‘The Chieftains’ is the story of a group of ordinary men who undertook an extraordinary musical journey. These men not only helped to save Irish traditional music from disappearing altogether, but spread it across the world and proved you could not only sell millions of albums with it, but pick-up six Grammies and countless other awards along the way.
The band’s strong association with Belfast goes back to the early 1970s when Paddy Moloney was introduced to the harpist Derek Bell. Paddy always maintained that The Chieftains became complete only when Derek agreed to join the band.
Over the years they played regularly in Northern Ireland and in 1987 even collaborated with Van Morrison for one of their most distinctive albums, Celtic Heartbeat. Derek passed away unexpectedly in 2002 and this programme pays tribute to the Derek’s musical genius.
The programme not only includes interviews every surviving member – both past and present – but features exclusive interviews with some of The Chieftains’ biggest fans and collaborators, including Rolling Stone Keith Richards, Sting, Elvis Costello, Ry Cooder, Sir James Galway and Andrea Corr.
Rare film from the vaults show the original Chieftains as young men, and follows their career throughout the decades as they tour the globe and collaborate with some of the worlds most famous artists, including Van Morrison, Frank Zappa, Ricky Skaggs and even a young Michael Flatley.
The story of the Chieftains is the story of a band evolving. There are just four members left; Sean Keane plays Fiddle, Kevin Conneff plays the Bodhrán and provides vocals and Matt Molloy plays the flute. The group is led by the chief of the Chieftains, Paddy Moloney who plays the pipes and tin whistle.
The programme also tracks down the original Chieftains, Michael Tubridy (flute) Seán Potts (tin whistle) and Martin Fay (fiddle), who provide an insight into life with the band in the early days, and reveal their reasons for leaving the group, but as Paddy Moloney says: “once a Chieftain always a Chieftain.”
This programme takes viewers on the band’s often rocky road to success. They were one of the “coolest” bands of the 1970s (winning Melody Maker’s Band of the Year) but were they selling out on their native traditions? Being one of the busiest touring bands of their generation brought fame and wealth but led to managerial conflict and personal family problems for the members of the band. Paddy Moloney talks about selling his soul to the business and how single minded determination was the secret to keeping the band together.
The Chieftains is on BBC One Northern Ireland on Monday, March 17 at 9pm.