We'd like to thank you all for your messages of support at this extremely difficult time.
While we are unable to do any gigs, we have created an offer which will be available only until the end of the current lockdown and we can start playing live for you all again!
You can help to support Kellys Heroes by sharing this offer with your friends on facebook as well as making an order and asking others to share our post too.
We're trying to keep music going even when, just for a while, we can't keep music live!
Until that happens (or until we run out of stock!) we will be giving away (yes, you heard right- giving away!) a CD of 9 remastered Kellys Heroes tracks which have never been released before with every order of albums and T shirts.
The CD, called 'A Brief Interlude', includes both songs and instrumentals and even a brand new piping track by Campbell Connet brought to you by the wonders of Helen and Steve's editing skills.
You can place orders either by messaging us over facebook (www.facebook.com/kellysheroesnottingham), through messaging us on our website or by phoning 07780912563.
T shirts are available in S, M, L & XL sizes £10 + £3 p&p (UK)
Albums are £10 + £1 p&p (UK)
Included in the offer are...
Banks Of The Roses
A Hungry Feeling
Seldom Sober
No Problem
Hard Life
That's The Story
Recollection
Kesh
Mooncoin
Mile By Mile
Banish Misfortune
Autumn Child
Live at Scilly Folk Festival
COVID-19
So, here we are, in virtual lock down along with most of Europe and many countries further afield!
Every weekend, while the current restrictions are in place, we will be sharing a video of the band on our facebook page www.facebook.com/kellysheroesnottingham so you don’t miss us too much!
For those people who have an existing booking with us in the coming months and would like to rearrange their date- please contact us as soon as possible so we can work with you to secure another date in the band’s diary. To help those of you in this dilemma, we have just released some extra dates in October 2020!
We will do everything we can to work with you to find a solution and get your event back on the calendar.
Keep well, stay safe.
Kellys Heroes.
Ghanafest and beyond!
Our first view of Valletta!
I think it’s safe to say that we got a bit ‘snap happy’ with our cameras during our trip to Malta- and why not? It was everyone’s first trip to the country and there were some very special friendships developed and amazing memories made!
Now that we’ve finally finished uploading all the files and sorting through them we can share some with you.
When we arrived, we were met at the airport by our guide/ babysitter/ troubleshooter, Daryl, from Arts Council Malta who were the organisation behind most of our Maltese tour. There he stood at the arrivals gate holding his Kellys Heroes sign aloft with the big welcoming smile that he subsequently greeted us with each day we were in the country.
A taxi ride later and we arrived at some of the most impressive digs we’ve ever had! Our home for the week was the Hotel Castille at the side of the Prime Minister’s Office in the very heart of Valletta.
Our favourite coffee stop, Cafe Castille.
The plan was that we rest up, unpack and then do a little sightseeing and that’s how our first day in the city began but, once we had checked in to the hotel and completed some paperwork we were free agents with hours of time and no gig to go to!
We got our bearings and our first much- needed coffees before wandering around the square and the very beautiful Upper Barrakka Gardens…
Barrakka Gardens, Valletta
Watching the sun start to set over the harbour.
As the sun went down, we gravitated towards the closest bar to the hotel for ‘one quick drink and then bed’ as we had been travelling since 5 am. Well that didn’t happen! We found ourselves outside the Beer Cave, sitting in wonderfully warm weather with even more wonderfully cool drinks. As the evening progressed we ended up having an impromptu session and were joined by some other late night revellers who came and sat at tables around us. Eventually (about 1 am!!) we started chatting with folks who were asking what we were doing in Malta and we told them about the gigs we had coming up- it turned out that three of the people at the next table were from Ireland so, after a few more drinks, we arranged to meet up with them again a few days later at Ghanafest where we were headlining the concert.
Driving to Dar Tal Providenza in the sunshine. Our journey back was during the largest thunderstorm they’d had in years with flash flooding throughout the island!
Our first official gig for the Arts Council was a trip to play at a place called Id-Dar tal-Providenza where we first met David and Ernest who were our roadies for the day. It turned out that Ernest knew all about us already as he was due to play in one of the support bands at Ghanafest so we hung around together after the concert and it was fascinating to hear about the traditional folk music of Malta and the origins of the music festivals that take place. David had been cajoled into taking some photos of us at the Dar Tal event so we enlisted his help for more photography duties later in the week!
Our first official concert of the tour.
The following day we headed for the ferry to take us across to Sliema and our next port of call- Tony’s Bar! Yes, you heard me right. Can you imagine how happy our singer, Tony, was to be singing in Tony’s bar??
