 I'm not the talkative musician, and I will be up here in five minutes. My name is Greg Stucey. I'm the vice president of the Trans and the Waterbury Library. And what we do, we're like the fundraising arm of the library. The library, being part of the municipal government, has their budget, but they can't go out and request more funds. So that's what we do. Being, you know, a non-profit 501C3, that's what we do for the library. Through our generous donors last year, we've been able to help by the digital streaming service called Canobie for the library, as well as some new, Rachel's going, yeah. As well as some new, this year some new rocks which have words carved in them for the word garden. As well as in the spring and the summer, some plants and flowers for the garden. And if anybody is interested in donating, I think there will be some donation envelopes at the table in the back. Which, speaking of that, I failed to mention there's water and some shortbreads and tasty things in the back. I'd also like to take a moment to thank Rachel Muse, the library director. She's in the back. She is a wonderful liaison with the friends. Her enthusiasm is contagious. I actually volunteer in the library as well, so it's a pleasure to work with her. And I'd also like to thank Judy Byron, the adults program. The friends sponsored the event, but Judy did all the heavy lifting with organizing and planning. So again, thank you, Judy, and I'll turn it over to you. So I'm so glad to see everybody, and we've heard from Jeff, and he said all you have to do is put Celtic in the publicity pool cup. So there we are. Jeff is a multi-instrumentalist, and he brought a few of his instruments. I didn't even know there was such a thing as a Celtic bazookie, but there is, and you'll get to hear that. The auto harp, I had the privilege of playing earlier, and it is gorgeous. And he has, I think, just the six string, right? No twelve strings today. But hey, that's okay. We've got three instruments, you know? And he not only has he performed for audiences of all ages and so forth, but he's been all over the country and the British Isles. Here tonight is his love of the British Isles and how the history comes through in song. And that's, for me as a musician, how I learn. If it's through song, I'll retain it. And Jeff, he is also featured in the Acoustic Guitar Magazine, and he is a contributing writer to Acoustic Guitar Magazine's Auto Harp Quarterly. I didn't know there was an Auto Harp Quarterly, but apparently there is. And I want to turn it over to Jeff because you're not here to put something to go, blah, blah, blah. You want to hear Jeff perform his magical instrument. So welcome, Jeff Snow. It works best if you scare a kid, please. Thank you all for coming out tonight. It's going to be fun. Come by the hill to the land where fancy is free And stand where the peaks meet the sky and the locks meet the sea Where the rivers run clear and the bracken is golden sun And the cares of tomorrow can wait till this day is done To the land where life is a song And sing while the birds fill the air with their joy all day long Where the trees sway in time, even the wind sings into me And the cares of tomorrow till this day is done Come by the hills to the land where legend remains Where stories of old fill the heart and may yet come again Where our past has been lost and the future is still to be won And the cares of tomorrow can wait till this day is done And the cares of tomorrow can wait till this day is done I went to Waterbury, Vermont tonight. I have not been to Waterbury specifically in many, many years. I've passed through it from time to time. It is just very nice to be here tonight. It struck me as I drove into Waterbury today that Waterbury is known for the ice cream business. That's something you can't get away from probably. And I came to you from the home of what is left of friendly ice cream. I live in Wilberham, Massachusetts, which is where friendly is planted. They still make ice cream and they still do all those things. So I went from one ice cream place to another. The first tune that I played for you is an old Irish song based on a poem. And that last line of the song, and the cares of tomorrow can wait until this day is done. Isn't that special? Isn't that a great line? Musicians hear other people's things and they say, I really wish I'd written that. I didn't. The second one, some of you recognize, it's an old English tune. Play it this time of year. It's called In the Bleak Midwinter. It's a pretty tune. We're going to touch on all of the Celtic lands tonight. We're going to kind of wander in and out of Christmas. I'm not going to throw a whole barrage of Christmas things at you. I'm not going to throw a whole barrage of Celtic things at you. I'm just going to kind of jump back and forth. I think you won't have any trouble at all keeping up. One of the things that I like to get out of the way quite early every night is this. We're going to play from the Celtic lands, which are Scotland, England, Ireland, and Wales. And I am a Scot. My dad was a drummer in a bagpipe band. My great-great-grandparents came over in the Highland Clearances. So I grew up listening to bagpipe music in the house in Scottish folk songs. That's pretty much all I listened to as a child growing up. And some of