Irish Music Is Returning To Newtown Meeting House

On Saturday, October 13, at 8 pm, Newtown Meeting House will host an evening of traditional Irish music featuring the legendary Irish flutist Jack Coen and his son, Jimmy, on guitar.

Since emigrating to New York as an All-Ireland Champion from his native Galway a half century ago, Jack Coen has firmly established himself as perhaps the most influential Irish musician in North America. A founder of the legendary New York Ceili Band, and later Green Fields of America, Mr Coen is also the continent’s most heralded flute teacher. In 1991, he was a recipient of a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.

His son Jimmy is an exceptional virtuoso performer in his own right, having developed a unique, distinctive style of melodic guitar playing which transcends typical accompaniment. The event will not only be a rare offering of a live performance of traditional Irish music, it will also mark the world premier CD launch of the father and son’s first joint recording.

The concert is being sponsored by Shamrock Traditional Irish Music Society, a non-profit educational organization dedicated to the promotion of traditional Irish music. A donation of $10 is requested for adults, and $5 for children. For reservations or more information about the concert, call 203-256-8453 or send email to timothymcquinn@msn.com.

Jack Coen was born in 1925 in Woodford, County Galway, Ireland. His father, Mike, a concertina player, taught him his first tunes, and by the age of eight, Jack could already lilt up to 100 tunes. He began playing the tin whistle at age nine and moved on to the wooden flute at the age of 16. Local east Galway flute players influenced Jack’s playing, and he has always remained true to the unhurried east Galway style of traditional Irish music.

Mr Coen emigrated to the United States in 1949 and played with the New York Ceili Band in the 1950s. He and two members of that group – Paddy O’Brien on button accordion and Larry Redican on fiddle – placed first in the 1960 All-Ireland trio competition.

Mr Coen is also renowned for his skill and devotion as a teacher of traditional Irish music. His dedication to passing on the tradition through performance and instruction has been recognized often, must notably by the National Endowment for the Arts in 1991. The NEA awarded him a National Heritage Fellowship, the most prestigious honor bestowed on folk artists in the United States, making him one of only a few Irish musicians to be so honored.

Jimmy Coen was born in the Bronx, N.Y., in 1967, and has played the guitar since age 11. While in his twenties, Jimmy Coen began to earnestly learn tunes from his father. While he sometimes plays as an accompanist for traditional Irish musicians in the New York area, his specialty is playing the melodies in duet with his father. Stylistically, the Coens’ music remains rooted in the east Galway tradition the senior Mr Coen has always expounded.

Jimmy Coen has been an instructor in the Catskills Irish Arts Week in New York, and has performed at the Smithsonian Festival of American Folklore in Washington, DC, the Irish Arts Center’s Traditional Music & Dance Festival, the Guinness Fleadh, Town Hall and Symphony Space in New York.

Jack and Jimmy Coen: Traditional Irish Music on Flute and Guitar is a collection of traditional Irish music that features flute/guitar duets of Irish jigs and reels played in the classic, older Galway style. Jack Coen is featured as a solo melody player on three tracks, including some beautiful waltzes, while Jimmy Coen contributes two flatpicked guitar solos.