Seeking Donegal Fiddler Mp3s!

Hey there, I’m a tenor banjo/octave mandolin player, I prefer to learn tunes by ear and like to learn the particular way that tunes are played in Donegal. Some compilations are fairly easy to find MP3 files for, such as fiddle sticks or the brass fiddle, but finding full lengths from many of these fiddlers is rather difficult I’ve found. The Doherty’s, Tommy Peoples, Altan and Paddy Glackin maybe being the exceptions.

At the moment I’m especially trying to find the following:

Vincent Campbell - The Purple Heather
Con Cassidy - Traditional Fiddle Music from Donegal
Frank Kelly - Memories of Hughie Gillespie
Any of the Fiddle Music of Donegal

There’s many more Im just blanking at the moment. I try soulseek, music blogs and here but haven’t had any luck with anywhere. If anyone has a copy of one of these albums you’d wanna rip, or if you’ve just got the files uploaded somewhere already I would much appreciate em! I’m really just a music lover and wanna learn as much as I can.

And what do you offer in return?

Hi Cloudling. Unfortunately, buying the albums and converting them to mp3 format on your computer would be your best bet. Asking someone to rip the files could put them in an uncomfortable position.
Try: https://www.amazon.com/Purple-Heather-Vincent-Campbell/dp/B0040QX1DS
as an example of one you were looking for. Discogs is also a great place to get music that’s not already available in digital format.

Sad that anyone would so casually post a request like this.

Hence my comment, Michael. The CDs he wants copied are produced by a group of music-lovers involved in the maintenance and preservation of Donegal’s musical traditions. Any income generated by sales goes towards those goals.

"The CDs he wants copied…"
He? What gives it away, GW?

http://donegalfiddlemusic.ie/shop/

All their releases are pretty fantastic.

"Hey there"

That gets my back up straight away. (S)He does seem like a "he", methinks. 🙂

Yes, I agree. Cloudling should buy the albums or pay to stream the MP3s on a legal and official site. The latter may not be much help to the musicians but it’s better than "ripping off" tracks. 🙁
There may be some You Tube and/or other recordings out there too but he(or she) can seek these out his/her self.
I wouldn’t be as mean as to not lend a recording to a friend so that he or she might learn a few tunes but that’s a different scenario.

In this day and age, the digital revolution has cheapened music. (And folk musicians are maybe getting hit hardest by that… So I always try to buy music that I like that I found on streaming services…) I agree that it’s not great to publicly ask someone to break the law and rip music off CDs for you. Having said that, there are all sorts of tools for pulling music off of YouTube, etc. And an awful lot of trad music can be found that way.

Here’s a good one for the OP:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=oisin+mcauley+far+from+the+hills+of+donegal

FWIW, all of my music is available that way too, or even just on my bandcamp page, but people still buy my recordings even though it’s available for "free". So if we can all just agree that the music is worth something, and try to support our artists, the world will continue to rotate… 😉

I’d have to agree. I bought pretty much the entire Cairdeas discography, and it’s all fantastic. Cloudling, you should bite the bullet and do the same — it will absolutely be worth it. Talk about supporting a local culture and some local people. That’s one of the best ways to help them in return for the music.

Now, I admit, I have asked here about recordings that are hard to get either as CDs or online, and people have been helpful. But this is different. With the exception of Frank Kelly’s album, all the recordings you listed are available on CD from Cairdeas. It’s not like they’re old out-of-print LPs. Is it maybe a pain to have them shipped from Ireland to the US? Sure, a little. Are you left with CDs you don’t necessarily use once you’ve converted everything? Again, sure. But if the fiddlers aren’t worth you going through that little extra hassle, then that’s a damn shame.

As a side note, was Frank Kelly’s album ever reissued as a CD or digitally? If so, I’ll probably buy it sometime or other.

Daniel,

Frank’s CD was apparently reissued in 2019, according to this article - http://donegalfiddlemusic.ie/frank-kelly/ - which includes a contact address for purchase.

Wow a lot of responses in so short a time. I understand that people have strong feelings about supporting musicians and labels and I just want to put it out there that I’ve been an active musician for 20 years now, have played and toured in many bands, run a cassette label and have always made any albums I’ve released available for free to the public. I love music and want to share it with other enthusiasts despite economic status. I get and would agree that musicians and labels should be compensated for their knowledge and labor, I just personally think that people who don’t have $35 to spend on a piece of plastic shouldnt have to be chastised for attempting to enjoy music.

I had emailed the donegal fiddle website directly about asking if I could just purchase the MP3 files directly from them and they just never responded. I also don’t collect CDs nor have a cd drive in my laptop for which to even play cds if I were to pay to have em shipped over from Ireland. To boot I don’t know exactly what cairdeas policies are, but most labels don’t exactly do the best job of putting record sales money back into the hands of artist, particularly when the artists themselves are deceased. I also just wanna point out that the link to the amazon seller with the VC cd is selling for $902……. not exactly an ideal route

Regardless of my own personal feelings about free/low cost spreading of music, i appreciate people’s responses. Again honestly just trying to learn music by amazing artists

Hi Cloudling. Sorry, that was me who linked to the Amazon seller but I had not checked the price before posting… should have done that.

Cloudling, Cairdeas is not a commercial organisation. Any income generated by CD sales is directed towards the development and support of fiddle music in County Donegal. The organisation is run by volunteers and is community-based.

Neither is it a commercially-oriented record label, though it has released a number of CDs and sells a few others by Donegal fiddlers to help raise income.

Nowhere on its website does it say that MP3 files of its recordings are available. If you really want them in that format then, buy the CDs and get a friend to convert them for you.

https://donegalfiddlemusic.bandcamp.com/album/n-l-gar-ann-frank-cassidy
https://donegalfiddlemusic.bandcamp.com/album/a-feeling-in-the-blood

Maybe they’ll put more up on bandcamp, but there’s a couple to get you started.

It does seem like cairdeas is a solid organization worthy of support. Thanks Nico for the bandcamp links!

I would just email them a few times if needed - it seems like it would be in their interest to make more available through Bandcamp, especially since tomorrow Bandcamp is once again waiving their fees.

Great, let’s harass someone who has a day job and already has enough on their plate. It’s a non-commercial organisation!

… and there’s another issue which deserves consideration. Maybe nurturing and protection are more important than global dissemination.