The Highstool Prophets ‘delighted’ to join Cavan Eco Féile

Popular Cavan folkband The Highstool Prophets are set to take the stage as one of three free live concerts during the upcoming Cavan Eco Féile.

Organised by Cavan County Council, the flagship sustainability and innovation festival will take place in Cavan Town from October 23-25.

A live music gig rig located in Tesco Car Park will host the free concerts, and hometown band The Highstool Prophets will perform from 7pm on Saturday, October 24.

With roots dating back to a pub session during the All-Ireland Fleadh in Cavan, the band has “snowballed” from there, playing in local pubs for several years before reaching a much wider audience with their viral cover of Amy McDonald’s ‘This is the Life’.

There have been a couple of changes to the group’s original lineup over the years, including singer/guitarist Kevin Meehan, who joined around a year in.

“Somehow, I’m still getting away with it,” the Cavan town native jokes. Two of his fellow bandmates, bassist Niall Carolan and singer/bodhrán player Jason Brady are also from Cavan town, while Pat Tierney, who plays the flute and the whistle, hails from Lavey and singer/banjo player Stephen McCaffrey is from Shercock.

Speaking to the Celt from Newfoundland, where the quintet have brought their ‘This is the Life’ tour, Kevin says that a “resurgence” in folk music during the pandemic gave the group a “big lift” in allowing them to reach a wider audience through live streaming on their social media platforms.

“We were so surprised at the interactions,” Kevin recalls.

“There were people logging in and viewing it from all over the place, not just in Ireland.”

This recognition “really helped” the band, and they started to get gigs in theatres, including the Townhall in Cavan and the Ramor in Virginia, as well as others “up and down the country.”

Eager to perform for a full audience, the band recorded a live album during the pandemic in the Townhall at only 30% capacity. Despite their initial hesitation, they are now very glad to have done so as the album has since amassed millions of streams, and features their cover of the hugely popular Scottish song.

“It’s nice that the ones that are most popular are the ones that you did at home,” Kevin remarks.

“We feel very lucky and fortunate that we did decided to go ahead and record it.”

The group decided to upload the video of the cover to TikTok. Overnight, it received around half a million views but the “biggest” part for them was that Amy herself shared the video and commented that it was the best cover she had heard.

“To have that sort of backing was invaluable,” Kevin explains.

“For her to go out of her way and share it and speak so fondly of it - we were blessed.”

In the wake of this success, they soared to new heights once again, and started playing in music venues and hotels.

The song is “still the most popular” request at gigs - playing it live is like adding “fuel to a fire”, and they are regularly sent videos of people listening to it. Across their social media platforms, it has now reached almost 50 million streams.

The group are “very thankful” that the folk scene continues to thrive, and feel “so blessed” to have this career.

Their tour continues this year with more dates across Ireland, the England and Scotland, and further shows will take place in Australia next year.

The group’s love for music is “deeply rooted” in Cavan, and they are “delighted” to join the lineup at the inaugural Cavan Eco Féile.

“Everybody lifted an instrument, learned it in Cavan, and here we are, still doing our thing with it,” said Kevin.