Séamus Egan is an Irish-American musician.

Early days

Séamus Egan was born in Hatboro,

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

to Irish immigrants Mike and Ann Egan. At the age of three his parents moved the family back home to

County Mayo County Mayo (; ga, Contae Mhaigh Eo, meaning "Plain of the Taxus baccata, yew trees") is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. In the West Region, Ireland, West of Ireland, in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Conn ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. He learned

accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...

from Martin Donaghue. He saw

Matt Molloy Matt Molloy (born 12 January 1947) is an Irish musician, from a region known for producing talented flautists. As a child, he began playing the flute and won the All-Ireland Flute Championship at nineteen. Considered one of the most brilliant ...

and

James Galway Sir James Galway (born 8 December 1939) is an Irish virtuoso flute player from Belfast, nicknamed "The Man with the Golden Flute". He established an international career as a solo flute player. In 2005, he received the Brit Award for Outstan ...

on television and suddenly decided to take up the

Irish flute The Irish flute is a conical-bore, simple-system wooden flute of the type favoured by classical flautists of the early 19th century, or to a flute of modern manufacture derived from this design (often with modifications to optimize its use in Ir ...

. Seamus had won the all-Ireland championship on four different instruments by the time he was 14.

Later work

When

Mick Moloney Michael Moloney (15 November 1944 – 27 July 2022) was an Irish-born American musician and scholar. He was the artistic director of several major arts tours and co-founded Green Fields of America. Early life Moloney was born in Limerick, Ire ...

founded

Green Fields of America The Green Fields of America is an ensemble that performs and promotes Irish traditional music in the United States. It was formed in 1977 in Philadelphia, led by musician and folklorist Mick Moloney. They perform Irish and Irish-American culture ...

in 1977, Seamus joined up and took lessons from Mick on the

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

. Two years later he returned to Ireland and won the All-Ireland championship on

and

mandolin A mandolin ( it, mandolino ; literally "small mandola") is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick. It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of 8 ...

. In 1985 he recorded a solo album ''Traditional Music Of Ireland''. In 1992 he joined

Susan McKeown Susan McKeown (born February 6, 1967) is an Irish folk singer, songwriter, arranger and producer. Early years Susan McKeown was born on February 6, 1967 in Terenure, Dublin, Ireland. She briefly attended the Municipal College of Music, Chatham ...

's band The Chanting House and appeared on a

live album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

with them.

Eileen Ivers Eileen Ivers (born July 13, 1965) is an American fiddler. Ivers was born in New York City of Irish-born parents, grew up in the Bronx and attended St. Barnabas High School. She spent summers in Ireland and took up the fiddle at the age of ni ...

was also a member of the band. In 1994 he founded Solas and has been on every one of their albums. In 1995 he recorded music for the quirky low-budget film ''

The Brothers McMullen ''The Brothers McMullen'' is a 1995 American comedy-drama film written, directed, produced by, and starring Edward Burns. It deals with the lives of the three Irish Catholic McMullen brothers from Long Island, New York, over three months, as they ...

'', directed by

Edward Burns Edward Fitzgerald Burns (born January 29, 1968) is an American actor, producer, writer, and director best known for appearing in several films including ''Saving Private Ryan'' (1998), '' 15 Minutes'' (2001), ''Life or Something Like It'' (200 ...

. He also co-wrote the hit " I Will Remember You" with Dave Merenda and

Sarah McLachlan Sarah Ann McLachlan Order of Canada, OC Order of British Columbia, OBC (born January 28, 1968) is a Canadian singer-songwriter. As of 2015, she had sold over 40 million albums worldwide. McLachlan's best-selling album to date is ''Surfacing ( ...

. Egan is also the producer for Solas and has worked as producer for other artists, including American singer-songwriter Antje Duvekot, fiddler

Liz Carroll Liz Carroll (born September 19, 1956) is an American fiddler and composer. She is a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts' National Heritage Fellowship Award. Carroll and collaborator Irish guitarist John Doyle were nominated for a ...

, and singer

Karan Casey Karan Casey (born 1969) is an Irish folk singer, and a former member of the Irish band Solas. She resides in Cork, Ireland. Early years Casey was born in Ballyduff Lower, Kilmeaden, County Waterford, Ireland. Her family encouraged her to sin ...

Family

He has a younger sister named Rory who is a very good

concertina A concertina is a free-reed musical instrument, like the various accordions and the harmonica. It consists of expanding and contracting bellows, with buttons (or keys) usually on both ends, unlike accordion buttons, which are on the front. The ...

player. She graduated from

St. Francis Xavier University St. Francis Xavier University is a public undergraduate liberal arts university located in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada. It is a member of the Maple League, a group of primarily undergraduate universities in Eastern Canada. History St. Franc ...

in Antigonish,

Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...

, Canada. He has another sister named Siobhan who was the chief fiddle player in Cherish the Ladies for many years.

Discography

Solo albums

* Traditional Music Of Ireland (1985) * A Week In January (1990) * When Juniper Sleeps (1996) * Early Bright (2020)

Seamus Egan, Eugene O'Donnell & Mick Moloney

* Three Way Street (1993)

As session musician

* The Brothers McMullen (Soundtrack) (1995) * Eileen Ivers, ''Wild Blue'' (1996) * Celtic Tapestry (1999)

With Solas

* Solas (1996) * Sunny Spells and Scattered Showers (1997) * The Words That Remain (1998) * The Hour Before Dawn (2000) * The Edge of Silence (2002) * Another Day (2003) * Waiting for an Echo (2005) * Reunion-A Decade of Solas (CD/DVD) (2006) * For Love and Laughter (2008) * The Turning Tide (2010) * Shamrock City (2013) * All These Years (2016)

References

External links

irishphiladelphia.com Interview
{{DEFAULTSORT:Egan, Seamus 1969 births American emigrants to Ireland American people of Irish descent Living people Musicians from County Mayo People from Hatboro, Pennsylvania Songwriters from Pennsylvania