‘Port’ star boards for Ramor
“It’s a big old ex-industrial town,” is SJ McArdle’s somewhat folksy description of his hometown Drogheda.
“There’s still a lot of industrial revolution architecture, particularly down at the port. It still has that kind of personality,” reports the renowned singer song-writer.
The area is close to both SJ’s home, heart, and now music. During SJ’s tenure as Artist in Association at Droichead Arts Centre in 2019 he penned songs inspired by the port’s heritage and past.
Conscious of their legacy, the Port Company maintains an impressive archive, and SJ was given access to all of that source material. Amongst all the ledgers and shipping reports, were archive audio recorded with elderly ex-dockers, residents, sailors in the 1990s compiled over 18 months by Louth composer Michael Holohan.
“The audio recordings were probably my favourite part having more of the living, breathing personal touch, which is what the songs are all about. They are not history songs really, they are set in a historical context to a degree, but they are songs about people and emotions and the dramas of every day life like every good song should be.”
The critically acclaimed album ‘Old Ghosts In The Water’ surfaced from his research, and additional tracks from the sessions are brought to the stage for his ‘Port’ tour. The song Jack leans heaviest on the audio recordings
“That’s largely about a character called Jack McDonald who was a harbour master in the early to mid 20th Century and a couple of different people on the tapes talked about working with him at the time and he seemed such an incredible character.”
The song takes the form of Jack giving advice to a younger colleague.
“I was trying to get across that sense of calm he seemed to emanate - unflappability and slight bit of mystery maybe.”
The song that begins the album is the Celt’s favourite ‘All For The Sailing Tomorrow’.
Drawn from newspaper accounts it recalls the era when Drogheda was the second biggest Famine port in the country, serving Liverpool.
“A journalist had written about some young people who had come the whole way over from Connaught to get to Drogheda Port and over to Liverpool where they stayed, or on to Nova Scotia,” having tried to visualise what the reporter saw and might have seen at this dreadful time.
SJ admits he struggled with the song until his friend and collaborator Eugene Donegan of Pilgrim Street helped him unlock. Eugene tightened up these lyrics: I see rats in the water/and crows on the quay/and mothers with stones/where their hearts used to be.
“Once I had that I was like: I have it now. It’s a funny thing writing a song, you have to chip away until you get a sense of it and then when it does it’s easy because you know what will feel right or wrong - it’s a bit like knowing a person: and thinking oh they would say that, or they wouldn’t say that.”
Now it feels like the song has always existed and couldn’t have been written any other way. That in part could be due to the amazing vocal delivery of Carol Keogh who takes the lead in this song.
“Carol to me is one of the best singers in the country, she’s phenomenal, so it was interesting to write some things with her voice in mind. She has a great storyteller’s voice, it’s really authoritative voice,” he praises.
To hear Carol’s voice along with SJ McArdle’s and others, head along to Ramor Theatre this Saturday, April 20 for 8pm. To book, see: ramorartscentre.com or call 049 854 7074 Monday to Friday between 10am-4pm.