the things that you hear from me tonight will be pieces of music that I learned as a child. Now those of you who are parents will know that when you became a parent, you raised your children the way that you were raised. So when my kids were little, we would pack everybody in the car and I would use cassette tapes back then. I would pop in a cassette tape of bagpipe music and off we go for six hours. It's what I knew. It was normal for me. So I tell you all that to tell you this. A couple of years ago, my birthday rolls around, but it's one of those things you can't control. And I went out to the mailbox. And in the mailbox was this wee little package from one of my sons who now lives in South Carolina. Now those of you who are parents will also know that when that happens on your birthday, your first thought is, isn't that nice? They remember dad's birthday or mom's birthday. So I went in the house. I was pleased and proud and full of myself. And I opened it up inside the test kit from Ancestry.com. I took a deep breath and I called my son. And I said, thank you for remembering me on my birthday. What's the point? And he said to me, well dad, when the sentence starts with well dad, you know it's not going to end well. My brothers and I were little. It was Scottish this and Scottish that all the time. And now we're going to find out exactly how Scottish you are. Oh, he also put in the part about how I had them convinced his children that McDonald's was a Scottish restaurant. He was not a happy soul. So I took the test because I knew where my family came from. So I say to you before you tonight, very proudly telling you that according to the smart people at Ancestry.com we'll get paid lots of money to know these things. I am 83% Scottish. That's a big number. That is a big number. So if we all start marching around and killing cows and doing all the things that the Scots do, you don't know why we do that. I'm going to play for you one now that you might know and you should know. It is what we call in the music world a piggyback song. A piggyback song is when you take one melody or one piece of music and you just keep writing new words for it. And it keeps popping up in different places. And this one beautiful English folk song that we just take out at Christmas time and call it something else. I'm getting ready for the good stuff. I want to make sure that here. I can't. 1851. 1851. Michael Constantine was born. Remember that name? Michael Constantine was born in County Claire, Ireland in the little village rising the road called Spansell Hill. In 1851, Spansell Hill was kind of a happening place, but not so much anymore. In 1851, there was Michael Constantine and as he was growing up, he realized as so many other young men did at that time period, that there was no future at all for him. And if he was going to make something of himself, it would need to be someplace else. Ireland lost somewhere around 40% of its population in a 10-year period to America. It just came over, but 40% is a lot. So across the ocean came Michael Constantine. And he settled, he came to Boston and he settled there for a short time, a little bit less than a year, before realizing that there were a lot more Irish lads looking for work in Boston than there was work for them. And if he was going to make something of himself in America, it would need to be someplace else. He had heard of the prosperity in California, all the things that were going on out there with the gold rush and all of that. So across the country, he went. He settled in San Francisco. He spent the rest of his life in San Francisco and Michael Constantine died in San Francisco. In 1873, he was 22 years old. History does not tell us what Michael Constantine died of. Back then, they didn't write such things down. They didn't write down causes of death. They just kind of drew a line through your name and checked you off and moved on. But it does tell us this. When Michael Constantine was dying, he knew that he was dying. Whatever he was dying of took him progressively. It was not something that happened suddenly. So he knew that he was dying. And that made him very sad for a couple of reasons. The first and most obvious reason is that he was 22 years old and he knew that he was going to die. But the second reason is that he knew that he was never going to get back to Ireland and back to his village. You see, back then, when the immigrants came here, it was a mark of their success in America. To make enough money, to gather enough resources to go back to Ireland and say to your family, look at me. I went to America. I'm a success. I came back here. And most often, they would come back to their villages carrying a handful of money for their family to help their family get by. And that was just a measure of their success. And that was never going to happen to Michael. That made him sad. Not long before he passed away, he had a dream one night, a very, very vivid dream. And in that dream, he went back to Ireland. And in the dream, he did all the things that he would have done had he been able to go there. He went and visited the house that he grew up in, saw his relatives, and even found his old girlfriend. It was a very, very vivid dream. And when he woke up in the morning, he made a series of notes based on the dream. And he took