Why Irish traditional music is having a moment

There's the sound of banjos, fiddles and tin whistles everywhere, as Irish trad music enjoys a roaring resurgence.

It's resonating "fiercely" with young people, who "roar out the lyrics" in pubs under the "looming threat that we might run of out of Guinness", said The Independent. One venue owner compared the phenomenon to Beatlemania, as "clamouring" fans of Irish folk flock to see their favourite trad acts.

'Changing the face of trad'

The success of Ryan Coogler's vampire film "Sinners", which features Irish ballads and reels aplenty, has helped put the genre in the spotlight. More widely, Irish indie folk band Kingfishr are topping the charts, while acts like The Mary Wallopers and Lankum are also helping to connect younger audiences with these traditional sounds.

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We're "changing the face of trad" but "keeping the tradition there, too", all-female trad group Cailíní Lua told The Irish World. The "stereotype" is of "lads in Aran jumpers and beards", band member Tara Brady said. People "can't believe" that women could form a trad band, but there's a "strength" and a "power" in that.

Lisa Canny, from the 11-piece trad group BIIRD, told Image magazine that trad "needed a new image" to ensure that it "connects with everyone" and reaches audiences "in a contemporary way".

'Subconscious protest'

The popularity of Irish folk sounds could also be a "subconscious protest against the rise of AI and the forced homogenisation of our musical palettes", said The Independent. It is, perhaps, the equivalent of young people "ditching their iPhones in favour of a Nokia 3210", because they've realised that new "doesn't always mean better".

Young people have been "starved of communication, of human interaction", button accordionist and "trad legend" Máirtín O’Connor told the paper. Folk music is "very much music of human interaction, celebration and commiseration", and "quite the opposite" of "isolating technology". People feel "oversaturated by screens", particularly after the isolation of the Covid pandemic, said singer-songwriter David Keenan. We're entering an "era of romanticism", and looking at culture again.

For young people in Ireland, traditional music offers a "reaffirmed sense of national identity and pride", said Image. It's not that "we were lacking in patriotism before" but, for a time, we "found the outside world more alluring". Now, BIIRD's Lisa Canny told the magazine, "the focus has started to come back in".

Fundamentally, trad is popular because it's "very inclusive, egalitarian" and "everyone gets the chance to play it", Jason O'Rourke, who plays a 1920s vintage concertina, told the BBC. It's no wonder it's become a "global phenomenon".