Track Listing: 1. The Milky Way, The Ring Around the Moon, Peg McGrath's, The Mill of Kylemore (4:58) 2. The Haunted House, Whistler at the Wake, The Old Flail (3:31) 3. The Home Ruler, Mulhares (3:01) 4. ]enny's Welcome to Charlie,College Groves (5:43) 5. The Humours of Ballyloughlin, Paidin O'Raifeartaigh (5:08) 6. Tommy Coens, The Glen of Aherlow, The Porthole of the Kelp, Maid Behind the Bar in C (5:31) 7. Bruach na Carraige Baine. (2.39) 8. Trip to Athlone, Caileach an Airgid, Leg of the Duck. (5.41) 9. The Toss Pot,The Golden Eagle. 93.07) 10. The Maids of Mount Kisco, Sporting Nell, The Flagstone of Memories,Rolling in the Rye Grass (5:l6) 11. (Garykennedy Selection) Gan Ainm, The Humours of Derrykissane, Gan Ainm (3.10) 12. Dwyers, Mick O'Connors. (4:21) 13. Sean Bhean Bhoct, The Rights of Man,Throw It Across The Road, Farewell to Connaught, Imelda Roland's, Last Nights Fun, An Gliomach, Sean BheanBhocht (Tomeen 0'Dea's) (10:25) Click on underlined titles to see MacDara play on You Tube

We are delighted to announce our release of this brilliant CD.

MacDara O'Raghallaigh
Ego Trip
LARACOR001

"The reason For This...
On a frosty night, January 19th 2001 to be precise, I played as part of a recital along with renowned flautist Catherine McEvoy in a small parish hall in a village by the name of Newtown in north Kildare. This was one of a number of recitals in the same venue. These were organized by members of Clann Uf Chatham from Kilcock, fiddle player Caomhfn 6 Raghallaigh (no relation, not even a tiny bit) and members of the Boylan family from Celbridge. This planted the seed for a live cd. Though the idea never wilted the years passed by. Children appeared,hair disappeared and still no sign of a cd, or even the smell of one. I think I was waiting for maturity to reach its peak. Then, having realised I was never going to mature (my wife Lara has repeatedly told me this), I sent a fella by the name of Paul Quin a text. Paul, a fine flautist and old acquaintance, has a major role to play with Noiz Entertainment. I remembered that Paul had previously mentioned an interest in recording my fiddle playing. Due to his exquisite taste in music I asked him in the text was he fit to do a live recording or was he just useless! After his initial surprise at this totally out of the blue enquiry, he realized the massive fame and fortune this opportunity would bring him. For the next two months he rang me three or four times a day until the dates were set. He then mentioned that he needed someone with him who actually knew what he was doing and so Shay Leon joined the recording crew. The audience were invited, threatened and bribed with lashings of tea, mulled wine and homemade baking of the highest order. Recordings took place on the 14th and 15th of January 2011. This was only four days short of ten years since the original recital in the same venue!
So finally here it is. One fiddle player, two fiddles (I like living on the edge), two audiences of thousands of possibly the most knowledgeable people in traditional music, two techno heads and a few microphones scattered haphazardly around the hall. There isn't anything radical or shiny and new here. It's not rocket science. It's not even fiddle science! Just a bunch of tunes that I like to play. All the mistakes, scratches, squeaks, bum notes, bad variations, weird variations, downright silly variations and even a few tunes are all left in for your pleasure alone. To all those tunes I consider great friends that I left on the editing floor, my sincere apologies. If there's a next time ye'll be there! So, whether you've bought this cd, received it as a gift (of distinction of course) or won it as last prize in a raffle, well then failte romhat. You're very welcome to my Ego Trip. I suppose it's about time! MacDara O'Raghallaigh.

Can we recommend these recordings available from Copperplate

Mícheál Ó Raghallaigh,
The Nervous Man
Inside Out
with Providence
Debut album
A Fig For A Kiss

Catherine McEvoy:
Traditional Music in the Roscommon/Sligo Tradition
The Home Ruler
Catherine & John McEvoy: The Lismore Fancy


Click on the link to see Mícheál Ó Raghallaigh & Danny O'Mahoney on UTube playing 4 great reels: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YLo3wH8dsk

Press Reviews

Folkworld 46
MacDara Ó Raghallaígh is a traditional Irish fiddler from Rathmoylan, Co. Meath, a multiple All-Ireland champion, including three titles in a row with the Naomh Pádraig Céilí Band from 2004 to 2006. "Ego Trip" is his debut solo album, recorded live in the parish hall of Newtown, Co. Kildare in January 2011, and it is essentially an ego trip, entirely unaccompanied, or let's say in MacDara's words that main accompaniment is my right foot, and additional accompaniment is my left foot and loads of other feet that don't belong to me at all. Many tunes have been learned at home from kith and kin. Furthermore, flutist Vincent Broderick[37] is a composer often mentioned, MacDara seems to be a big fan, as is Josie McDermott. The first two sets feature seven compositions of these two only. I've known only Vincent's "Milkyway" reel[34] and Josie's reel "Peg McGrath's"[29] before. After this trip into the unknown, there is more familiar stuff in a sudden burst with Frank McCollum's hornpipe "The Home Ruler". Most tunes have been widely travelled, such as "Tommy Coen's Reel" (probably better known as "Christmas Eve"). "Bruach na Carraige Baine" is one of three slow airs MacDara likes to play and thrown in for good measure to take a break in the middle.
All things considered MacDara Ó Raghallaígh's "Ego Trip" is a superb fiddle album, though, it comes with the territory, addresses fiddlers almost exlusively.