Coming in Nov & Dec

And time continues to fly....Linda's birthday has come and gone (10/24, and if you're curious, she's 29 AGAIN!!), Halloween is over (we succeeded in avoiding most of the candy), and we are now heading into a new era with the first African-American president! I'm not sure if that's gonna make any difference, but we'll just have to wait and see.

In the meantime, N8i have a few cool gigs coming up. We entertained Firefighters at the Firefrighters' Ball in Chico, CA, which is took place at the famous Big Room at the Sierra Nevada Brewery. It was not a public event, but we were able to enjoy the great food and drink while we were there, and met some wonderful people, and did our part to show our appreciation for the Firefighters.

We are going to be at the Fox & Goose a few times in both November and December...11/13 and 12/26 are Nine-8ths Irish band performance nights, while 11/25 and 12/30 are Irish Session nights (the Last Tuesday of the Month session).

We're quite excited about the December dates, as the 26th will be the day after Christmas, so we're thinking it'll be a night for everyone to finally relax after the hectic pre-Christmas shopping, the emotional Christmas eve & morning, the stressful Christmas dinner, etc....so what better way to unwind than a few drinks and some Irish music at your favorite pub downtown??! Come as you are, and we'll be happy to see you!!

So if anyone is wondering what to do on Thursday 11/13, or to unwind before Thanksgiving (11/25), or the day after Christmas 12/26 (a Friday night!!), or 12/30 Tuesday, come on down to join us at the Fox & Goose!

Happy Holidays everyone!

Gosh I've been remiss to have waited so long to add anything to our Blog!! My apologies!!
So let's remedy that.
Here's what's happened since the Cobblestone accident....
In late August, Bo was the host of a fabulous House concert: Paddy Keenan, one of the best Uillean pipers in the world, and one of the founding members of the historic Bothy Band, along with Tommy O'Sullivan, and special guest Pete Grant, a great musician from close by in Auburn. Here are links to find out more about all three of them:
http://www.paddykeenan.com/
http://www.tommyosullivan.net/
http://www.petegrant.com/

We were all extremely entertained, and though Paddy and Tommy were obviously exhausted, they were gracious enough to all a few of us to play a few tunes with them....and the next night they did another house concert in Auburn at our friend Sharon's house. Bo was asked to come up and play a set of tunes with them, and when Paddy remarked about having played at Bo's house the previous night, he also mentioned that he had the opportunity to play with a "fiddler as good as any [he] had heard, here or in Ireland." Which made me feel all warm and fuzzy! We also got a bit of video of the evening, which we'll post soon on our website. A wonderful time was had by all, at least on our end! 

Also, Chris got the cast off his leg - though he had to wear one of those removable Velcro boot thingies for about a month, and he's not completely 100% yet (still on light duty at work), he's finally able to wear two matching shoes!! Woot!

So what else......we made it through the KVMR Grass Valley Celtic Festival (9/27-28), where we had a great time, met the members of Solas, and became completed enamored of their new album "For Love and Laughter". We are using that as inspiration for tunes for our next recording, for which we have started organizing and choosing.....perhaps studio time in January....


More to come shortly!!

A Cobblestone Malfunction?? (or The Great Photo Session Caper)

If you are reading this, you have mostly likely visited our website recently. As you can see from some changed we've made, we have some new photos (taken by the talented Mike Parker) to share with everyone. However, in the process of getting these new photos, we had a bit of a mishap. Perhaps it could be even be considered a cobblestone malfunction. Or a bodhran player malfunction. In any case......as you see in the photo shown here, we were all excited about Chris getting up on the ledge above us, and were amazed as he hauled himself up there....a few photos were taken, and we were ready to move on to the next location, and then....he jumped.

I believe his first words were "Oh crap, get my boot off, I just broke my leg." Or something to that effect. And then he was lying in the alley, on his back wearing his kilt and one boot (there was a bit of writhing involved as well.) Thus ended our photo session with Mike. And Chris was even jokingly asking Mike to take photos of him lying there on his back, but Mike just couldn't bring himself to do it. (I'da done it!!)

So after the 911 call (during which, when Chris was asked if anything else was injured, his answer was "Just my pride!!"), the subsequent arrival of the fire truck, the paramedics and crowd of onlookers (we were in Old Sac on a beautiful Saturday morning, after all), we of course spent the rest of the afternoon at the hospital. Chris ended up getting just a temporary splint put on (sort of a half-cast). At the follow-up session on Monday, the doctor discovered that in additional to the spiral hairline fracture on the fibula (the small bone in the lower leg), he had succeeded in breaking the bone in his ankle, which could end up needing a pin! As they say: Go Big or Go Home!!

So though Chris ended up on crutches for a couple of months, off work for a couple of weeks, and unable to carry his own food or drink (unless it's a beer bottle, and he's wearing shorts with sufficient pocket space, or his Utilikilt), we got some great photos!! 

We'll still be at the Fox & Goose Session on the 26th of August, at which time everyone should be able to sign his cast while making fun of him, or at least ribbing him about thinking he's still 17. He'll even provide the Sharpie! See y'all then!

N8i will be back at KVMR Celtic Festival!!

We've recently found out that we've been asked to come back for the second year in a row to play at the 2008 KVMR Celtic Festival this coming September in Grass Valley, CA!! This will be the 12th Annual KVMR Celtic Festival, and this year's lineup will be extremely exciting!!