He was a little concerned when we came up to the bar and found this…
…until we worked out we were in the wrong place and then we found this (now that’s more like it!)…
Arriving earlier in the day meant that Simon was able to finally get his swim in the sea- and just look at the colour of the water when you get up close to it! And it was full of loads of tiny little fish too.
All those little fishies- and look how clear the water is!
The friendliness of the people in Sliema was just as warm and welcoming as it was in Valletta and we were sorry to leave so soon but thanks for having us and we hope when we next play in Malta that we can do a bit more work for you.
Our day off in the middle of the gigs was spent mostly in the heart of Valletta and we went off exploring around the market place and admiring the amazing buildings both old and modern when we suddenly found ourselves in the middle of a marching Brass Band. Not exactly what we expected to see but excellent all the same!
Eating al fresco was definitely our first choice whenever possible. Breakfast we ate on the roof top at the hotel and later in the day we always found somewhere nice to eat, whatever time of the day/ evening that ended up being but we took full advantage of our down time to spend a little extra time dining and socialising with each other over some excellent food with Tony and Simon deciding to go for local recipes for their dinner.
Did I tell you that our promo video had been playing on Maltese TV as an advert for Ghanafest every hour, 24 hours a day? No? Well, it was- Simon had discovered that while flicking through TV channels at about 2 am at the hotel the first night we arrived. We had just about become used to randomly hearing snippets of ourselves playing coming from screens in bars, cafes etc but on this evening the waiter taking our order literally did a double take as he turned away from our table and there we all were on the restaurant’s big screen! It was a busy area of the city and people were waiting for the national football team to start playing their match at the time and I have no idea what the waiter said but all of a sudden more and more heads started to turn in our direction! Luckily the match soon started and we went back to being just diners again.
Oh, and then Simon found a friend!
Meet Lieutenant Pigeon!
This bird literally dropped out of the sky and landed on Simon’s shoulder where it stayed for the next 15 minutes. He talked to it, stroked it, fed it and it eventually walked down his arm and onto the table where we put some water down for it.
Awww!!
As the footie got underway we made our way through the town centre, past an old ruined theatre which had been bombed during WWll and never repaired. There was an orchestra rehearsing on the stage and we stopped to listen while Steve and Tony went in search of a toilet. When they eventually returned they told us how the toilets were located in caves underneath the old theatre and you had to walk through carved out tunnels to reach them. As Steve was trying to find his way out again, the music from one of the James Bond movies suddenly reverberated around the chambers as the orchestra above launched into the 007 theme tune. Steve said it was quite surreal and, knowing that Tony wasn’t far behind, he was sorely tempted to creep along the wall, pretending to be 007 and jump out to scare the bejeebers out of Tony! And this was after just a few pints!!
We finally made our way down to one of the most famous venues in Valletta- the bar where Oliver Reed died. Aptly called ‘The Pub’ it’s a small bar in Archbishop Street and we sat with one eye on the footie, chatting to other people in the pub. We were an eclectic mix of some locals, a lovely fella from Russia who played violin in the National Orchestra of Malta and had just finished rehearsals and stopped off for a drink on his way home (we finally said goodnight to him around 1 am as I remember!) and a group of German ladies on the last night of their week long holiday. We had an amazing night full of stories and swapping tales of our days in Valletta. The only downside was that it was all uphill to get back to the hotel again!
And so to the day of Ghanafest. We were taken over to the venue by our friend, Daryl, early in the day to set up and soundcheck. The stage and other festival stalls were in the most beautiful setting of the Argotti Botanical Gardens in the Floriana district- a stunning backdrop to a music festival! When a green room really is a green room with cacti over 8ft tall adorning the walkways and fountains gently splashing water into crystal clear pools you realise you are somewhere pretty special…
As with all soundchecks, once they are done there are hours to kill before the evening concert starts so instead of being transported back to the hotel we chose to explore Floriana and we wandered off with Tony in the lead. We quickly replaced Tony’s leadership with Simon’s as Tony’s sense of direction even back home isn’t great and I’m sure we saw the same garage at least twice!
We walked along large, tree-lined avenues and saw many churches dedicated to many different saints (almost around every street corner) until we stumbled across the smallest of cafes in a back street with just two little tables crammed onto the pavement. The owner was sitting taking a quiet break until we descended but he was all smiles and chatty, quite curious how these people had appeared at his doorstep in the middle of the afternoon as he really was off the beaten track.