those notes and he turned them into a poem. This is the good part. With all he had happening in his life, Michael Constantine had the foresight to take that poem, put it in an envelope, and mail it back to his nephew in Ireland. That is the only reason that poem survived all of these years is because he had the foresight to do that. This is Michael Constantine's poem. To Erin Gile, I desired. I stepped aboard a vision. I sailed off with a will. Till we gladly came to anchor at the cross on Spansel Hill. It'd been the 23rd of June, the day before the fair. Here in sons and daughters, they were all assembled there. The young, the old, the stout and the whole, they came to sport and kill. It's a curious combination at the fair on Spansel Hill. To see my old home at every stone hotel. The old boring was just the same, the apple trees over the well. I miss my sister Ellen, my brother's Pat and Bill. There only were strange faces at the house on Spansel Hill. To see my neighbors, to hear what they might say. The old were getting feeble, the young ones turning gray. I met with Taylor Quigley, he brave as ever still, to mend my britches. When I lived on Spansel Hill, to my first and only love. She's pure as any lily, she's gentle as a dove. She threw her on, saying, Michael, I love you still. She's not the ranger's daughter, she's the pride of Spansel Hill. Nice to kiss her, as I did in days of yore. She said, Michael, you're only joking, as you often were before. The cock grew in the mornings, he grew both loud and shrill. I awoke in California, far, far from Spansel Hill. And then my vision faded, and tears came to my eyes. I'd hope to see that dear old land, once more before I die. May the joyous king of angels, his choices bless and spill. From that glorious piece of nature, across Spansel Hill. Different direction from woman, if I may. This is not a Christmas song, per se. Many of you will recognize the song. It was written by a man named Tom Paxton. Tom Paxton is an old folk singer. He finally, I think, just came off the road in the last year or two. He wrote many, many great things, and this is one of his songs. I kind of changed it a little bit. Just a couple little pieces of it that kind of fit for Christmas and for kids. You guys ready? Me too. One Christmas morning, I awoke. A happy little boy. Follow my father had for me a marvelous little toy. I'll wonder to behold it was with many colors of bright. And the moment I laid eyes on it, it became my mark of life. Wait, wait, wait! Move that! Stop that! How hard it is to do that? It's probably even harder when you don't have any front teeth. We're going to try it. Can you help me? It went zippy boop then boop when it popped and boop! Did you do that? Boop! It stood still. I never knew just what it was, and I guess I never would've known. Well, the first time that I picked it up, I had a big surprise. Right, I thought of one or two big buttons, and it looked like two green eyes. I first pushed one, then the other, then I twisted its lip. When I set it down again, this is what it did. It went zippy boop! Stop! I never knew just what it was, and I guess I never would've known. Well, the first march left, then it then march right, and it then march under a chair. When I looked around again, it wasn't even there. I started to sob that my daddy laughed, because he knew that I was fine. When I turned around, that marvelous toy came chugging the foam behind. It went zippy boop! Stop! It stood still. I never knew just what it was, and I guess I never would've known. Too quickly, it seems, and I have my own little grand boy. And on Christmas day, I will give to him that marvelous little toy. Pop right out of his head, and he'll have this sphere of glee. Neither one of us knows what it is. He knows it just like me, and it'll still go zippy boop! When it stopped, it stood still. I never knew just what it was, and I guess I never would've known. This is the part every night when I look up, and I see many faces looking back at me with repressed middle school memories. The ones that laughed the hardest are the ones that have the memories. You thought you were rid of this, and you only thought that. This isn't auto-harp, and many of you are familiar with it, and many of you are probably not. The reason I say middle school memories is the short version of all that is that there was a period of time from the late 1950s to the end of the 1960s when the Oskar Schmidt Company, the company that still makes commercial auto-harps, got the marketing idea that if we put auto-harps in every middle school that we can find up and down the east coast, every middle school child will get exposed to the auto-harp. Every middle school child will love the auto-harp, and their birthdays and Christmas roll around where we're going to sell a gazillion to auto-harps. I guess there was some merit to the idea, but because they were giving them away, they had to make them as economically cheaply as possible. So they make a lot of plywood, and those of you who understand acoustic instruments know that plywood has no resonating properties whatsoever. So you might want to put some strings on the floor and have that. They painted them black because that's a great color for kids. They painted them black with the strings on them. It didn't work very well. The instrument