About Gaelic Storm
Gaelic Storm is an American Celtic band founded in Santa Monica, California, in 1996. Their musical output includes pieces from traditional Irish music, Scottish music, and original tunes in both the Celtic folk and Celtic rock genres. The band appeared in the 1997 film Titanic and recorded songs on the movie's soundtrack album, and has released more than a dozen of their own albums.
In 1996, Patrick Murphy and Steve Wehmeyer joined with Steve Twigger, drummer Shep Lonsdale, fiddler Samantha Hunt, and Uillean piper Brian Walsh to perform at O'Brien's Irish Pub and Restaurant in Santa Monica, California, of which Murphy was the manager. This led to a number of pub performances for the next year.
In 1997, Gaelic Storm appeared in the film Titanic as the steerage band, performing "Blarney Pilgrim" , "John Ryan's Polka", "Kesh Jig" and "Drowsy Maggie" . The first two were published on the second soundtrack album as "An Irish Party in Third Class", while the band's second album, Herding Cats, featured "Blarney Pilgrim" and "Drowsy Maggie" as "Titanic Set ".
After this film appearance, Gaelic Storm started touring, and have performed in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France and Japan. Brian Walsh left the band before the first album was recorded in 1998. Samantha Hunt left in 2000 after the group's second album.
The group has released 14 albums since its inception, including two compilation albums. The band is known for their energetic renditions of traditional Irish music and Scottish traditional music, and for their albums which consistently top the Billboard world music charts.
From 2002 to 2006, the band's membership underwent a transition period. The second fiddler, Kathleen Keane, left the band after their third album "Tree", and drummer Shep Lonsdale left, leaving only Murphy, Wehmeyer, and Twigger as the original members. Their sound engineer at the time, Tom Brown, was also a bagpiper and whistle player and began playing at periods in their show. Ryan Lacey was recruited on drums. This quintet recorded three new tracks for their fourth album, Special Reserve, also a compilation album of their previous three albums. Deborah Clark Colon was the fiddler on the three new tracks, "Courting in the Kitchen," "Schooner Lake Set", and "Nancy Whiskey." Chinese-born Shasha Zhang toured with them on fiddle for several months in 2002. For a brief time in approximately 2003, the band recruited their, to date, only male fiddler, Bob Banerjee. Teresa Gowan was also the group's fiddler during this transitional period. Finally by 2004, Ellery Klein was hired as full time fiddler.
Gaelic Storm's fifth album, How Are We Getting Home?, was released in August 2004 and debuted at #3 on the Billboard World Music Charts, #10 on the Billboard Heatseekers Chart, and re-entered the September 2005 World Albums Chart at #3.
Map & Directions To Venue
