Welcome to the Irish Folk Club Munich website
The home of Irish & British Traditional folk music, song, storytelling & Retro Folk
The Irish Folk Club Munich celebrates its 21st. anniversary in 2009. Is that old? For a Folk Club, it is indeed. People get older and their tastes and priorities change. Young people lose interest in the idea of “handmade music” preferring the ease of a quick audio- visual download to the idea of traipsing down to a folk club to sit and watch the artists display their finely honed craft live on stage. However, the latter idea has been the driving force behind the Irish Folk Club Munich.
It was 20 years ago, when Alison Moffat and Frank McLynn first booked artists for the club, then based in the Max-Emanuel-Bräuerei in Adalbertstr. in Munich’s Schwabing. We never thought that we would be able to generate enough interest in live traditional music, song and theatre from Ireland, Britain and Mainland Europe to fill a kitchen, let alone a theatre. But we filled venues and people appreciated what we were doing. They loyally followed us from the “Max” to the “Theater im Fraunhofer “, Fraunhoferstr. 9a, where we turned Monday nights into calendar fixtures that were missed at the audience’s peril. People appreciated the idea of watching and listening to world -renowned artists in the ambience of one of Munich’s oldest theatres.
Over the years an array of first class-artists have graced our stage, and we fondly look back on nights with musicians like Frankie Gavin, Andy Irvine, Dick Gaughan, Tony MacMahon and Eileen Ivers, Chris O'Neill (R.I.P.), Micho Russell, Tony Macmahon, Chris Wood & Andy Cutting, John Campbell & Len Graham. Bands such as Blowzabella, Chanting House, Altan, and DeDanann alternated with nights of storytelling from Len Graham and John Campbell while keepers of the tradition Liam Weldon and Micho Russell shared the club stage with writers, playwrights and actors Desmond Egan, Terry McDonagh and Ulick O’Connor and Chris O’Neill.
Today, the Irish Folk Club exclusively presents selected traditional artists on different dates at chosen venues. The Theater im Fraunhofer remains one of the favourite venues and, of late, we have enjoyed the hospitality of arsMusica, so why not drop by and enjoy guitarist Tony McManus on 21.09.2009, savour the mead of Pure Irish Drops on 12.10.2009, relax with Colum Sands on 27.10.2009 or take in the “Voice of Ireland”, Seán Keane, on 16.11.2009. You won’t regret it.
Go here for event details, venue and reservations