was designed to be played flat on a desk. It was very simple and just strummed. It didn't sound anything at all like that, but you get the concept of how it was supposed to be played. And it didn't work out very well. Somewhere in the late 1970s, in the very early 1980s, somebody rolled along and said, hmm, let's take the auto-harp out of the musical closet. And there has to be a harder way to play this. I told you I was a Scott. And if you know any Scott, we started the hard way and worked backwards. We don't ever sneak up on it. So what I'm going to do for you tonight, can you hear okay in the back? What I'm going to do for you tonight, I'm going to play it not the way it was intended to be played. With the funny centers. I'm going to finger pick it, like if you're picking a guitar with a banjo or something like that. I saw this on YouTube already, it wants how hard can it be. You're laughing at me, I haven't done it yet. Seven strings, 37. The standard auto-harp configuration is 36 strings. Being a Scott, and when I had this one built, I wanted an extra Scott. If 36 is hard, 37 is harder. Every time I push down the button, a musical chord or a different palette of notes, and it does that by muting out certain notes. A lot of certain notes are just muted out because they don't play. So if I do this, it sounds very pretty. But if I do it slower, you can hear the strings that click and they don't ring. So about half the strings ring and about half the strings don't ring every time I push down the button. And the combination of strings that ring and don't ring is different depending on the button that you push down. And the strings are only like that far apart. If you watch me play it, I never look at my right hand. And that's because you can't think that fast. You just have to teach your hand with the strings and I'll go get them. Well, it's tunes. The first one is another one of those piggyback things. It's a very pretty tune all by itself. And some of you will recognize it for what it is. It's tunes called... You don't know it as Ash Grove. You might know it as Ash Grove. The music from Ash Grove has been been borrowed and stuck in every hymnal that you can find. It has some version of Ash Grove with their own hymnal words for it. It's just that pretty melody. And then I will kind of pair that one up tonight with another Welsh tune that you might know. It builds a little Welsh wallaby called All Through the Night. Ward 2 was breaking out. Over on the west coast of Scotland, in a wee small village known as Campbellton Scotland. It's kind of southwest corner, if you will. Campbellton Scotland, there was a man named George McIntyre. And George McIntyre was a piper in the village bagpipe band. Every village in Scotland to this day has their own pipe band. And Campbellton had one then. And George was in it. But when the war started out, he did as so many other young men did. And he went off and he joined the British Army to do this part for the Great War. Well, if he went to Germany, and he was not there for very long before, he was captured and held in a prisoner of war camp for the duration of the war. He spent his time in captivity playing his bagpipe games over and over and over again in his head. It was the way of staying connected to his music, connected to the bagpipe, connected to his village, and probably connected to his sanity in some way. He was playing his bagpipe tunes. While he was there, he wrote a bagpipe tune in his head. And when he got back to Campbellton at the end of the war, he taught it to the bagpipe band. And from there, it was taken off. You don't hear it much in America. But if you go over to Scotland and you see the pipe band coming down the street, it's quite likely you will hear this one at some point. He calls his tune The Hills of Argyle. Smile. This instrument is special. It is taking you to all kinds of different places. It's Judy told you, I can play a lot of instruments. Kind of small smattering over here tonight. But when I am home and the house is dark and quiet, this is the one that I will pick up and play for myself. And we just kind of sit in a chair and just let it go. It's really that special. So I'm going to put it down now, but my promise to you is that before we're done tonight, I will pick it up again. You okay with that one? Back in the 1700s and in the 1800s when the merchant ships would leave the various ports in the United Kingdom to go off and deliver their wares around the world, they could be gone for upwards of seven years before getting back to where they started. And that sounds crazy. But you're thinking about that today. Think about it in terms of the times in fact in the 1700s and 1800s. You've got a ship full of whatever and you're leaving Dublin to take it to Boston. Well, it takes you seven to eight weeks just to get there and then an old sailing ship to slow it down. And then you have to wait a couple of weeks to get in to the harbor. And then you have to wait to turn to unload and then you have to unload it by hand because there were no frames or gantries and you had to pick up a load in Boston and you might wait a couple of months for that and then take that load anywhere in the world that it was going. So you're pretty soon you're hopscotching your way around the world and you might not get back for