Ireland

The Wexford Carol (Carúl Loch Garman) is Ireland’s best-known Christmas carol. Where it came from, how old it really is, and the versions worth hearing.

In 2020 almost 40 Irish female artists recorded The Cranberries’ Dreams from home for Safe Ireland. It topped the Homegrown chart and raised over €250,000.

Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol, fronted by Bangor man Gary Lightbody, is the most-played song on UK radio this century. The Grey’s Anatomy moment and the story behind it.

The Script, three lads from Dublin, made Hall of Fame with will.i.am in 2012. How it hit number one, why it is everywhere, and the band since Mark Sheehan.

Gráinne was promised to the ageing Fionn mac Cumhaill, but at the feast at Tara she drugged the guests and bound the young warrior Diarmuid to run away with her. Here’s the whole legend of Diarmuid and Gráinne: the geis, the love spot, the long pursuit, the dolmens called their beds, the boar of Ben Bulben, how old the story really is, and how it compares with Tristan and Iseult.

In the Children of Lir, a jealous stepmother turns four children into swans for 900 years. Here’s the legend retold from the Irish text, from Lough Derravaragh to the Sea of Moyle and Erris, plus the bell and the ending, how old the story really is, where the versions differ, Irish swan folklore, the children’s names and the sculpture in Dublin’s Garden of Remembrance.

The Irish Brigade was the best-known Irish unit of the American Civil War: the 63rd, 69th and 88th New York, later joined by the 28th Massachusetts and 116th Pennsylvania. Here’s the story of Thomas Francis Meagher, why Irish immigrants enlisted, the Sunken Road at Antietam, the boxwood at Fredericksburg, Father Corby’s absolution at Gettysburg, the Irish who fought for the South, the 1863 draft riots, the Fighting 69th today and how to find an ancestor who served.

On New Year’s Day 1892, a 17-year-old from Cork named Annie Moore became the first immigrant processed at Ellis Island. Here’s her voyage from Queenstown on the Nevada, the muddle over her age, the wrong Annie Moore whose life was told as hers for years, the hard life she really lived on the Lower East Side, and how to find your own Ellis Island ancestor.

From 1845 to 1852, potato blight, deep poverty and an inadequate relief system left about a million people dead in Ireland and sent over a million more abroad. Here’s what caused the Great Famine, An Gorta Mór, what the government did and didn’t do, the evidence on food exports, the genocide debate, memorials from Dublin to Sydney, and how to trace a Famine-era ancestor.

Before funeral homes, the Irish waked their dead at home: the clock stopped, a window opened, keening women lamented, and callers got clay pipes, snuff and sometimes games. Here’s what the old accounts say, how the funeral and the month’s mind work, what survives today, what to say (including Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam), how to read an RIP.ie death notice, the robin belief, and why November belongs to the dead.

The Irish story behind You Raise Me Up: lyrics by Brendan Graham, a melody inspired by Danny Boy, first sung by Brian Kennedy, then a number one for Westlife.

The story of Clannad’s Theme from Harry’s Game, the 1982 song from the Donegal Gaeltacht that went to number five in the UK, the only UK hit sung entirely in Irish.

The story of Linger, the first big hit for Limerick band The Cranberries: how Dolores O’Riordan joined the band, and how a gentle love song went top ten in America.

The story of U2’s 1987 rooftop gig in Los Angeles for Where the Streets Have No Name: a thousand fans, the police shutting it down, and a Grammy-winning video.

The story of Enya’s Only Time, the song from a Donegal singer that comforted millions after 9/11, and how she became Ireland’s best-selling solo artist.