Irish Cross Memorial New Orleans

Irish Cross Memorial New Orleans
The Celtic Cross Memorial in New Orleans, Louisiana. Photo by Adrian McGrath. Click the image for the story about the cross.

Monday, March 11, 2019

The Concertina and Irish Music


My very own Anglo- German
concertina from a music shop
in Dublin, Ireland, given
to me by a good friend















By Adrian McGrath

You might have seen a classic film which had old time sailing ships in it, a film like Mutiny on the Bounty or Moby Dick. Among the various items on board these ships -- along with sails and lines, capstans, anchors, bad food, and many salty sailors -- you might have seen a musical instrument.

It could have been a fiddle, a fife, a tin whistle, an accordion, or one of those strange little squeezebox things that a seafaring musician swings around. That little squeezebox thing is called a concertina.

The concertina was a great instrument for seaborne musicians because unlike the accordion, they were compact and easy to carry and stow away. And there was very limited space on most sailing ships.


Sailing ships in olden days, hunting the whale.
Concertinas would likely have been on board
after the 1830s. Photo from Wikimedia Commons. 

Unlike the fiddle, the concertina is self-contained, not needing extra strings and rosin, etc. And it sounds louder than a fiddle. Unlike the fife it has more versatility and more power. All in all, the concertina was a great instrument for the romantic days of sail.

Music was a boost to a sailor's morale and was helpful even when doing work. Sea shanties, for example, were played or sung when the crew would haul in lines and weigh anchor.

Sailors using a capstan to haul a heavy object.
They often did this work to the music of a sea shanty
sometimes played on a concertina, or a fife,
or just sung aloud. Photo from Wikimedia Commons.

The concertina, however, was (and is still) used for more than sailing ships. It is a popular instrument for Irish music. It is great for most types of Irish dances -- jigs and reels, hornpipes, waltzes, slip jigs, slides, polkas, and marches. It is great for songs and ballads too either for the melody or as an accompanying instrument.

An old time dance, possibly a
polka. Concertinas are good for this
type of dance. Photo from
Wikimedia Commons, circa 1840.

There are two main types of concertinas -- the English and the Anglo-German. The main difference is in the way the instruments play notes. On the English, a push-in and a pull-out of the bellows plays the same note. On the Anglo-German the pull-out plays a different note from the push-in, much like the way a different note is played on a harmonica. The Anglo-German makes for a more jaunty, bouncy style than the English, making the Anglo-German better for Irish music.

Most Irish folk tunes are played in the key of D and sometimes G.
The typical 30 button Anglo-German concertina comes in the keys of C and G with scatted, extra notes in the top of three rows. With the scattered notes, we can play in the key of D.

Sir Charles Wheatstone, inventor of the
English version of the concertina
Photo from Wikimedia Commons, circa 1868.

The concertina was invented almost simultaneously -- and without mutual knowledge -- by two men, one English and the other German. Sir Charles Wheatstone developed the English concertina in 1829, and in 1834 Carl Friedrich Uhlig invented the German concertina which evolved into the more popular Anglo-German version. The Anglo-German added a few elements from the English to the German, including the famous hexagonal shape and smaller size.

Carl Friedrich Uhlig,
inventor of the German version
of the concertina. Photo from
Wikimedia Commons.

Overtime the concertina, especially the Anglo-German, became popular with Irish music.

You can learn much more about the concertina at the website for the
Irish Traditional Music Archive in Dublin, Ireland. The website is here or see https://www.itma.ie/ This is a research organization for Irish music and culture.

The concertina is known as a free-reed instrument and is related to the accordion and the harmonica. It is larger and more powerful than a harmonica, but it is not as big and bulky as an accordion. So, the concertina is really just the right combination of power and size.

More portable than an accordion, louder than a fiddle, flute, or tin whistle, an old-time musical instrument with a pleasing and unique sound, as suitable for the Irish Dance as for sailing on the high seas -- that is what the concertina is.

The Anglo-German concertina is, by the way, my favorite instrument for traditional Irish music.


Sources and further reading: Website for Irish Traditional Music Archive; a book about learning the concertina The Anglo Concertina Demystified by Bertram Levy, 1985; McNeela Instruments in Dublin, Ireland; and Wikipedia.com's article on concertina here.

Tuesday, March 5, 2019

Cabbage and Ham: An Irish Dish or a New Orleans Dish?