seven years. So look at it this way. You have the wife or the girlfriend of a sailor. It's time for him to go. You walk him down to the pier and you kiss him goodbye. Up the gang where he goes he waves, you wave and then you go home. And you wait for upwards of seven years to see if he comes back. Sometimes he did sometimes he didn't. If he didn't he didn't know why he just didn't come back. The ship might have sunk, the pirates might have gotten him. He might have found somebody he likes better in another place. I'm sure all of those things happened if you didn't know there were no cell phones back then. He couldn't call you and say I'm just going to hang out in Asia some place. It was so many things that you're learning in the Celtic world the way they record the history of somebody writes a song about it. This is a song about an English sailor. His name is John Riley. Strange young man said fair young man will you marry me? This tensor was very kind no kind sir I cannot marry thee I will love he sails a deep salt sea still no man he said to her what if he's dying or in a battle slain what if he's drowned in a deep salt sea what if he's found another love he ended new life if he's died or in a battle slain I will die when the moon is dark away I will live in salt sea I will be true in his memory Place that music on the bazooki. I've tried, it's never worked. Okay, you have been sitting very nicely for the better part of an hour and this is the moment you've been anticipating for the better part of an hour didn't know that you weren't anticipating maybe you'd better say this part I've been anticipating for the better part of an hour it'll work so far haven't I this is the part where you're going to sing for me don't have to worry don't have to worry I checked with Rachel and Judy at the library and they said the people in Waterbrave, Vermont they're well above average this would be easy for them they can do anything you ask of them what we're going to do we're going to sing a song and I'm going to give you five words five words that's not hard now is it but I want to tell you the back story because with so many things I have the back story that goes with this I told you about my dad a little bit about my dad in the beginning my dad's name was Donald of course, the Scottish name they're all named Donald and my dad's name was Donald one of his very closest friends was also named Donald and Donald and Donald would get together when I was a wheelhead in the house and they would listen to the folk songs and they would march around the house and they would sing and they would do all the different things that they do in the house and as they did that more often than not they would invite their friend Johnny Walker to join them you know him sir, do you Johnny Walker would always be the first one to be done they would march around the house and they would sing the song one particular song popped up I even knew as a wheelhead when this one came it was going to get sung over and over and over again it's a song about a man named Donald and this Donald lived up in the Isle of Skye which is off the northwest corner of Scotland maybe the most beautiful place you will ever go if you've ever been there it is phenomenal and this is a long time ago and Donald left Skye, he thought he would go on vacation to London which was a pretty big deal because back then the Scots didn't go to England they went on terribly well but he went anyway wearing his kilt and the ladies in London were taken back by such a thing as a man wearing a kilt they had never seen anything quite like that before they expected him to be wearing his trousers that's what the English people would call pants back then and not a kilt so when he walked around in London the ladies would just look at him and say Donald what are your trousers somebody writes a song about it and we're going to sing this song and it's okay mom you're good and you're going to help me sing this song so I will sing the first line of the chorus and you will sing to me the second line of the chorus easy enough my part, first time the chorus is let the wind blow high would you like to share what you find so funny man I bet you're really glad I'm not wearing a kilt right now and you will sing back to me let the wind blow low simple enough it goes just like this let the wind blow high let the wind blow low ready let the wind blow high perfect the streets and the kilt don't go oh the last sea shark hello Donald where's your trousers I'm from the isle sky I'm all very big and I'm awful shy the last sea shark when I go by Donald where's your trousers let the wind blow high through the streets and my kilt don't go oh the last sea shark hello Donald where's your trousers down to the big town and I had some fun in the underground the ladies turned their heads around saying Donald where's your trousers let the wind blow high through the streets and my kilt don't go oh the last sea shark hello it was slippery in the hall and I was afraid that I might fall me every morning let them catch me if they can they cannot put the big sun high let the man go they won't wear no trousers let the highlanders couldn't get to fright if they saw me wearing trousers let the wind blow high and because of that I'm going to reward you I'm going to give you another one let's do