The headliners this year are no less than one of the biggest bands in the Celtic genre, SOLAS!! We made a comment on stage last year about being "just a Karan Casey away from a Solas tribute band", and that says in the proverbial nutshell how Nine-8ths Irish feels about Solas. They are one of the best traditional Irish bands, even though the majority of the members are actually American-born! But enough about Solas....you can visit the KVMR website to read more about the entire festival as the late September date gets closer.

N8i will be playing two sets on both Saturday 9/27 and Sunday 9/28 (no Friday performances this year, as they have eliminated that due to lack of volunteers.) Our performance times are still TBA, but check our website - we'll be posting any other information as soon as we have it available!!
See you at the next show or Contra Dance!!

Linda, Chris, Bo & Kathy
Nine-8ths Irish
"Irish and a wee bit more!!"

Summertime!

It's already nearly July, and somehow it just doesn't seem like it!! School has let out, it's been over 100 degrees, but it's just not like it was when we were kids and summer meant the biggest accomplishment of the day was where to go swimming and how much more tan we were than the day before. Now it seems like a feat when we get an afternoon nap!
Half of Nine-8ths Irish (Linda & Chris) were finally able to take a real vacation, which we spent in Weiser, Idaho for the National Oldtime Fiddlers Contest. This was the first time I (Linda) had gone back to Weiser in about 18 years, and was Chris' first time. He admitted he thought it would be nothing but contest fiddling, but upon arriving and experiencing it, there was plenty of bluegrass, swing music, irish, and old-time, as well as the contest fiddling. We were able to stay up until the wee hours playing music, visiting with some old (and some new) friends, and generally having a WONDERFUL time!! We succeeded in the sleep deprivation experiment, though surprisingly we slept quite well. And the fact that it didn't really get dark until nearly 11 o'clock at night added to that, and made for great music to which to go to sleep.
While there, we ran into Patrick and Robin from Boise, as well as Dave Marshall (and others) from Vancouver, Roland White from Portland, and Clyde Curley even put in an appearance!! Plus there was Larry Chung from San Francisco, with whom my brother John Relph was in the band Cabin Fever (featuring Megan Lynch, who also was there!!) We saw Tristan Clarridge, the Grand National Champion this year (4th time for him, I believe), and his sister Tashina (who took 2nd place), as well as Kimber Ludiker (who took third!). As I understand it, those three are roommates in the Boston, MA area, and they swept the top three...perhaps we should all visit Massachusetts and drink some of the water.....!!
We saw Starr McMullen and her husband Pat (from Oregon...great fiddler, great people!!), and witnessed a marathon jam with quintessential Texas fiddler Carl Hopkins (man that guy can improvise!!). We had great food from Benny's Tacos....spent a bit of time at the grocery store, as well as the State Liquor Store in Weiser, and also ran into Kim & Duffy Markel, who used to run the camping there at the old Institute where we camped. All in all, we had a really great time, and I'll put up some photos in the next post, and continue with the story....

Time for Hot Gigs and Cold Beers!!

With the weather getting warmer, the Festival season gets into full swing. Or at least gets a good swat at it...or maybe just a putt...either way, there are Festivals aplenty coming up here in northern California, starting this weekend with the Sacramento Valley Highland Games, taking place in Woodland at the Yolo County Fairgrounds. 

There will be all the regular Scottish Games fun: beer, whiskey tasting, guys in kilts, bands with Bagpipes (with guys in kilts), bagpipes competitions, Scottish dancing competitions, guys in kilts throwing big heavy things, ladies in heavy dresses following around the guys in kilts, a few sheepdogs, some smoked turkey legs, Scottish fiddling, and perhaps a few guys in kilts drinking beer and/or whiskey.

Many or all of these things can be experienced this weekend, April 26th and 27th in Woodland, and then again in Livermore on the weekend of May 17th & 18th. Click here for more info on the Livermore Games.

On the homefront we've got a Fox & Goose last Tuesday session coming up on the 29th, as well as some Contra Dances coming up soon. We've added all kinds of goodies to our website, www.nine8thsirish.com, including a link to the video footage that was part of our Pre-St. Patrick's Day Fox & Goose show, when KCRA-Channel 3 news came in and stirred up the place!! It's kinda fun to watch.

So come see us soon, add your words to our Blog if you want, send us an email anytime, nine8thsirish@nine8thsirish.com, and most importantly, follow Mark Twain's advice:

"Dance like nobody's watching; love like you've never been hurt. Sing like nobody's listening; live like it's heaven on earth."

New Website!!

Well, we've successfully negotiated through the maze of domain names, hosting options, database operating systems and so on. After all that, we can now say that our website, though not perfect, is finally up and running!!

Our website lives at www.nine8thsirish.com, and contains the requisite photos, song samples, links, shameless self-promotion, and more!! Soon we'll add a form to join our mailing list (we're still getting that set up), and we'll have sound clips of all the tracks off our CD. For now, there are a few full tracks, plus a link to the live radio broadcast from last year's Main Stage set at the KVMR Celtic Festival. Just visit the MUSIC page.

Check it out, click on everything (it's virtually unbreakable!! ;-)

Cheers and blog on, baby!!

N8i