Cabbage and Ham with Rice (and Potatoes)
An Irish or a New Orleans Dish?
All Photos by Adrian McGrath

























By Adrian McGrath

Here it is Mardi Gras night, and I need to eat something fast before
Ash Wednesday comes and Lent begins. Naturally, being in New Orleans I need a real New Orleans dish. But, St. Patrick's Day is just around the corner (on March 17), so I should really begin my countdown by eating a real Irish dish too.

What to do? Quite a dilemma I'm in now.

No problem. The answer is Cabbage and Ham. Oddly enough this one dish is great for both occasions.

Main ingredients for Cabbage and Ham
Photo by A. McGrath

New Orleans food comes historically from Creole Cuisine which is basically a mixture of French and Spanish food plus local south Louisiana ingredients. World famous dishes like Jambalaya, Gumbo, Crawfish Etouffee, and dishes from people of other cultures who immigrated to New Orleans like the Sicilians with dishes like Muffulettas, Crawfish Pasta, Stuffed Artichokes, and fried Eggplant Parmesan. Other New Orleans dishes were influenced by Native American Choctaws, African Americans, Germans, and many others over the years.

Yet there is also a very popular dish in New Orleans called, depending on who you talk to, Smothered Cabbage or Cabbage and Ham. No one really knows the origin of this dish. But could it be Irish?

Red Potatoes for our dish


Unlike most of the South in the USA, New Orleans historically had a very large Irish immigrant population starting in the mid 1800s. It was, again unlike the rest of the South, mainly Catholic as well. It is quite possible the Irish brought with them one of their favorite dishes which was Cabbage and Irish Bacon (which is not readily available in the USA, but resembles Canadian Bacon). But an easy substitute for Irish Bacon is ham. And, of course, ham could be found in Ireland too. (In the 1850s about 20% of the population of New Orleans was Irish.)

White Rice for the dish
with parsley and green
onions

The Irish journalist Lafcadio Hearn lived in New Orleans in the late 1800s and actually wrote the very first English language (as opposed to the French) New Orleans Creole cookbook in 1885. He gave a recipe for Stewed Cabbage in his work called La Cuisine Creole.  (See more about Lafcadio Hearn.) He made it with butter and a cream sauce. He did not add ham, but it would have been easy enough to simply add chopped ham to the cabbage.

Irish cookbooks and Bord Bia, the Irish food board, give various recipes for cabbage dishes with some type of pork product, usually Irish bacon. So, we could imagine how the Irish love of cabbage worked its way into New Orleans cuisine.

Not many other New Orleans dishes have cabbage as a main ingredient, except for Cabbage Rolls which has stewed cabbage leaves as a wrap for ground meat and rice in a "red sauce" (tomato sauce). We could easily speculate that New Orleans Cabbage and Ham has Irish origins.

Whatever the case, here is how I made my version of this popular Irish/New Orleans dish. Perhaps you can make it at home and decide for yourself if it seems like an Irish dish, a New Orleans dish, or both.

Cooking in a copper pot


I used both white rice -- the New Orleans way -- and a cooked potato -- the Irish way; and you can take your pick of which way you like it.

Being in Louisiana, I finished the dish off with a garnish of freshly sliced and uncooked green onions and parsley.

Cabbage and Ham, a fine meal
from New Orleans and Ireland

You will need a green cabbage, a ham steak, parsley, green onions, Creole spices, butter, and rice and potatoes. And a pinch of brown sugar to balance the salty ham.

Cut and core the cabbage and place it in a pot with a little water. Cook it down on low for about 30 minutes. Drain and add butter and sliced pre-cooked ham and seasoning and cook on low. Cook the rice and the potato separately.

Cook until done and serve with warm New Orleans French Bread
 or Irish Soda Bread and butter. Be sure to garnish the dish with fresh, uncooked, sliced green onions and parsley; this is an old Cajun touch.

Cabbage and Ham makes a very nice and filling dish for Mardi Gras, St. Patrick's Day, or any day -- no matter what your background is or where you live.

Bon Appetit!

Sources and Further Reading:
La Cuisine Creole by Lafcadio Hearn; Irish Cooking by Ruth Bauder Kershner,Weathervane Books, 1979; A youtube video How to Cook Cabbage Southern Style; Bord Bia's discussion of cabbage, here