an Irish sing along this time but instead of just five words I'm going to give you the whole chorus to the song the whole chorus you can do this I know that you can this is your part ready? Mary match fathers make a Mary match marry me my fathers make a me Mary Mary mat got a gun a Mary Mary cause he can't do it you will always feel a Mary when I marry Mary mat that's your part I got the rest here we go no huh Mary match fathers making Mary mat marry me you will sing back to me my fathers making me Mary Mary mat would you like to help me because you seem to know all the words you can kind of lead them you don't want to do that my fathers making me Mary Mary mat that's your part it will sound like this once you get it Mary match fathers making Mary mat marry me my fathers making me Mary Mary mat making Mary mat marry me let's try that again I left that that was on me I left out one part of the instructions let's do it together this time match fathers making Mary mat I can work with that I'm going to Mary Mary for my Mary cause they care you will always feel Mary but I'm Mary Mary mat the last center name is Mary mat make no mistake she's a girl I want to get a lot of other fellas try to get her on her track and I'm making that I have to get up and release Mary match fathers making Mary mat marry me I'm going to Mary Mary for my Mary cause they care you will always feel Mary but I'm Mary Mary mat the last is God a lot of crap God a lot of crap the center father needs to get some ideas he'll ask if I let the matter pass your father says you're really fairly good Mary match fathers making Mary mat I'm going to Mary Mary for my Mary cause they care you will always feel Mary but I'm Mary Mary mat well Mary Mary mother I'm going to go off a lot together in fact I hardly ever see the one without the other and all the people wonder if Mary or her mother or could both put them together that's important Mary match fathers making Mary mat Mary me Mary to be care you will always feel Mary when I'm Mary Mary let's take a detour see she has these little sails on that the sailor do the same when they had to work in rhythm with each other pulling boats, raising sails, whatever they were doing fucking sailor but they don't do the same value to the rest of the day I must say about 1962-ish on Hollywood California the music department of the TV studio was handed the pilot episode for the TV show they said here you go here's the show, write us a song they took drunk and sailor and they moved to about four notes from a different place these kinds of sailor and sideways they kind of twisted sense of humor back then they did if you look at this just to sit right back in each of the pages of the Gilding and Glacier songs that was so good one more time but this last time let's do it fast if you're having fun tonight it's not me Rachel and the friends of the library and all these people and Ruby back there with the microphone and the camera and all they're the ones that made this happen I just show up and sit here and please thank them because this was all on them as much as I'd like you to believe that I randomly wandered into Waterbirds Vermont tonight I don't think anybody randomly wanders in it is a bleep bit off the beaten path up here I love it up here it's a beautiful ride thank you to the friends and to all the people that are part of this I am nowhere near the end I just want to put that piece in I'm going to play for you an English children's song this is a children's song from England and it dates back to about 1650 a long time ago 1650 how many years ago that was very good 400 that's better than I would have done the song is called the Elfin Night E-L-F-I-N K-N-I-G-H-T Elfin Night translated from the language of the times because things were different back then Elfin Night loosely means small boy or wee little lad or something along those terms this is the Elfin Night you're looking at you're looking at me and I said four minutes you said one thing and did something else no I didn't the song that you know is Scarborough Fair and soon they played that little bit in the beginning pretty much all of you would have recognized that as Scarborough Fair that song began its musical life as the Elfin Night in about 1650 it was a children's song back then the way the folk music process works is the songs as they pass through time they morph and change as everybody gets their hands on kind of like I did a Tom Paxson song a little bit differently than Tom Paxson did it you just change it because that's how the process is so the Elfin Night started off in 1650 and around 1900 it started to be called Scarborough Fair because it morphed and changed and that's how you know it today there is a Wikipedia page for the Elfin Night and if you go to the Wikipedia page you can find the original words and when you read the words from the 1600s it's not word for word by any means but as you read through the original words you'll find the little bits and pieces that will sound familiar to you there's little bits and pieces of what was written survived all of these years and made it into Scarborough Fair and that's just how the whole song process works now the little bit that I played in the beginning that little riff that kind of identifies Scarborough Fair thing was not written by Paul Simon it was written