PORT | SJ McArdle

PORT, is a new song cycle from contemporary Drogheda folk artist SJ McArdle, full of timeless, indelible folk songs – work songs, story songs, love songs to the sea. Songs written in anger and written in sorrow. Songs about injustice and change. Songs about people. Produced by  Droichead Arts Centre and funded through the Arts Council’s Touring Scheme. Born of year-long research and writing project around the history and stories of Drogheda’s ancient Port, conducted during SJ’s tenure as Artist in Association at Droichead Arts Centre in 2019. Along with its accompanying critically-acclaimed RTÉ Radio 1 Album of the Week Old Ghosts In The Water, PORT features Carol Keogh (Plague Monkeys), Graham Henderson (Moving Hearts, Sinead O’Connor) and Trevor Hutchinson (Lúnasa, The Waterboys) along with vocalist John Ruddy and fiddle player Barry Kieran (Kern). SJ was previously the songwriter and singer in award-winning Irish folk band Kern from 2013 to 2020 and he is also known for his career as a singer-songwriter in Nashville and Germany, which produced 2014’s critically-acclaimed Blood and Bones album (featuring Rodney Crowell). He is also in trad trio Long Woman’s Grave with Nuala Kennedy and Trevor Hutchinson. SJ’s songs and performances have been featured in radio, film and television and he has toured and recorded extensively in Ireland, Europe and North America, gathering a loyal following and critical accolades along the way. More info: sjmcardle.ie Reviews: “An impressive song cycle … the songs are intriguing and evocative; they are rooted in folk but coloured by expansive and imaginative arrangements.” – The Irish Times "What a great, great collection of songs this is from SJ McArdle. I urge you to go out and get it." – Fiachna Ó Braonáin (The Hothouse Flowers, RTÉ) “All the ingredients of great folk songs” – Lynette Fay (BBC) “SJ McArdle … can’t fail to capture your attention, with a sonorous voice – not unlike Garnet Rogers’s – that can be gritty and gruff yet also unexpectedly tender, even vulnerable. His writing exhibits a similar versatility.” – Sean Smith, Boston Irish “Quite lovely … McArdle’s voice has a breathy gruffness to it that is commanding without being loud, and it sets a strong tone. ‘The Hard Wind’, a McArdle original, is a lively, cutting song about Irish soldiers who returned to Ireland after World War I to acrimony and indifference.” – Daniel Neely, The Irish Echo “Bravo for an artist who has taken contemporary Irish music to parts it far too seldom reaches” – Hot Press