7th Annual Celtic Appalachian Celebration

Mick Moloney, originally from County Limerick, Ireland, was a member of the Johnstons folk group in Ireland before coming to the US in 1973. In America, he teamed up with the much-loved fiddler Eugene O’Donnell while pursuing a Ph.D. in folklore at the University of Pennsylvania. They played together for over twenty years. He also performed during this time and recorded extensively with Robbie O’Connell and Jimmy Keane. Now a professor of Music and Irish Studies at New York University, Moloney is also a producer and performer in over sixty recordings and several documentary films, author of Far from the Shamrock Shore: The Story of Irish American History Through Song and editor of Close to the Floor: The Story of Irish Dance in America and the recipient of the National Heritage Award. He currently plays with a wide variety of musicians including The Green Fields of America, an all-star group he formed in 1978 which helped launch the careers of young artists such as Eileen Ivers and Seamus Egan, Jean Butler and Michael Flatley. In 2007, his album McNally’s Row of Flats on the Compass label was awarded the title of best Irish traditional music album of the year by the Irish Echo and also gained the Irish Livies top album of the year award. His 2009 album If It Wasn’t For the Irish and the Jews was once again awarded the title of best Irish album of the year by Irish Livies, and most recently he was awarded a 2013 Presidential Distinguished Service Award for the Irish Aboard, and a 2014 Gradam Ceoil Lifetime Achievement Award from TG4.

Photo credit: Amanda Gentile 

Athena Tergis hails from a musical family in San Francisco where she released her first album at age 16. She followed her passion for traditional music to Ireland and joined the Sharon Shannon Band. Athena was also the featured violinist in the production of Riverdance on Broadway. She spent over a year on tour with Bruce Springsteen’s sax player, Clarence Clemmons. In 2001 she joined Mick Moloney and Billy McComiskey in The Green Fields of America releasing their self-titled album on Compass records along with her solo album A Letter Home and a PBS documentary: Absolutely Irish! Athena is a regular principal soloist and composer with the Dublin Philharmonic Orchestra.

Photo credit: Amanda Gentile 

Internationally renowned fiddle player Eddie Bond is from Grayson County, Virginia, a thriving center of Appalachian old-time music. Taught by his maternal grandmother, who played guitar and sang music handed down for generations of musicians well-documented in the Library of Congress’ archival field recordings, Bond has been the lead singer and fiddler for the New Ballards Branch Bogtrotters since 2001. Among the most respected of Virginia’s old-time string bands, the Bogtrotters are frequent first-place winners at the Old Fiddlers’ Convention, where Bond has won numerous fiddle contests and was twice-named Best All Around Performer, one of the highest honors in old-time music. Bond has performed across the country and overseas, including in the Music From the Crooked Road tours produced by the National Council for the Traditional Arts, and remains deeply committed to his local community, where he teaches a string band course at a high school in Grayson County. He was awarded a 2018 NEA National Heritage fellowship.

Brenda Castles comes from a rich tradition of music in Co. Meath, having learned concertina and singing from great Irish masters. She has won several All Ireland Fleadh titles—the top honor in Irish traditional music—and traveled around the world including Hong Kong, Rekjavik, and Taipei. Castles is currently based between Dublin and New York, where she regularly performs and teaches music. She released her debut solo album, Indeedin You Needn't Bother in 2016. She's been a performer in two Celtic Sojourn productions and is often a guest performer with the Green Fields of America. 

Megan Downes (dancer), artistic director of City Stompers, performs improvisational flatfooting in the Southern Appalachian tradition, contemporary Irish sean nós, and American clogging. She is a dance caller, leading Irish sets, Southern squares, and céilí dances. She'll teach anyone who asks how to move and make rhythm with their feet to the music they love. Take class with Megan at Theatre 80 St. Mark's, where they play Irish music late into the night every Monday. Before graduating from Hunter College High School and Smith College, Megan spent her youth training in competitive step dance with National Heritage Fellow Donny Golden. She spent 17 years with Footworks Percussive Dance Ensemble directed by Fiddle Puppets co-founder and Green Grass Cloggers alumna Eileen Carson and Mark Schatz. Fun fact: a member of SAG-AFTRA and ASCAP, Megan is known for co-writing the popular Uncle Earl song “Crayola” with folk phenom Kristin Andreassen.