We sat watching locals come and go from the cafe, we met three generations of the cafe owner’s family and then to the cafe owner’s surprise another group of five women appeared and took up residence on the table next to ours. Even more surprising when they ordered their drinks in English! We ended up chatting with them and found out they were from Leicestershire of all places. We tried to persuade them to come along to our evening concert but they were literally just in the area for a few hours having gone on a bit of an adventure and just taken the local bus, alighting at a random stop. Good for them! What a great way to see the area!
As the cafe closed for the day we took a stroll back to the botanical gardens ready to meet up again with Ernie and David and to listen to the local bands performing their very unique form of traditional music.
What a great atmosphere began to develop as the crowds filtered into the park plaza and gradually filled up the seats around the stage, the bars and food stalls. Traditional craft demonstrations lined the walkways which led towards the main arena. As ever, Daryl was on hand to look after us and it was great to be able to sit and chat with him, David and Ernie along with two more new friends, Miriam and Mario- local musicians who had been following us online in the build up to Ghanafest and have remained friends ever since! That’s the beauty of this job, meeting new people and gaining new friends in the process.
Just before we headed backstage to get ready to go on stage, we spotted our three friends from Ireland- remember them? We met them on our first night outside the Beer Cave. True to their word, they had made their way across to Floriana just to come and watch our concert and it was great to catch up on what we’d all been doing over the last few days.
And so we walked out onto a fantastic stage and only then, with our new vantage point, did we get the full effect of looking out across the gardens while the sun set behind the hills in the distance, silhouetting the iconic domed church with it’s stone cross against the vivid burnt orange sky.
It seemed that no sooner did we arrive in Malta than we were heading back to the UK but I guess time really does fly when you are enjoying yourselves and, honestly, we have all fallen in love with this country!
Sitting in the sunshine, eating breakfast on the hotel rooftop, we made our last new acquaintance of the trip. Not to be out done by Simon’s friendship with Lieutenant Pigeon, Tony shared his breakfast with a very inquisitive little feathered friend who was quickly named Captain Jack. Why? Because he was a sparrow, of course!
Malta is most certainly in our sights for a return visit whenever we can sort out some dates. The Maltese people are some of the kindest, most welcoming people you could wish to meet.
Thank you Arts Council Malta for making this trip possible.
KH.
The view from our hotel balcony.
Happy New Year to you all!
2020! How did that happen??
Kellys Heroes have now been gigging continuously through five, yes, five decades!!
I'm very sure that back in 1983 when Kellys Heroes was first formed they never thought that, in the year 2020 AD, the band's box player would be sitting at a computer on New Year's Day posting on a thing called Facebook, writing to fans across the world to thank you all for your amazing support.
2019 was another year in which we were honoured to share in the special occasions that meant so much to so many of you.
We played christenings, weddings, birthday parties and wakes. We did gigs in pubs, clubs, parks, football stadiums and castles to name just a few.
We shared music, songs, stories and watched you dance, laugh and, sometimes, cry.
Looking forward, 2020 is already shaping up to be a very busy year of gigs for us and we still have an album to complete for our own label as well as another requested by the record company we do work for.
We've just started some discussions about a possible trip to play in Brittany too and we hope to be making plans soon for a future long distance tour!
Memories are there for the making and we hope you'll all be a part of them and that we will be a part of yours!
So, here's to absent friends- you are never forgotten- and to all the friends we've made along the way.
A very Happy New Year to you all.
Kellys Heroes.
St Andrew's Day 2019
The last home nation's Saints Day of the year is the patron saint of Scotland, St Andrew, and this year it falls on a Saturday so we are taking advantage of that fact and going even bigger than usual with our celebrations!
On Saturday 30th November we will be hosting an afternoon of all things Scottish from 1.30pm at The Victoria Hotel in Beeston. All music is free of charge and children are welcome.
Kellys Heroes will be sharing the stage with Piper Pat Larkin and, later on in the day, the Mellish mini Pipe Band. There will be traditional dances performed by the highly accomplished Highland Dancer, Leanne Pearson, and there will be Scottish beers on tap at the bar as well as the finest selection of whiskies this side of the border! Traditional Scottish Stovies will be on sale for those of you who get a bit peckish from all that dancing, clapping and singing. 👏
Come along- and bring a friend with you!
If you can't bring a friend, bring a stranger and they'll be your friend for sure by the end of the day.
The Alzheimer's Society Cupcake Day fundraiser 2019
Some of you will have seen the documentary programs ‘Our Dementia Choir’ which aired recently on BBC1 and which featured heavily in the national press following both programmes, such was the extent that people were touched by the story of the choir and the individuals involved.
We have a close connection with the choir as Helen’s mum, Maureen, is a member and we have been helping support them since they formed last year. Such a diverse group of characters, vast age range and totally different personalities, all brought together by their love of music and Vicky McClure’s curiosity about the effect music can have on the brain of someone suffering from dementia has formed a ‘choir family’ with bonds stronger than we could ever imagine!
