Radio Ballads: Northern Ireland

Radio Ballads: Thirty Years of Conflict

Songs arise from conversation, connection, reflection, imagination -- and all of these applied and worked out in the course of real events. For the last thirty years and more, the real events in the six counties of Ireland's north, and along the borders with the republic as well, have included verbal and physical conflict, and the loss of more than 3000 lives. This recording is part of a six part series by the BBC honoring and challenging that idea of songs coming out of the intersection of lives and history. With this one on Northern Ireland, it is especially to the point, as both musicians those who tell their stories of events often say, directly and indirectly, that music reaches across borders, and always has. A powerful project, and especially on point with the ongoing process of devolution in Northern Ireland.

Songwriters and singers here include Cara Dillon, Jez Lowe, Julie Matthews, Sam Lakeman, and Tommy Sands.

photographs [©Kerry Dexter]: standing in the republic, looking toward the north, and along the Falls Road, Belfast

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