by an English folk singer named Martin Cardi and Martin Cardi is still alive and he's still running around in 87 or 8 or 9 years old or something now and he wrote that back in the 40s he wrote that instrumental version of it and he taught at the Paul Simon he was there at 18 years old after he got out of high school they traveled England together and he taught at the Paul and Paul came back he wrote the second part to that the canticle part was like a call and answer thing he wrote that and he wrote the canticle part that belongs to him the arrangement that he used he kind of borrowed from Martin Cardi which is fine you can do that but you have to pay him for the rights it's still a beautiful song 1855 we're back in the 1800s 1855 John Hunt comes to America he settles in Aberdeen, Maryland just a little bit north of Baltimore, Maryland he gets a job, he gets married he has kids, he buys a house he does all those things John Hunt spent the rest of his life in Aberdeen, Maryland John Hunt died in Aberdeen, Maryland and John Hunt is buried in Aberdeen, Maryland as I tell you the story and play for you the song that goes with it please keep in mind that when John Hunt came here in 1855 he was 13 years old 13 years old let's think about that for just a minute and let's think about our 13 year old child or our 13 year old grandchild or our 13 year old niece or nephew the 13 year old kid who lives down the street leaving home going to a country where he didn't know anybody didn't know a soul but he knew at 13 that he had to get out of Ireland he had no idea at all what he was going to do when he got to America but he had to get here first and he did he came here and he made a life for himself in America there were thousands and thousands of them he was just one he never went back and saw his family again nor they him back in Ireland John Hunt's father a man named Brian could either read or write every year he would go next door because the village schoolmaster was over there and he would sit down on the village schoolmaster and he would dictate to him all of the comings and goings of the family over the past year who got married, who had kids and what a house, who died all the things that we do and recently today with a text message anywhere in the world they did once a year with the annual letter kind of like the old Christmas letter thing that they used to do and every letter to John included a request for him to come home and see his family again and he never did jump ahead to about 1972 and a man named Peter Jones is cleaning a house in Aberdeen, Maryland and in that house he finds a stack of old papers with the letters that had been written to John Hunt for 100 years earlier they even just tied together and stuck in a corner someplace he took those papers and he laid them out I believe it's 22 in the series he laid them all out, such as they were and he figured out how they fit together chronologically and he turned them into something that we know today as the ballot of Kill, Kill, Ireland the story of the Hunt family Kill, Kelly Ireland 1860 my dear and loving son John your good friend the school master Pat McNamara so good to write these words down your brothers have all gone to find work in England the house is so empty and sad the crop of potatoes is sorely infected a third to a half of them bad your sister Bridget and Patrick Godano are going to be married in June your mother says not to work on the railroad be sure and come on home soon Kill, Kelly Ireland 1870 my dear and loving son John hello to you, Mrs to your four children may they grow healthy and strong our Michael has got in a wee bit of trouble I don't think that he'll ever learn because of the dampness there's no turf to speak of we have nothing to burn Bridget is happy and aimed at child for her you know she's got six of her own you say you found work you don't say what kind where are you coming home Kill, Kelly Ireland 1880 Michael and John my sons I'm sorry to give you the very sad news your mother has passed on we buried her down at the church your brothers and Bridget were there you don't have to worry she died very quickly remember her and your friends it's so good to hear that Michael's returning with money he's sure to buy land the crop has been poor and the people are strong at any price that they can kill, Kelly Ireland 18 and 19 my dear and loving son John I suppose that I must be close on to 80 30 years you've been gone because of all of the money you sent me I'm still living out on my own Michael has built himself a fine house Bridget's daughters are grown thank you for sending your family picture their lovely young women and men why don't you think about coming to visit a joy to see you again Kill, Kelly Ireland 1892 my dear brother John I'm sorry I didn't write sooner to tell you that father is gone he was living with Bridget she said he was cheerful healthy right up to the end you should have seen him playing with the grandchildren of Pat Mattlemare on your friend we buried him alongside of brother down at the kill Kelly churchyard he was a strong and feisty old man considering his life was so hard it's funny the way he kept talking about you he called for you at the end why don't you think about coming to visit we'd all like to see you again that one is special that one is special and