Even while we and many others are fundraising to keep the choir going (if you would like to donate, go to www.justgiving.com/fundrais…/music-and-memory-dementia-choir ), once we heard about the Alzheimer’s Society Cupcake Day, some of the families decided they would like to take part and so on Thursday 13th June we held our event as part of the national fundraising effort and we had a blast!!
Maureen very kindly opened up her home to the choir, their families, her neighbours, friends, friends of friends, local councillors and many more.
For over four hours and despite the rain, there was music from Kellys Heroes, Lynn Goulbourn and the choir themselves, loads of laughter, a little bit of dancing, a raffle, a ‘guess the weight of the cake’ competition. There were people in the living room, the passage way, the kitchen, up the stairs, in the garden, basically anywhere there was room, there were people!
All together the amount raised was £340.00 which is great and if you would like to contribute too then just go to www.alzheimers.org.uk/get-involved/make-donation
Our new album is finally here!!
Look what’s just arrived!! After a few delays, we have just received the first copies of our new album, ‘Live At Scilly Folk Festival’.
This is our very first entirely live album, recorded in May when we headlined the opening concert for the 2018 Scilly Folk Festival.
Our new album, ‘Live At Scilly Folk Festival’, was recorded by our sound engineer on the night, Brendan McGreal, of Cornish Underground (cornishunderground.co.uk) and produced by Celteire Music which is the recording company owned by Kellys’ guitarist, Steve Hall, and our accordionist, Helen O’Connell. It’s packed with seventeen tracks played in true Kellys Heroes style. With over an hour of live music from the truly foot-stomping ‘Galway Girl’ to the heartfelt ‘Caledonia’, this album really captures the essence of what a Kellys Heroes gig is all about! ‘Live At Scilly Folk Festival’ is available to buy from our store now so take a look at the full track listing. We think you’re going to love it- we do!
The concert took place in the Town Hall, Hughes Town, on the stunning St Mary’s island. It was the first visit to the Scilly Isles for everyone in the band and we were very much looking forward to it after hearing so many great things about both the Scilly Isles and the festival. We boarded the Scillonian Ferry in what felt like the middle of the night, feeling a little bit the worse for wear from lack of sleep and over-enthusiastic socialising with new friends made at the previous night’s gig in Truro. The four-hour ferry crossing from Penzance to Hughes Town left everyone in no doubt as to which two of the band are good travellers and which two really aren’t! Helen and Simon disembarked both very white with just a hint of green around the gills but we arrived to bright blue skies, a couple of friends quayside who had made the journey by plane or should that be biplane?) and two of the friendliest festival organisers who quickly sorted out our bags which were sent ahead to the digs and the instruments which went straight to the sound check.
It’s fair to say that our first impressions of the island were stunning and we continued to be wowed by it’s beauty as much as by the friendliness of the local people throughout our stay. So much so that we intend to make a return trip next year and are hoping to stay longer and to be able to venture onto more of the islands next time!
CeltFest 2018 line up just announced!
CeltFest is always a special date in our diary but we're very excited about this year's line up of bands.
Alongside Kellys Heroes for CeltFest 2018 we have a fantastic band, The Outside Track, who describe themselves as a Pan Celtic group that performs Scots, Irish and Cape Breton songs and step dance. Members of the group include Ailie Robertson who has won a Live Ireland Music Award and was a BBC Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician Finalist, and Fiona Black who was a winner of the BBC’s Fame Academy. As a group they won ‘Best Group’ in the 2012 Live Ireland Music Award a ‘Tradition In Review’ award, and were nominated for the 2013 MG Alba Scots Traditional Music Award. For their album Flash Company, they also won the German Radio Critics' Prize.
Joining us to complete the 2018 line up we are very excited to have The Fitzgeralds, a family group consisting of fiddling and step dancing siblings Tom, Kerry & Julie Fitzgerald from just outside of Canada’s renowned Ottawa Valley. Featuring 3-time Canadian Grandmaster Fiddle Champions and Ontario Open Step Dance Champions, this unique act features high-energy fiddling and mind blowing step dancing. It is the rare combination of exceptional musicianship, incomparable step dancing, audience interaction, evident love of performing, and genuine sibling connection that resonates with audiences of all ages and sets this group apart.
The music will start at 2.00pm and don't forget- you get all of this for free! So come down to The Victoria Hotel, Dovecote Lane, Beeston, Nottingham, settle back and enjoy Celtic music at it's best.