the fact that we'd played together 10 years before in a band that Andy Irvine had formed called Mosaic. It was a brilliant experience and I just love her singing. So she said 'yeah'. Eddie Reader had sung with us on Sult the previous year and it went really well, so she was one of the first people who popped into our minds. And Mairead had sung with the band two or three times before.

Is part of the challenge now to find new things to do? You've already broken new ground and taken the thing onto a different plane. Is that a concern when you come to think of a new project or do a new record or whatever?

I would say there's a degree of continuity between Moving Hearts and this situation. But there are other things happening as well and as far as I'm concerned we're going in a certain direction and the next album could be different again. The push to get to someplace new is not so much for its own sake as just something implicit, anyway. I feel about my own music, personally, that there are areas I'm still very excited about that I haven't had the opportunity to look at. I think the band has addressed some of them in this album but there are a lot more.

What sort of things do you mean there?

I mean rhythmic ideas and harmonic ideas as well. And I suppose the whole organic aspects of accompanying – what that means, what that is, how it affects what you're hearing, and how you use the components, what voices you have, what sounds. That's a very interesting area to be explored.

In the light of all this, how do you view the Riverdance phenomenon and the effect it's had?

I think it's had a fantastic effect. When it appeared as a show I think a lot of people, and myself to some extent, felt well, here's Irish culture on an enormous platform, highly visible to the rest of the world, are they going to think this is Irish music? But that was a kind of narrow view to take really, because it is a concept or a conceit by Bill Whelan. And Bill has his own music and here it is and highly effective it is too. He's travelling a different road to me but I very quickly reconciled myself to the fact that it's a bit provincial to think of it in those terms. Irish music can take a Riverdance, no bother. It's not going to have bad effects.

Would you link Riverdance , musically, back to Time Dance, which was a Planxty creation?

I think Planxty was a really important experience for Bill. It's a thing Bill was very quick to acknowledge when Riverdance exploded, which it did. He mentioned me as an influence and I thought 'fair play to you, that's fair'. And I don't have any problem with where he takes it from there.

What do you think of the big work – the type of thing Shaun Davey has done with Grannuaile?

I think it's a good thing. Again you could say that the music is travelling a path. It's changing. There are different things coming in and enriching the breadth of Irish music. I think The Brendan Voyage, Grannuaile etc. all bring a certain thing to the music.

Are you ever tempted by the big work yourself?

Yes. But it's a bit more inaccessible to me because I don't write music dots, so if I'm to go into that area I'm usually accompanied by some very qualified person like Noel Kelehen or Fianchna Trench to actually make sense of whatever ideas I have in terms of, say, a string section, which happened last year for the Famine Commemoration. I did a piece called 'Omos' which involved a fairly big string section. And it worked. I was very pleased with the experience.

I remember I think it was Noel Hill or Tony Linnane or both of them giving Shane MacGowan a ferocious time on a radio programme, abusing the Pogues. What did you think of that?

I have strong feelings about destructive criticism. Sometimes I think it's better to leave things unsaid. I'd say critics can find ways of doing which can be eloquent in themselves and I'd say it's a much healthier road to take. And, sure, Shane MacGowan was some dose for an awful lot of people to take. It was like, what??? He was so upfront, so in-you-face. Of course, it would offend a lot of people's sensibilities. But I don't know about getting on the radio and ranting about it.

What was your own feeling about Shane?

Shane? Completely off the wall (laughs). Up there, mad, flags flying, fantastic and by no means a negative influence.It was like here’s another corner, facet, whatever, of Irish music in a fairly robust state which actually made inroads. It travelled.

He has written some fucking fantastic lyrics.

He's an amazing songwriter. In fact I feel that the band is sometimes obscured by the depth of his lyrics. I can't pick out anything in particular, but they were verging on abrasive at times and sometimes what it needed was a bit more space for the things he could touch on. He just has a brilliant connection with his heart, he really has.

How important do you think is the sense that Irish music has taken its place among the musics of the world so that it's a facet of world music, part of a bigger thing?

It definitely benefited from the whole world music phenomenon, you know. There was a lot of Indian, rain-forest pygmies chanting and so on appearing in various places, but also Davey Spillane's pipes popping up here and there and various applications of Irish music in that context. And I think that the whole consciousness of it has taken a big step. This has been, I think, perceptibly affected by Riverdance and Lord of the Dance.