special to me it is a song that over the decades playing it telling a story it's attached itself to me and it's one that it's one that I play every day whenever I happen to be I tell that story and play that song and it's that important but it's attached itself to me in many ways and one of which I will share with you now about 17 ish years ago I had the opportunity to see the letters to see the original letters from there I had the opportunity to transcribe the original letters it was a wee bit of a challenge because the paper was 100 years old and it was folded and faded and smudged and all of those things you can imagine what the paper was like but I got most of it I got most of it there were a couple places where I had to guess a word there were a couple places where I left a blank space but I got most of it I think it's 22 and I tell you that but you know this there's some cards up there with my picture on them and on the back of the cards but one of the things that's there is my website address if you go to my website there's a page on the website to Kill Care Like Ireland and on that page you will find the transcriptions of the first and last letter so you can go there and read the first and last letter and get an idea of what it was really like because the song is obviously a synopsis of a lot of things but you'll get an idea and if you read the letters on the website and it fires up your interest and your curiosity there is a little internet button thing on the page that you can push it it should pop up an email window all addressed to me and all you have to do is fill it in and tell me that you met me here in Waterbury tonight and my gift to you, my thanks for coming I will send you a PDF file with all 22 letters and then you can read all of the letters and you can just kind of dig your way through the whole family history because if you google kill kelly letters you will find me I have them, I make them available to everybody there's not too many people that have seen the letters because of that I hear from people all over the world who hear the story, hear the song google kill kelly letters so I have sent the letters over the years I have sent the PDF file pretty much to every corner of the world I have sent the country, they should be keeping the list I have sent it out more times than I can even imagine and I would be happy to include all of you on that list but I will share one with you 8 years ago I got an email from a gentleman who lived just outside of Atlantic City, New Jersey between Atlantic City and the Delaware border it was kind of like a piece of New Jersey it was kind of tucked in down there and that's where he lived and he google killed kelly letters wow, of course I did so do you remember the part of the song about the brother Michael, Michael ran off and he came back and got in trouble and he put the house and Michael had a pretty prominent role in the song this gentleman is Michael Hunt's great-great-grandson the Hunt family knew the song, they knew the story they did not know that the letter still existed in any form so I was able to give them the letters and he shared them with his family the story that I told you in the beginning about John Hunt much of that came to me from him as we corresponded back and forth he filled me in on the history of John and how John came to be here so it's a very very special story and please, if you have any interest at all, please take advantage of it I played it as I told you I played it every day for decades now and I never tire of it and I played it in rooms full of Irish grandmothers and you could imagine I play it and I look up and I can see the room filling with emotion and that's a good thing but when I play it in front of Irish grandmothers it's like over the top and then I have to make it a little sadder when I see that for them but I will share something with you that I have learned over the years playing this song about Irish grandmothers and Irish grandmother can hide an entire box of Kleenex on her person I start playing the song and somewhere around the second verse I'll look up and we're we're down here and we're up this sleeve we're up that sleeve and passing it back and forth and from the front it often looks like it's snowing now Kleenex going back and forth it's a hoop so thank you thank you for being here tonight back to the harp I promise you that I would it has been an honor and a privilege and a joy for me to come and share the evening with you tonight thank you for I know that you have choices and I'm glad that you were here there are still some CDs in the world and some of them are over there anything that you would be so kind to purchase and take home I don't have to it works for all of us I'm going to play you two more the first one my favorite Christmas tune to play it on the harp I even try when I'm playing for myself in the dark I even play this one all year in July I'll play it just because I like to play it and I will finish this off tonight with the song that gets played last in the Scottish sessions all over the world when Scottish musicians get together we always play the same song last I have absolutely no idea why what we do and in America it just gets played at the end of the year based on a Robert Burns poem so thank you bless you, thank you for being here tonight