Not your typical St George's Day...

I bet none of you spent St George's Day like we did!

Okay, hands up who would've thought to book an Irish band to play in an English village for an Australian landlord celebrating Anzac day on the 23rd April Well why not!!

We took a trip down to the village of Denford in Northants, a journey we've made a few times before in the last few years, to play in a pub called The Cock Inn for a weekend of celebrations as landlord Jayme combined the pub's beer festival with his Anzac Day event and most importantly his dad, Neville's, birthday. I'm not sure Jayme could have crammed much more into just one weekend- or many more people into the pub to be honest!

To find a village pub in the heart of the midlands with so many Aussie accents in it has to be one of the strangest experiences and it takes you off guard when someone starts to speak to you and a broad Aussie dialect issues forth . You'll not find a more friendly, out going bunch with a sense of humour that takes no prisoners and we love playing for Jayme and his family, friends and pub regulars.

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Epic session with Mike McGoldrick and John Doyle!

Just a week ago and ahead of their concert at The Lakeside Arts Centre Mike McGoldrick and Johnny Doyle were keen to have a few tunes. What followed was an amazing, hastily-arranged session at The Victoria Hotel in Beeston where Kellys played both individually and collectively with Mike and Johnny and around a dozen fellow musicians. Absolutely wonderful music!

Now ... given that we've played with Mike - and Mike has played with Mark Knopfler (and Kellys have played for Mark Knopfler!) - and Mark Knopfler has played with Bob Dylan - that makes THREE degrees of separation between Kellys and Dylan!

A busy month ahead as we head into March...

March is the busiest month of our year, as you can imagine, with so many people wanting to celebrate St Patrick's Day and we absolutely love the variety of venues and audiences that it brings with it

We always hit the ground running when the first weekend of March comes around and this year has been no exception. Our gig at The Royal Oak in Westwood on Friday night was a brilliant return to a wonderful pub where the landlord, David, and his wonderful team are so enthusiastic about Irish music and give a wonderfully warm welcome to people as they come through the doors.

The audience were a mixture of people who had heard of Kellys Heroes and never seen us play live plus faces who have been following the band since the late 80's- and they're still taking ownership of that dance floor like it was yesterday

As is the norm these days there were many mobile phones out during the night, recording favourite songs and tunes as we powered through some fast and furious old favourites alongside some of our more recent additions to the sets.

During one of these sets of tunes, Tony left the stage to do a quick check on the sound and not wanting to get in the way of one fella who was recording at the time, he dipped underneath the camera. When he came back towards the stage, the guy had lowered the level of his phone to get a better angled shot of the band so Tony tried to be considerate and took to his hands and knees to get past- what Tony didn't know (but we could see) is that the guy obviously found it as funny as we did and so took some footage of him crawling on the floor

If that video ever sees the light of day I'd just like to point out that he wasn't drunk at the time- honest!

Thank you to Nick Morland for taking charge of the camera for us during the second set- cheers Nick!

RIP Seamus Begley

Kellys have had many heroes over the years, in all walks of life, and it is fitting that we pay tribute to them where we can.

Lovers of Irish music will be familiar with that great dynasty of Irish musicians and singers the Begley family from Kerry. Sadly, on Monday they lost that giant of a man - in every sense - Seamus. His box playing, especially of polkas and slides, was wonderful and his voice, in both English and Irish, brought many venues to a hush.

I saw him playing with his old side-kick, Steve Cooney, in West Belfast 25 years ago on the back of a lorry and he brought the place to a stand-still.

Have a listen to the pair of them on their now ancient recording, Meitheal, or find Seamus on YouTube and raise a parting glass to the one and only Seamus Begley.

Patrick.

Happy New Year!

2022 was a busy year, wasn't it!

According to Google we drove over halfway round the globe in 2022 to get too and from gigs and I refuse to look at how many hours it tells me that we've spent in the car but to spend time with you all, and each other, makes it so worthwhile

Even though the band is approaching it's 40th year (yes, you heard me right!) we have played many new cities, towns and villages over the last twelve months performing at festivals, folk clubs, pubs and clubs, house and garden parties. We've played for you for your weddings, christenings, birthday parties and to help you celebrate the lives of loved ones you've lost and it has been our privilege!

