New album release for Ballyfermot folk musician Darren Lynch

FOLK musician Darren Lynch has released his new album The Spinning Wheel, a collection of songs woven from his performances over the past 15 years, timeless songs which continue to spin onto future generations.

Reared in Ballyfermot, Darren, who still lives in Ballyfermot, five minutes from his family home, started playing music after finishing a successful amateur boxing career with Crumlin Boxing Club.

Speaking with The Echo, Darren explained how he veered towards folk music in his late teens and it was then that he picked up the banjo, and later the octave mandolin, mandola and bouzouki.

“Growing up I was into the kind of music that most young people are into, like dance music and that”, Darren said.

“However, music never really struck a chord with me until I was in my late teens and identified with folk music.”

In the early days, Darren learned from some of the great folk and trad musicians in his area, such as Tom Moran, Liam O’ Neill, Darach de Brun and John Lane, going on to play and record with bands including The broadside Merchants, So-Ranna, Tam-Lin and The Feekers.

After The Feekers parted ways in 2013, Darren embarked on a solo career and has brought his sound to a number of venues and festivals nationwide.

He also plays as part of folk duo The Ballyfermot Rakes, which gig regularly around pubs, clubs and festivals.

A hard working musician, Darren, who also holds down a job in IT, has despite all of the travelling and festival performances released an album called The Spinning Wheel.

According to Darren: “This album is a collection of some of the songs I have sang over the past 15 years or more.

“Groups such as The Fureys, The Dubliners and Sweeney’s Men, as well as singers like Pecker Dunne and Brendan Behan, did not merely perform these songs, but offered them to listeners as their own story.

“This is testament to the timeless quality of the art of the folk song and the stories of yesterday, which stand the test of time and filter into the future by their ability to resonate with every era.

“This is an album of my renditions of these timeless stories.”

Dedicating the album to his mam Thomasena, Darren believes that “the vast array of music she played as I grew up was an undoubted influence on me.

“Everything from folk, pop, rock to country would be played from our stereogram in our living room, 24 hours a day, seven days a week”.

The Spinning Wheel is available in Claddagh Records and Tower Records or visit Darren Lynch’s Facebook page HERE or www.darrenlynch.com, www.claddaghrecords.com or www.towerrecords.ie