We were lucky enough to catch this next artist support Lisa O’Neill in the Linenhall Arts Theatre in Castlebar just a few months ago and since then we have been wanting to do a feature on the artist.
John Francis Flynn is a singer and multi-instrumentalist whose work centres around traditional and folk material from Ireland and further afield. He is a founding member of the band, Skipper’s Alley, with whom he has toured extensively throughout Europe and America. John is an active session musician around Dublin and has recorded with artists such as Lankum and Ye Vagabonds.
John Francis Flynn is an artist to watch out for the future
The evening we got to see John Francis live in Castlebar we felt there was defintely something very unique in this artist that we had not seen in some. Check out the track Shallow Brown below, According to John’s Youtube page he says about the song,
“Stan Hugill’s book, ‘Shanties from the Seven Seas’, was the source for this song. It was a slave song in origin and most likely made it’s way into the sea shanty tradition as slaves were rented out as crew for America’s mercantile marine during the winter months. On board these ships everyone would sing everyone else’s songs and so they all became part of the one thing.”