So from Kellys Heroes to all of our friends, to everyone who has danced, clapped and sung along with us, to all of the people who work so hard in the venues where Live Music is supported and celebrated we say thank you and we wish you all a very

Happy New Year! Enjoy this selection of photos from the last twelve months and from various parts of the UK.

We hope they bring back some good memories.

Here's to 2023, whatever it brings- Here we go!

Kellys Heroes 2022 round up

Colour Friday is here!!

Happy Colour Friday everyone!

What is Colour Friday?

Well, Colour Friday is an annual alternative to Black Friday and today's the day!!

Why? It's to remind us all to celebrate the colour and creativity that small businesses bring to the UK so before you start bending those cards and sending all your hard earned pennies to the big corporations, why not take a look at what small, local, independent businesses have on offer.

If you want to give someone the gift of music then head over to our online store for some special offers!

Back at Bingham Folk Club

Lets wind the clock back a little and tell you about last Friday night- what a great time we had with everyone at Bingham Folk Club.

This is such a warm and friendly club and it was great to be back playing for them again! Tickets were sold out long before the actual date so apologies to all those who wanted to come along and couldn't this time.

We thoroughly enjoyed everyone who sang and played for us before our first set- Dave Smith, Marion Downs and Al Harris gave us a fantastic start to the evening.

Being the 11.11.22 there were some songs to reflect the date and we decided to do one which we'd never performed before, Eric Bogle's very poignant All The Fine Young Men and we paired that with our version of Hector The Hero which we play as a slow lament.

In fact, we did a few songs which were Folk Club Firsts for us including our own song, Dr Syn, written by Helen and based on a poem by her good friend Nick Weekes with the tune coming from Patrick. Watch out for this one popping up in our sets!

The Scottish contingent of lads at the back of the room were especially happy that we were including songs like 'A Parcel of Rogues' and 'Sober Men' in the set as we approach St Andrew's Night at the end of November and the evening flowed along very smoothly- well, in the main.

There was a little thing that happened in the first set...

I have to say that I had been feeling very happy with myself because a flight case I'd ordered had finally arrived from Germany. I'd always planned to have a go at kitting it out with foam and material lining myself in a foolish fit of feelings of adequacy. Don't ask me where they came from but Thursday evening I decided to tackle the job and I was so pleased with the results! It's not perfect but it looks good and is such a better fit for the accordion.

You're probably wondering what this has to do with Friday night (apart from an opportunity to show off!) well we were getting towards the very end of the first set when I had a slight feeling of wooziness and the thought went through my mind that there was a strong smell of glue where I was sitting. Trying to be subtle, I was glancing around me wondering where this was coming from until I realised that it was, literally, right under my nose! Not only did the instrument I'd been playing for the last half hour smell strongly of it but the flight case which was at my feet being used as a stand was emitting an Eau de Adhesive aroma from all the contact adhesive I'd used to attach the shiny new lining!!

Don't look too closely at my eyes in these photos from the night

A big thank you to Mick Herring for taking some great photos of us and his permission to use them. And a big thankyou to Dave Downs for use of his PA and for being our sound engineer for the night.

Nottingham Global Roots Festival

A couple of weeks ago we took part in a very special event. The Nottingham Global Roots Festival held at Stonebridge City Farm was a huge success and much credit goes to the two inspirational women who had the belief and the energy to pull this festival together and bring the community out in droves to celebrate different cultures through their music and live performance.

Nottingham Global Roots Festival was founded by Rastarella Falade in 2015 and has grown in strength and popularity ever since. The festival is now led by female co-ordinators Rastarella Falade and Jude Winwood.

The day was packed with amazing musicians and artists and was appreciated by a very sizeable audience! It was great to meet Reece from Eaton Mills Photography who was on hand as the day’s official photographer and he has kindly shared his work with us for this post alongside some photos taken on our own camera.

Stonebridge City Farm was the ideal location for the festival as both the festival and the farm share such a strong commitment to the people of the local community. There was a fantastic atmosphere with all ages enjoying the activities, the sunshine and the music as we played for dancers of all ages who took to the grassy spaces available in front of the band to move their feet to some jigs and reels!

It was an absolute pleasure to play for the Nottingham Global Roots Festival- keep your eyes on our diary dates for December as there are plans in process for a December event! Don’t worry, it will be indoors this time.

In the meantime, lets leave you with more amazing memories of the day captured in wonderful photographs…

Thank you to our sound engineer, Nigel Christie, for giving us and all the other musicians such a great sound through the PA!