Padraig O'Keeffe

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Pádraig O'Keeffe (Irish: Pádraig Ó Caoimh) (1887 – 1963) was an Irish traditional musician.

O'Keeffe was born in Glountane Cross (in the townland of Knockdown), Cordal, near Castleisland in County Kerry, the eldest of eight children from a musical family. He was known for his fiddle playing, self-devised system of notating music, and numerous skilled pupils.^{[citation needed]} He is regarded as one of the greatest fiddlers of the Sliabh Luachra style.^{[citation needed]} His death marked the end of the travelling fiddlemasters of Munster.

There is no great consistency in the spelling of the anglicised version of his name. On returns from the

Early years

Pádraig O'Keeffe was born to John Leahy O'Keeffe of Glountane, a schoolmaster and skilled dancer, and Margaret O'Callaghan of Doonasleen ("Doon"),

Local legend suggests that Padraig O'Keeffe was able to tune a fiddle at the age of four.^[citation needed] He is supposed to have received some formal instruction of the fiddle at his father's request but it is unknown who his instructor was.^{[citation needed]}

Life as school master

O'Keeffe attended school at Glountane until he was sent to his grandparents, attending Ummeraboy National School to the age of fifteen. He is then believed to have attended the Ballydesmond National School for secondary school.^{[citation needed]} Upon graduation, he left for Dublin to train as a national school teacher upon his father's request where he learned some music theory. After qualifying he returned to Kerry, where he taught brief stints at a number of local schools and substituted at Glountane. After his father's death of recurring illness on 30 April 1915, he was called upon to take over as principal of Glountane National School, adjacent to the O'Keeffe home in Glountane Cross.

John O'Keeffe had been known as a hard schoolmaster (even inciting a boycott against him in 1890), but Pádraig O'Keeffe did not carry on this legacy and was thought to have been as kind as his father was strict, and was thought to have been very progressive in his lessons, even holding some lessons outside (in a style more reminiscent of a hedge school).^{[citation needed]}

Pádraig O'Keeffe is said at this time to have met Abbie Scollard, who he courted for some time. The two are said to have had a minor falling out due to his mother's notion that he ought to marry into his own class (of teaching and education).^{[citation needed]} Scollard emigrated to Chicago and did not return, and is supposed to have been happily married with no ill feelings toward O'Keeffe. O'Keeffe is not known to have maintained any further love interests, though he was often quoted as referring to his fiddle as his wife, being quoted once as saying "When I stroke her across the belly she purrs". He lived in the family home in Glountane with his mother. O'Keeffe did not care for the teaching work and he was often missing when he should have been calling role. After numerous poor showings, O'Keeffe was replaced officially on 30 June 1920, largely to the regret of his mother. Upon his mother's death in 1938, Pádraig O'Keeffe is said to have played his fiddle the entire night through.^{[citation needed]}

At this point, O'Keeffe attempted to take up as a cattle dealer, and found work as a clerk in Tralee before returning to teaching, this time of music.^{[citation needed]}

Musical career

The remainder of his life was spent teaching and playing the

Recordings

His music was collected in 1947-49 by Séamus Ennis and later by Séamus Mac Mathúna. These recordings were broadcast on Radio Éireann (RTÉ), and later re-used by the BBC in 1952, bringing him wide fame. The 1940s recordings were later issued on a CD "Pádraig O'Keeffe: The Sliabh Luachra Fiddle Master" in 1993.

Commemoration

Since 1993 the "Patrick O'Keeffe Traditional Music Festival" has been held in Castleisland in Kerry.

References

• Padraig O'Keeffe, the man and his music, Dermot Hanafin

External links

• Comhaltas.com - O'Keeffe biography
• Sliabh Luachra
• Festival
• Ennis, Séamus (January 1970). "Padraig O'Keeffe - Last Of The Old FiddleMasters" (PDF). Treoir: 8. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 September 2014.