I've been writing a lot lately about Joni Mitchell. Today I'll be writing about a different Joanie.
So yesterday was a weird birthday. It started with having to get up early for work, as I had a 9AM staff meeting in Little Neck. Now it's not all that unusual for me to work on my birthday. I spent most of the last two decades working as a proofreader in a company where early-to-mid March was the height of our busy season, so not only was I working every birthday, more often than not, I was working overtime.
But in my current job, we have these staff meetings once a month, and they tend to wipe me out for the rest of the day. This is because my normal sleep schedule finds me up until three or four in the morning and sleeping until eleven or twelve. I find it hard to alter that, so usually, I wind up going to these meetings on about four-to-six hours of sleep. And inevitably, there's always something cool going on later that night that I might or might not have the energy to make it out to. These days, my principle is that I'll go to something local on that Saturday night if I'm driving myself, or I'll maybe go as far as the Tilles Center or the Westbury Music Fair if Denise is driving.
But this Saturday was different because this was also the weekend where Denise was going on her eighties cruise. She was originally supposed to go with a friend. But her friend has some health issues, and a compromised immune system, and in the wake of all this coronavirus stuff, she dropped out. I considered going in her place, but I have a lot of work obligations this week, and I've gotten to a point where I hate traveling besides. I love cruising, but the thought of flying to Miami (and dealing with the whole two-seats-on-an-airline thing because of my weight) just felt like too much. Eventually, we worked it out that my son would go on the cruise with her, which I felt good about. My son would throw himself in front of a bullet to protect Denise, or myself too, for that matter. So I felt good that I knew he'd have her back, help her with her bags, etc.
So anyway, I got even less sleep Friday night than I usually do on the night before my staff meeting, knowing Denise and my son were traveling in the morning too. (And I realized as we were getting dressed this morning that this is the first time since Denise and I got married in 1995 that this is the first time we'll be apart for a whole week.)
I got out to my staff meeting on time, and over the course of the morning (and the rest of the day), I got updates from Denise -- they got on the plane OK, they made it to the hotel OK, etc. (They were sailing out the next morning.)
In the meantime, I got home about 2:30, and after getting a birthday call from a high school friend I haven't spoken to for awhile, I was able to lay down for an afternoon nap. This, and knowing that the traveling was going well, put me in a good state of mind for the night. If you haven't guessed from the title of the blog post, I was going out to see Cherish The Ladies at the Patchogue Theater.
I got up about 7, and was just about the walk out the door, when I got intercepted by my daughter and her boyfriend. They had a birthday card and mini-apple pie for me. They also had a piece of cheesecake that they put a candle in order to sing "Happy Birthday" to me. (And thankfully I see that that song has just finally made it into the public domain, so they won't even have to pay a performance fee.)
I left about 7:20, parked across the street in the back, and made it into the lobby of the Patchogue Theater by 7:40. As I got on line to buy my bottle of water, they announced that the house was now open.
I found my way to my seat easily (as I was in the same seat I usually buy, on the aisle in the second row), and relaxed to enjoy the show. Given the Runa disaster of a couple of years ago, I was pleasantly surprised to see a mostly packed house. The entire middle section on the floor was sold out, and the wings were almost full as well (except for the back few rows.) I couldn't tell for sure, but it looked like more than half of the balcony was full too. This made me proud of my people -- coronavirus be damned! The Irish are in the house!
Before too long, Cherish The Ladies took the stage. For the unfamiliar, they are an all-female Celtic music band that started in The Bronx. Joanie Madden, the band's founder and leader, still hails from The Bronx, although the other members of the current lineup come from various other places. Madden plays the flute and tin whistle. She is joined by original member and co-founder Mary Coogan from Newburgh, NY on guitar; Nollaig Casey, from County Cork in Ireland on fiddle; Mirella Murray from County Galway, Ireland on accordion; and Kathleen Boyle from Glasgow, Scotland (although her parents are from Ireland) on piano. The show also featured Kate Purcell from County Clare, Ireland as an occasional guest vocalist (with Madden and Boyle providing harmonies), plus three male Irish step dancers, David Geaney, Michael Holland, and Declan Crowley. Coogan's husband Bruce Foley also joined the band in the second set to sing lead and play guitar on "The Three Sea Captains" (which was one of the highlights of the night).
Now Madden announced at the beginning of the night that the band had never played in Patchogue before, but she was mistaken. The first time I ever saw them was fifteen or twenty years ago at an Irish music festival in Patchogue's Shorefront Park. She made it clear, though, that she hopes to come back to the Patchogue Theater again.
The show was very nicely planned, with instrumental songs interspersed with Purcell's vocal numbers, occasionally accompanied by one, two or all three of the step dancers. Madden, who served as the band's front person, made snappy remarks and told amusing stories throughout the evening, much as Paddy Moloney does with The Chieftains. The funniest line of the night, though, probably came from Ms. Boyle, who declared that she was half Irish and half Scottish, and she had finally figured out what that means: "I like to drink, but I hate to pay for it."
Some of my favorite songs of the night included Purcell's rendition of "Nora Lee" (an Irish folk song from the 1700's that Elvis Presley made famous as "Love Me Tender"); the instrumental medley of "Gloria's Travels/Galloping to the Glen/The Montana Reel"; and the first song of the encore, the classic folk song "Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go?".
There really wasn't a weak spot during the night. The band itself is quite tight, and has great dynamics -- they can all fire it up at once, but they're not afraid to let you enjoy the quiet spots, either.
I hope the Patchogue Theater does book them again in the near future. I waited almost two decades for Cherish The Ladies to come back to Patchogue, but their show was worth the wait.
The full setlist for the performance can be found at IrishLadiesRule.com.
