In the heyday of the showbands – dating roughly from the mid-1950s to the late 70s – an estimated 1,500 bands of various musical genres travelled the country.
Very often these were family affairs with the composition of the band drawn, in some cases, entirely from one family or included a number of musical siblings.
This week Francis K. Beirne recalls some of those bands.

 

To begin, at the height of the showbands’ era in the 1960s, there were so many siblings working side by side that it would be impossible to mention all of them in this article without making it look like a page from a telephone directory. I hope that regular readers will understand if their own family or friends are not mentioned.

First, showbands that had more than two siblings in the line-up. There was the Davitt Brothers Showband from Wexford, with brothers Christy, Eddie, Liam, Richard, Seán and Thomas and the Rhythm Stars from Ballintubber in Roscommon featuring Stephen, Aidan, Al, Sylvester, Gerald, Len and Liam Treacy. Up north in Derry, Johnny Quigley had three brothers in his band Mike, Joe and Edmund and a first cousin for good measure while Maurice Mulcahy in Mitchelstown, County Cork, also had three brothers in his orchestra, Dave, Michael and Joe.

There were twins in a few showbands too. The McGandy twins, Brian and Leo, were in the Skyrockets’ brass section; Paul and Gerry Kaye had their own band but also played together with the Miami, Farmers’ Sons and with Maurice Mulcahy and twins Barry and Bobby Hendrick featured in Cork’ Regal Showband.

It wasn’t uncommon for three brothers to work together in a showband. Johnny, Francie and Brendan Flynn from Tuam were in Johnny’s band while Michael and Frankie Lynch shared the stage in their brother Maurice’s showband. The Smith brothers, Peter, Paddy and Jimmy, were founder-members of the Mighty Avons as were Jim, Mick and Pat Tyrrell of the Columbia Showband from Arklow.
Jimmy Wiley’s brothers John and Gerry joined him in his band and John; Joe and Willie Brown from Limerick played together in the Berwyn Showband and Michael, Nicholas and Noel Cahill were members of Waterford’s Derek Joys.

In Tralee, the Curtin brothers Alfie, John and Denis (D.J.) were together in the Kerry Blues and two other brothers, Henry and Billy played professionally in other bands.
Bunty Hayden joined his brothers Tommy and Peter in the Nevada Showband and in Ballina, Jack and Judd Ruane played in their father Jack’s outfit.

Continue reading in this week’s Ireland’s Own