YankCelt returns in time for St. Patrick's Day

PRIME – March 2014 By Debbie Gardner debbieg@thereminder.com Six musicians. Seven concerts. A Western Massachusetts tradition nearly as anticipated as Holyoke's famed St. Patrick's Day Parade. For their 24th year, Robert Emmet "Bo" Fitzgerald, Jeffery Sullivan, Guy DeVito, Craig Eastman, Michael "Mixie" Clarke and Billy Klock will come together as "Bo Fitz and the YankCelt Band" on March 13 at The Harp in Sunderland, Mass., to begin a whirlwind two weeks of performances, including their annual St. Patrick's Day party at Theodore's in downtown Springfield and a special March 22 concert at CityStage. The band's purpose – to keep alive the Irish music tradition, and well, to have a good time doing it. "We literally never rehearse," Eastman, who flies in annually from Los Angeles to play fiddle and mandolin with YankCelt, said. "One of the things that makes it exciting is that when we get onstage in March it will literally be the first time we have played together as a group in a year. It keeps it fresh, that's for sure." Originally from Northampton, Mass., Eastman is one of two YankCelt performers – the other is Clarke, who hails from Galway, Ireland – who make what he calls "a wonderful pilgrimage" to Western Massachusetts each March. Eastman is an accomplished musician who has performed on the soundtrack of films including Walt Disney's "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Brokeback Mountain," and won a 2013 Grammy Award for his work on Steve Martin's banjo album. He said playing with YankCelt brings him back home to his family, his "best friends" and a kind of music that spans the centuries, but does it with a modern twist. "The YankCelt Band is a very authentic type of music," Eastman explained. "In Irish music in particular you get a lot of people who play music in a way that's replicating … the way people did 100 years ago, 200 years ago. "Though we touch on a lot of those elements it's always been a very original and current interpretation of the music," he continued. "We do a lot of improvising when we play. Bo tells lots of stories, and a lot of the same messages and morals that are in the stories and songs, Bo tells people in the audience how it relates to us in the current time we are living in." The storytelling and bodhran-playing Fitzgerald, who said YankCelt came together partly out of his desire to recreate the blend of music and history that was part of his own family growing up, listed songs such as "Eileen Oge," "Danny Boy" and a rebel tune called "Patriot Games" as some of the traditional favorites audiences might hear at this year's concerts. "There aren't too many songs that you can choose that aren't emblematic of our history," said Fitzgerald, who noted that as a people the Irish were often denied education, and preserved their history through story and song. "Sometimes they don't want to talk about it, but when you do some of the music you can't deny it." According to button box player Jeff Sullivan, who with Fitzgerald, Eastman and former "Fat" bass guitarist Guy DeVito, began playing together in 1990 in what was then called "Bo Fitzgerald and Friends," the YankCelt's concert schedule carries on a Western Massachusetts ritual that began when he and Fitzgerald played with an Irish group called The Dustmen back in the 1970 and 80s. "They did St. Patrick's Day parties for five years at the Springfield Civic Center," Sullivan recalled. This year's concert at CityStage on March 22 also echoes that "big performance" tradition by giving YankCelt the opportunity to play before a crowd larger than what attends its annual schedule of pub dates. "CityStage is a good venue," Sullivan noted. "It holds about 400 people." He added that the theater-style setting is the perfect place for "people who don't want to go to the raucous party at Theodore's on St. Patrick's Day" to come out and just enjoy YankCelt's music. YankCelt owes more than just their St. Patrick's Day observance to The Dustmen, however. Sullivan said today's band is, in a way, an outgrowth of The Dustmen, which itself was the reincarnation of a band he and Fitzgerald put together when the two men were growing up together in the Hungry Hill section of Springfield, Mass. "I've known Bo for more than 60 years," Sullivan remarked "We had our tonsils out together when we were 6 or 7 years old." The Dustmen, he added, played together for a total of about 18 years. "When the Dustmen broke up, [Fitzgerald] put a [solo] album together and 'YankCelt' kind of evolved from that album," Sullivan said. DeVito met Fitzgerald when he did some work on the album. Eastman met him through DeVito, and the original quartet was born. The four played together as "Bo Fitzgerald and Friends" for a number of years before Ronnie Stratton, drummer for the band Steppenwolf – and a Western Massachusetts native – briefly joined for a few seasons of its whirlwind March tour. About 15 years ago, Billy Klock started sitting in for Stratton when it got too difficult for the Steppenwolf drummer to fly back for the March tour dates. Klock said he was introduced to YankCelt's unique place in Western Massachusetts music though his "best friend" DeVito, whom he'd played with in the late 1980s. "I went to see Ronnie play [with them] and I sat in," Klock said, remembering the first time he saw YankCelt in concert. "It's a special band. I'm lucky to have them as musicians and friends." But more than the opportunity to play with his "second family," Klock said YankCelt's connection with its audience – from the oldest members who come to reminisce to the young ones who dance in front of the stage – is what draws him back to the drummer's throne for those precious few concert dates every March. "People sing along," Klock said. "Our fans are everything … if there's no connection, it's hard to play. "Last year was magical," he continued. "At the end of the night of the first show [at The Harp] was packed." Michael "Mixie" Clarke, who has been flying in from Galway, Ireland yearly since 2004 to sing with the band, said in its 24th year, YankCelt just hopes "the music and craic [Irish for fun and laughter] continues. "YankCelt is an enthusiastic and uplifting band, blending many musical styles – Irish and American, traditional and folk. We love what we do and we hope the people who come to our sessions also enjoy it as much as we do," he said. No stranger to the Western Massachusetts music scene – he travelled over to America with The Irish Tradition and Harvest Home in the 1970s, and often encountered Sullivan and Fitzgerald when his bands and The Dustmen played the same pubs – Clarke said he and the founding members of YankCelt have always been "kindred spirits and shared the same love of Irish music." Clarke said his longtime friendship with Sullivan, and a conversation he had with Eastman when the musician was in Ireland on honeymoon a few years back, eventually led to his annual trip to perform with YankCelt. For Fitzgerald, who said creating YankCelt helped him over a personal low point in his life, continuing the Irish custom of storytelling and music he absorbed watching his father play in pubs during his childhood has been "one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. "The people have been wonderful," he continued. "When you start something like this and all of a sudden you have the people sincerely enjoying themselves it's a wonder, especially when we only get together for two weeks out of the year." The popularity of the band – and the commitment of its members – still astonishes him. "Here we are just a local band and a guy flies in from Ireland, and a guy flies in from Los Angeles … it's not like we're making a lot of money," Fitzgerald said. "It's just the reward of the music, I guess."