CWazyTom
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CWazy for Celtic Woman. Chlovër for life.
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« Reply #3 on: December 28, 2023, 06:48:56 PM » |
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Less than a day and a half after returning home from the Celtic Woman concerts in Costa Mesa, California, I was back in the air, this time on my way to Dublin, to attend Éabha's Celtic World At Christmas. Considering I effectively subjected myself to eight hours of jetlag (California to Toronto to Ireland) within the span of a couple of days, I'm surprised how well my energy level held up.
The venue was St. Nicholas's Collegiate Church in Galway. The church is over 700 years old. It was founded by the Normans the 1200s and first mentioned as St. Nicholas' church in 1320 AD. Christopher Columbus apparently stopped at this church in before his journey to the New World in 1477.
I got to the venue about half an hour before the doors opened and that was sufficient to get me a front row seat, with center stage to my right. The audience seating was in the nave of the church. I got to sit in a seat this time instead of a super-cramped pew. The stage was set up at the transept, with a Celtic World at Christmas banner behind the stage (it was the same size as the banner at the Song Circle at the Celtic World Forum, for those trying to visualize it.
The style of the show (and portions of the set list) were quite similar to the Celtic World Forum concerts.
Set List
Carol of the Bells (band)
Don Oíche Úd i mBeithil (Éabha)
River (Susan)
Mo Ghile Mear / Fairytale (Tara Howley)
Lark in the Morning (Fergus)
Caledonia (Megan)
Oh Holy Night (Megan and Glenn Murphy)
Come Home (Gleen & Ronan)
Dance Piece (James)
Téir Abhaile Riú (all)
It Came Upon A Midnight Clear (Susan)
Winter Song (Glenn & Ronan)
Aird Uí Chuain / Sadhbh Ní Bhruinneallaigh (Éabha)
ACC Carol / Oró, Sé Do Bheatha 'Bhaile (Fergus)
Lonesome Boatman (Tara)
Amid the Falling Snow (Megan, with choir)
Angels We Have Heard On High (Éabha, Megan, Susan, with choir)
Amazing Grace (Éabha, Megan, Susan, Tara, with choir)
You Raise Me Up (Éabha, Megan, Susan, Tara, with choir)
Níl Sé'n Lá (all)
Auld Lang Syne (all)
Susan's first solo was River. That was my first time hearing Susan in person in over five and a half years. Her voice sounded especially gorgeous with the acoustics in the church. It Came Upon A Midnight Clear was as spectacular as ever!
Tara Howley reprised her soulful rendition of Mo Ghile Mear from Éabha's summer concerts, followed by an abbreviated
version of Fairytale of New York, in memory of the recently passed Shane MacGowan of The Pogues. I hadn't been familiar with the song before Tara McNeill covered it on social media a few years ago. Since then, I've been wanting Tara McNeill to cover it on the Celtic Woman Christmas tour, and while that dream has yet to be realized, it was deeply satisfying to hear it performed by Tara Howley. No matter how much I rave about how amazing she is, it will never do her justice. Every note is so special.
A funny moment in the show came when the performers were stalling as Tara assembled her uillian pipes, only to be reminded by someone in the band that she was to be playing the low whistle instead of the pipes.
Both of Fergus' solos worked really well in the acoustics of the church.
Glenn & Ronan always sound fantastic together. They performed their original song Come Home. They also covered Winter Song, for those missing or mourning loved ones this holiday season. This was really pretty.
The duet of O Holy Night sounded nice, but I had been hoping to hear Megan solo the song with her classical voice, something he didn't get to hear with Celtic Woman. She didn't go for the epic high note near the end.
Three of the songs were performed with a choir. The choir was positioned in front of the stage in two rows: the first at ground level, and the second slightly elevated, at a height between the ground and the stage. Unfortunately, from where I was seated, I couldn’t see most of the performers on stage at all. I could see Tara Howley part of the time and caught fleeting glimpses of the top of Megan's head. Other than that, it was a purely auditory experience. I had to look at the set list after the show to see who performed in some of those songs, because I couldn't tell. The sound of the choir reaching me was also unbalanced, with the voices closest to me sounding like individual voices instead of a musical unit. The visual and audio experience for those three songs would have been significantly better further back from the stage. I hope the choir, should they be used in future concerts, are off to the side of the stage or positioned elsewhere within the venue.
Megan, who was hiding somewhere behind the choir, sang Amid the Falling Snow, which for some reason had been dropped from the Magic of Christmas tour after the first few shows.
Although Gavin Murphy wasn't in attendance, several of his arrangements were adapted for the show. Hearing the same arrangements performed separately from the Celtic Woman tour gave me an even greater appreciation for how polished the Celtic Woman touring production is. The sound quality on the tours is incredible!
The show ran straight through without an intermission.
After the show, the performers took some photos backstage in front of the Celtic World At Christmas backdrop and talked with family and friends. I got some brief photos with Megan, Éabha, and Tara Howley and got to hand them their Christmas cards. Thank goodness for my writing skills though, because I'm not good at talking with them at all (especially with the ridiculous brainfog I have to deal with now). I need to start memorizing things to say to them at the stage doors next year like I used to do for the Meet and Greets, because otherwise, I'm basically wasting my time standing there. 🙄
I managed to grab one of the set lists and one of the show posters (the poster took some punishment during the rainy walk back to the hotel, but though it's creased and crumpled in places, at it's still intact).
I stopped in Dublin on the way back for a night (a short separate post on that is forthcoming), then I was on a plane back home for Christmas!
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