Tuesday 3 January 2017

Single: Dean Maywood - Oileán na Marbh

Dean Maywood Oilean na Marbh



Dean Maywood - Oileán na Marbh


Info: Dean Maywood is a singer songwriter from Donegal who has just released his debut single, 'Oileán na Marbh', and is currently working on his debut album. To date, Maywood has played a number of support slots live, including two sold out theatre shows with Goats Dont Shave and one with The Four Of Us.

Oileáin na Marbh, or Island of the Dead, is located off the coast of Donegal, at Carrick Finn, the place is steeped with a tragic and disturbing history, it is where over 500 infants remains are located, as they were not allowed to be buried on the mainland by order of the Catholic Church who refused their parents a Christian burial, as a result of being stillborn and unbaptised. Parents often had to wait until low tide so they could make the journey across to the island from the mainland by foot to bury their dead child.

This is the backdrop to Donegal folk musician Dean Maywood's debut single release of the island's name. Maywood delicately deals with this theme in a poignant manner; 'mother cries there every Sunday, on the patch of rock most green, father cries for his lost treasure, when he's had too much poitín, tá seoid faoin talamh, ar Oileáin na Marbh ('there's a jewel under the earth, on the Island of the Dead')'.

Musically the song is quite beautiful and the guitar-playing is most impressive, mixing styles of traditional English folk and elements of Spanish guitar. Vocally he is certainly in the mould of Irish folk song-writers past and present with an equally impressive range in his voice which acts as a worthy medium in the age old Irish tradition of orally keeping stories from the past alive. It's a tantalising look at what might be in store on his full album.


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