KELTIC KIDS
 A Children's album for all ages

On the Making of Keltic Kids - A message from Larry Kirwan

One of the joys of being in Black 47 is watching different generations bond at our shows - parents and their teenage and twenty-something children united in some common interest in the political or social content of the songs. The memory of their flushed faces and regained familial intimacy has warmed me on many's the long, cold van journey home.

I have two children of my own. They are nine and seven now and as I watch mass culture prematurely rush them towards adolescence, I had a thought of stopping time in its tracks. One way of doing it was to share some music with them; but they are still too young for the ambiguities of Dylan, and while they adore Bob Marley's beats, the message still eludes them. And so, Keltic Kids!

I wrote these songs so that we might enjoy them together. The music and the rhythms are sophisticated and would not be out of place on a Black 47 album. For the lyrics, however, I tried to see my children as they see me and visa versa. I also attempted to look back at my own childhood in pre-television Ireland - a place where magic was always close at hand. Just lift Yeats' thin veil of reality and a world of sorcerers, leprechauns, fairy horses and the like could come prancing uninvited into your life.

As best I could, I tried not to patronize these kids who, nowadays, are sophisticated in ways we never imagined. Their humor is sharp, their patience thin, their experiences broad, their expectations vast - and yet they are children with all the attendant sensitivities and insecurities. Long may they stay that way. If this album can help keep the banality of adulthood at bay for a while longer, then it has succeeded.

Keltic Kids is also for those adults who, to quote Oscar Wilde, "have kept the childlike faculties of wonder and joy and who find in simplicity a subtle strangeness." By recording these songs, I have recovered some of my own lost faculties. Perhams, in listening to them, some others will do likewise. And finally it is for all those who helped in the recording, including Roseanne Cash, GE Smith, and my brothers in Black 47, but most of all for my dear, departed friend, Johnny Byrne, without whose help and kindness it would never have been made. Don't ever lose your dreams.

Produced: Larry Kirwan
Engineered & Mixed: Johnny Byrne
Recorded at Setanta Studios, NYC
Mixed at J's Studio & World Studio, NYC
Mastered at World Studio by Mark Dann
Cover Art: Mike Lappan
Layout & Design: Tom Schneider & Mike Lappan
All songs written by Larry Kirwan except Wild Colonial Boy (trad)
All songs published by Starry Plough Music (BMI)

Roseanne Cash: Lead Vocals on Billy The Kid, Arlo
GE Smith: Electric guitar
Tommy Walsh: button accordion
Siobhán Egan: fiddle, bodhrán
Larry Nachsin: Organ/synthesizer
Deborah Berg-McCarthy, Cherryl Marshall: Backing Vocals
Geoffrey Blythe: Saxophones & Clarinet
Andrew Goodsight: Bass, harmonica
Thomas Hamlin: Drums and Percussion
Fred Parcells: Trombone & Tin Whistle
Larry Kirwan: Vocals, electric & accoustic guitars, keyboards, drum programming

1. The Pirate Boy
2. I Won't Play With My Brother
3. Billy the Kid
4. The Boy Who Couldn't Count Sheep
5. Hookedy Crookedy
6. Arlo
7. Daddy is a Rock & Roller
8. The Leprechaun
9. I Wanta Be Five
10. The Wild Colonial Boy
11. Don't Ever Lose Your Dreams

Black 47 Front Man Does It For The Kids

Edited by Julie Taraska

May 29, 1998

Larry Kirwan, leader of New York-based Irish rock group Black 47, has released a children's album. Issued on Kirwan's own Pirate Moon Records, "Keltic Kids" pairs piquant tales about cowboys, buccaneers, and leprechauns with traditional Irish jigs performed by members of the Tim/Kerr act and guitarist G.E. Smith.

Rosanne Cash also guests on the set, adding vocals to tracks "Billy The Kid" and "Arlo," the latter about an 11-year-old fan who has AIDS.

"I'm appalled at pop culture and what it's doing to kids. It's turning them into cynics," says Kirwan about his motives for recording the album. A father of two sons, he adds, "I want to keep kids young, tell them stories that encourage them to use their imagination."

March 30, 2001

On the front cover of Keltic Kids by Larry Kirwan, it says for all ages. This old kid certainly agrees with that. Larry Kirwan is one of the most inventive songwriters of the day. He weaves history, legends and life's lessons together in an entertaining, creative and original way.

All the songs on Keltic Kids were written by Larry Kirwan with the exception of "Wild Colonial Boy," which he learned as a boy from his babysitter. "The Boy Who Couldn't Sleep" is set to a Reggae beat. When the boy can't sleep, he's told by his father to count sheep. Innocent enough, but with a child's imagination the room fills up with sheep of all descriptions. There are so many sheep in his room the boy can't sleep, finally the sheep return into the boy's brain as he falls asleep.

Kirwan sings of a common problem for a child with an older brother in "I Won't Play With My Brother. "

Arlo tells the story of a child dreaming
ofbecoming a rock and roll musician. The advice--dont' worry, "Tomorrow always comes".

Daddy is a Rock and Roller is a very understanding song about being the child of an entertainer and even wanting to be a rock and roller when he's an adult. Maybe even touring with his dad.

My favorites are Hookedy Crookedy, "and "Don't Ever Lose Your reams ." The latter brings you back to your own childhood reams and lets you grab hold of them again, a true gift to all adults. "Hookedy Crookedy" is a fantasy about riding a fairy horse, Black Jack through the Milky Way and our solar system,
then landing in New York City and finally jumping the Atlantic to County Clare, Ireland. It paints a beautiful picture.

Every Larry Kirwan puts his hand to, whether a solo endeavor or as part of Black 47 has a distinctive sound. The people he works with are great talents in their own right.

This may be a CD for Keltic Kids, but it also belongs on the CD rack of all Celtic loving adults.