There is an awful lot of stuff coming out with Celtic on it that hardly deserves the time of day.

(laughs) The one that I love the most is Celtic Passion. It had Andrew Strong singing 'Mustang Sally' on it. Yes, Celtic passion. I mean, Paul Brady began to refer to it as the 'C' word. Celtic was the label that was going to sell. And it did, it worked. If it had Celtic on it, it would sell. But I think that moment has passed. The trouble is that once something achieves a currency everybody's in there, everybody wants a slice of it, and the quality drops dramatically and then something new comes along. It's like a tide, you know. But I think that Irish music hasn't lost a momentum through the Celtic thing. It has its own personality.

Do you ever think about what it is that makes Irish music attractive to the Japanese?

I don't know how popular Irish music will become in Japan but it's actually growing in popularity right now. There's no doubt about it. There are loads of people who are passionate about it, who are moved by it. I remember being in Osaka with Mairead Ni Dhomnaill and the album that we did together on Gael Linn had been released over there. And we were in a neo-Irish bar In Osaka, very bizarre, and I can remember seeing people in the audience who were nearly all Japenese in tears listening to her singing in Irish. That kind of empathy is quite something. I think Mairead is brilliant. But their willingness to engage in it is remarkable.

What do you make of Altan?

A charming element of the scene. They play music that has its own dynamic range: it's quieter in some ways than would satisfy my desires and needs but at the same time they have a ferocious momentum from time to time in their playing.

They kind of came out of left field in a funny way, didn't they?

I would say that it's been a steady graft for Altan because they did many tours of the States. They started at a fairly humble level, doing small gigs and building up a following. I think Altan's success in the States is great. They have quite a profile there now. And this is helping them in other areas. Last June I arrived in Japan with Ray Fean to play on some recordings and Altan were there and they were at the centre of what was being called the Altan Festival. It was a week of music around Tokyo. It was a string of gigs but Kako, she's our agent there as well, she put it under that umbrella. It was very appropriate and really successful. They charmed people. Mairead is brilliant.

In all your travels what is the most extraordinary thing that was given to you, as in gifts that are given to musicians on the road?

(laughs) I've been given a few things (laughs). Well, let's see. Of the mentionable ones - I've a lovely lump of turquoise someone gave to me at home. It was a German guy actually. That's something I'd have to think about.

There must be one blow job that stands out!

You said that, you bollix. Although generosity is a wonderful thing (laughs).

Are there musicians that you think 'these are people I really want to play with 'that you haven't ?

I met some flamenco players in Spain from Paco De Lucia's band – absolutely stunning musicians, just fantastic. It's very concentrated flamenco, but I think myself it would open up really easily into other areas. And in fact, I'm trying to get Tino, a sort of flamenco percussionist, to be taken on board. Remember the Transatlantic Sessions? There's another one being done which is European. It's a very good idea. I think he'd be brilliant in that context.

Give us a few more.

Sheryl Crow. I'd love to work with her. 'All I Wanna Do Is Have Some Fun '(laughs). She's great.

Flamenco is interesting. Obviously you've got the Gypsy Kings touching on it, but it's not really been explored in a contemporary context.

It's quite concentrated. The whole world of flamenco you can think of as being vertical. It's very high and deep but not very wide. And the quality of what's happening in flamenco in Spain, the level of proficiency they achieve is stunning. It's all about passion. It's a very specific thing. But the music itself could definitely spread into other areas without taking too much of the obvious Spanish component, which can be much too strong a colour in other contexts.

What do you make of the whole Bob Quinn notion of an Egyptian influence in Irish music. Is that real?

I've been interested in Egypt myself for years and I could never begin to make a connection between Irish music and Egyptian music. But it might be there. To me, it's very hard to penetrate back beyond a certain point because there's simply nothing there. All you can do is look at the vestiges that remain in what's there now and see if there's anything in common. Much as I love Arabic music it has a different scale.

You could say you've been through an awful lot of musicians. Do you ever feel that it's too much putting something together starting from scratch again?