Liz Hanley, a native of Boston, is one of the top young musicians in the New York Irish music scene. She plays the fiddle with great energy and flair and is a fine singer whose repertoire spans multiple genres from Irish traditional and rock to hip-hop and classical. Liz graduated from New York University with a Bachelor’s of Music in classical violin performance and has toured the United States, Europe and Southeast Asia. She can be seen playing around New York in seisiúns and with the likes of Mick Moloney and Frogbelly and Symphony. Be sure to check out Hanley's debut album The Ecstasy of St. Cecilia.

Photo credit: Amanda Gentile

Billy McComiskey, originally from Brooklyn, has been playing the accordion for over 50 years studying alongside many of the finest Irish Immigrant musicians of the 20th Century. He has been hailed as “the best Irish accordion player in America” and at the center of the revival of traditional music with the trail-blazing group The Irish Tradition in Washington D.C., The Catskills and his adopted home in Baltimore, Maryland where he is considered the Godfather of Irish music. An All-Ireland champion in 1986, he either taught or deeply influenced many prominent traditional Irish musicians throughout the United States and he has performed with Mick Moloney since the late 1970s in The Green Fields of America Ensemble. He also plays in the quintessential Irish-American Trad band The Pride of New York a first-generation group of tradition bearers who have played in Ireland and major festivals in America.

Photo credit: Amanda Gentile 

The New Ballards Branch Bogtrotters have been playing old-time mountain music in the Galax, Virginia area since 1986, placing first in the Galax Old Fiddlers Convention a total of ten times. The original Bogtrotters (Uncle Eck Dunford, Wade Ward, Crocket Ward, Fields Ward, and Doctor Davis) won the very first Convention in 1935; Doctor Davis was instrumental in keeping the contest alive through the years. The present-day line up includes Dennis Hall, founder, band leader, and guitarist; Eddie Bond, fiddle and vocals; Bonnie Bond, bass and vocals; Josh Ellis, banjo and vocals; and Caroline Noel Beverley, mandolin and vocals. The band enjoys performing at square dances and local and international festivals, including the Smithsonian Folk Festival, Chicago Folk Festival, Great Lakes Folk Festival, Montana Folk Festival and the Kennedy Center, among others. In 2018, Eddie Bond was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage fellowship, the highest honor bestowed on a folk artist by the United States government.

The Bogtrotters' mission is to keep the traditional sound of the Galax, Virginia area alive and thriving for generations to come.

Niall O’Leary is an architect and a former All-Ireland and World Champion dancer originally from Dublin. He runs his own architectural practice in NYC, as well as the Niall O’Leary School of Irish Dance. His Irish dance teachers have included Kevin Massey, proclaimed by Michael Flatley to be the greatest Irish dancer ever, and Rory O’Connor, the first man to do Irish dancing on the radio. He is the artistic director of the New York City Irish Dance Festival presented by Irish Arts Center in May each year, and performs regularly as a solo artist, in duet with Darrah Carr, and with Mick Moloney’s Green Fields of America, as well as with his company The Niall O’Leary Irish Dance Troupe. He is in constant demand as a performer, choreographer and master instructor and conducts regular workshops and master classes around the US, Canada, Ireland, Mexico, Japan, Thailand and Vietnam. He is the founding chairman of Ull Mor CCÉ, the Manhattan branch of Comhaltas, and was president of the Irish Business Organization of NY Inc. from 2010-2011. In 2004, O’Leary was honored by Irish America magazine as one of the Top 100 Irish-Americans of the Year.

Photo credit: Amanda Gentile 

Multi-instrumentalist Jerron "Blind Boy" Paxton’s credits include performing to a sold out audience at the Lead Belly Tribute at Carnegie Hall in 2016, with artists including Buddy Guy, Eric Burdon, Edgar Winter, Kenny Wayne Shepherd; opening for Buddy Guy at B.B. Kings in New York and Robert Cray at the Reading Blues Festival in Pennsylvania; and playing at Woodford Folk Festival and Byron Bay Blues Festival in Australia; Calgary Folk Festival in Canada; Jewel City Jam in Huntington, WV; Freihofers Jazz Festival in Saratoga Springs, NY; Clearwater Festival in Croton-on-Hudson, NY; Fayetteville Roots Festival in Fayetteville, AK; Cambridge Folk Festival in the UK; Harvest Time Rhythm & Blues Festival in Ireland; and the 2017 Brooklyn Folk Festival as headliner.