Recording Details

SFW40553
Irish Pirate Ballads and Other Songs for the Sea
Dan Milner & Guest Artists


Notes - Pirates, shanghaiers, slavers, and smugglers are just some of the central characters in this album of lusty, authentic maritime songs; others are ardent patriots, hard-pressed immigrants, and weathered sailors sheltering in the taverns of the seven seas. All are midway between some dicey spot in life and an uncertain future. Their compelling stories of bold adventure are excitingly re-told here by an all-star crew of Irish singers and musicians led by vocalist/author Dan Milner.

Featuring an impressive array of guest musicians and singers, including Tim Collins of the renowned Kilfenora Ceili Band, champion fiddler Brian Conway, Gabriel Donohue of the Chieftains, The Johnson Girls, Joanie Madden, and John Doyle, Irish Pirate Ballads captures centuries of tradition and the revelry, mischief, tales of love and caution that characterize nautical life.

Milner "really gets inside a song and brings it alive," writes New York University professor Mick Moloney, who also appears on the album. "It's impossible not to be drawn in by the imagery of these songs and the absorbing stories they tell of memorable rakes, adventurers and scoundrels."

40 page booklet, 13 tracks, 58 Minutes.

Year of Release - 2009

Record Label - Smithsonian Folkways Recordings

Source Archive - Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage

Credits - Produced by Dan Milner ; Mixed by Dan Milner ; Recorded by Gabriel Donohue ; Mastered by Gabriel Donohue ; Liner Notes by Dan Milner ; Liner Notes by Mick Moloney




Tracks -
101 Ten Thousand Miles Away
Dan Milner, John Doyle, Robbie O’Connell
Duration:3:36




102 The Ballad of Ó Bruadair / Out on the Ocean
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Joanie Madden, John Doyle, Mick Moloney, Robbie O’Connell, Susan McKeown,Tim Collins
Duration:3:53




103 Saucy Ward
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue
Duration:4:12




104 Captain Coulston
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Joanie Madden
Duration:5:36




105 Granuaile
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Susan McKeown
Duration:3:47




106 Get Up Jack, John, Sit Down / Miss Thornton’s
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Joanie Madden, The Johnson Girls, Mick Moloney, Robbie O’Connell, Susan McKeown, Tim Collins
Duration:4:28




107 The Flying Cloud
Dan Milner
Duration:6:25




108 Larry Maher’s Big Five-Gallon Jar
Dan Milner, Bob Conroy, Mick Moloney,Robbie O’Connell, Tim Collins
Duration:3:13




109 Bold McCarthy (The City of Baltimore)
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Mick Moloney,Tim Collins
Duration:4:39




110 All for Me Grog / Parnell’s March
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Mick Moloney, Robbie O’Connell, Tim Collins
Duration:3:53




111 Castle Gardens (Sixty Years Ago)
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Joanie Madden
Duration:4:55




112 The Lowlands Low
Dan Milner, Brian Conway, Gabriel Donohue, Joanie Madden, John Doyle, Mick Moloney, Robbie O’Connell, Tim Collins
Duration:4:12




113 The River Lea
Dan Milner, Gabriel Donohue, Joanie Madden, Mick Moloney, Robbie O’Connell
Duration:5:34