I know what you mean. I've never felt that for a second. Starting from scratch again – no, not at all. I don't connect music as much as I should with my standard of living, because if I equated what I'm doing on those terms it might. I've gone through pretty rough patches in the last 15 years. Well, I could have gone into areas where I could have made money. It wasn't a big martyred stand or anything like that. I just tried to do what I wanted to do and keep that going.

And do you look two or three years down the line now and project as to where it might go?

I would hope the band's still together in three years, that would be brilliant. Trying to contain the activities of the band in a way that satisfies everyone is difficult – which means the band will gig a certain amount in a year and there'll have to be time for other people to do things. At the same time if the band hasn't got enough of a life of its own, it might have trouble surviving then as well – it's like when you're not going forward you're slipping back. So it's a matter of actually maintaining the right momentum that the band can enjoy a profile, can improve, play bigger gigs abroad and things. It can fill a big place.

Would you think that it's within the scope of the ambition of this band to do 20,000 seaters?

I think that's completely feasible. That's what I meant when I said the band can fill a big place. I meant fill a big space. I think the band can do huge gigs and sound huge.

You see someone like Jean Michel Jarre who is an enormous star and does play those kind of big gigs – do you think there's the potential to get into that kind of zone?

It's very interesting to hear you talk about it like that because I do think the band has the potential of becoming quite popular. So I would hope we can do festivals. That's what we're going to do next year, lots of festivals in Europe. I think the band is really well built for that situation.

I wanted to ask you about Sharon Shannon. Is she with the band for the duration or is she a guest?

She's a guest. She adds something great to the band. But she has her own thing going too. In a way she's part of the band but we're self-sufficient without her and we must be.

Sharon has an absolutely unique personality.

She has, yeah. A one-off. That's quite true. A spark in the firament of musicians.

In terms of the way she contributes to what's going on, does she verbalise stuff?

Not very often. But she goes straight to the heart of the matter with her music. I think she's one of these people who becomes the music itself. Her energy and personality go into her music and come out in a really special way. She has great power.

But she's wild.

She can run with the best of them. She's special. I just came from Digital Pigeon mastering studios where we're doing a compilation album with Sharon – 21 tracks on it. That's where I was this afternoon. Great stuff – it's all bouncy. It's a lovely collection of music.

In relation to the influence of Riverdance – at last musicians have pensions. Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

I'm mixed about it. On the one hand there are brilliant musicians I love playing with who are no longer available because they're in Australia or America. Riverdance is a sort of aberration in a way because it's absorbing so many of the best players around and they are undoubtedly making good money, and why shouldn't they?

That's fair enough too.

When the third Riverdance started up it was like, wow! But more power to them. It's a new thing, isn't it? Playing Irish music and there are proper jobs going. People will no longer say, 'but do you work as well?' which was the classic. I was asked that many times. 'Are you enjoying the travelling, do you work as well?'

What do you think is the single biggest disadvantage of being a musician?

Money? No, it depends on a lot of things. I think being a working musician, if you're a musician who's on the road, it's really difficult to organise your life. You have to work much harder at it to keep any kind of shape on it. That's something that happens to a lot of people, they find themselves in a heap after eight months on the road.

Your personal life's much harder to organise too, isn't it?

That's a really difficult thing to embrace, to integrate.

Somebody who is back at base is living at a different pace?

Absolutely. There's a lot of highs and lows. I suppose performers generally experience the same thing. You get adrenalised and passionate and do the gig and it takes you four hours to wind down after it and get back to normal. But I think you can adjust.

Is there stuff you regret?

I suppose falling prey to exactly what I've just said is one – partying on into the night and having a huge hangover the next day. It took me a long time to get a handle on that. It seemed inevitable. We were playing in a pub down the country, a big lounge somewhere. The end of the gig, the audience goes home and we all sit at the bar and have about five pints. That kind of thing. Drinking into the small hours is just so easy when you're on the road. It is hard to avoid unless you actively do something about it – like drink less!

Another side to it is family. Do you feel you missed out on it, being on the road?

Undoubtedly, yes. Mixed feelings about it. I'm a believer in not allowing regret to draw from what’s left of your life because it can have a very negative

effect on one's outlook. I'm a believer in not carrying regrets. And I have a very good relationship with my children, which is important.