Lovely Derry on the Banks of the Foyle sung by Charlie McGee
I am putting up 32 You Tubes from the Walton’s Glenside recordings (22 from a cd released in 2004; and 10 from a cassette – volume 1-was there a volume 2 (?)-from 1990). Until 2018 Walton’s had a shop at 11 South William Street which had been the home in the 1830s of the Waterford composer William Vincent Wallace before he emigrated to Australia.
The Walton’s’ was one of those commercially 15 minute sponsored programmes that was broadcast on Radio Eireann (now RTE) in the 1950s and 1960s. It used to go out at 1.45 on Saturdays (live as sometimes the needle used to get stuck in record groove and would have to be quickly adjusted!). It was Irish music “our fathers loved” and Leo Maguire always ended with advertising the shop in North Frederick Street, Dublin 1 and repeating the motto “If you do feel like singing-do sing an Irish song!”. It was more Thomas Davis than Luke Kelly. It was rather genteel and just compare the rather parlour rendering by Joe Lynch of The Wild Colonial Boy and that of vigorous Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem version? For me it had one outstanding tenor in Fergus O’Kelly and one would like to know if he did any other recordings. Liam Devally was another who also performed well. Mary McGonigle was yet another with a fine voice.
This is the founders grandson commentating in the Irish Times in 2018:
In 1922, Martin Walton, Niall’s grandfather, opened the music shop on North Great Frederick Street. An accomplished violinist and Feis Ceoil winner, Martin Walton took part in the Easter Rising when he was a teenager, was arrested during the War of Independence and was imprisoned in Ballykinlar internment camp in Co Down.
After fighting in the Civil War, he opened a music shop and established the Dublin College of Music. The original store closed a few years ago when Waltons opened in Blanchardstown. They also previously had a store in Dún Laoghaire.
In 2007, the George’s Street shop appeared in the movie Once when Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová perform the Oscar-winning song Falling Slowly.
“We must have had thousands of people coming in to photograph the piano they played on. In the stage productions they’d mention Waltons and the Oscars ceremony recreated the interior of the shop for their performance. It was very good publicity but ultimately it wasn’t enough,” Niall Walton says.
During these challenging times, Walton often reflects on his grandfather’s amusement when he mentioned the business was struggling during the 1970s.
“I was 19 and said business was pretty tough. He said: ‘Tough? You couldn’t spell it.’ He reminded me that when he opened in 1922 O’Connell Street was in ruins after the war. Then there was the Wall Street Crash, De Valera’s economic war on England and in 1938 Hitler came along. Then it was six years of survival during the war, another 10-15 years for the world to recover, a few easy years in the 1960s and then the oil crisis in the 1970s.
“Things go up and things go down. We complain but we don’t have a clue what tough means
Patrick Leo Maguire (1903 – 17 December 1985) was an Irish singer, songwriter, and radio broadcaster.
Born in Dublin's inner city, Maguire trained as a baritone under Vincent O'Brien, John McCormack's voice teacher. For many years he performed with the Dublin Operatic Society.
Leo Maguire was a prolific composer, writing over 100 songs. These include Come to the Céile, The Old Killarney Hat, If You'll Only Come Across the Seas to Ireland, The Dublin Saunter (which he wrote for Noel Purcell) and Eileen McManus (recorded by Daniel O'Donnell).[3] His most famous song is The Whistling Gypsy. In 1954 Rose Brennan was awarded third place by the New Musical Express for the best recording of the year for her cover of The Whistling Gypsy. It was also a hit in Ireland and later in the United States. Maguire also wrote parodies and humorous songs under the name Sylvester Gaffney.
In parallel with his musical career, Maguire worked as a broadcaster on Radio Éireann. The programme with which he is most closely associated is the Walton's Programme. This was a weekly sponsored show during which Maguire played recordings of popular Irish ballads. The programme was broadcast for almost 30 years until its cancellation in January 1981.