Johnny Duhan
 
“Peerless” -  Sunday Times
            “Genius” -    Irish Music magazine
          “Compelling honesty’ -  Hotpress
 
 
                                                                        
                                                                            photo: Kevin Byrne  
 
 
                                                                         Flame
    
 
                                                                        A rose won’t grow if the soil below goes dry,
                                                                it withers and droops and dies at the root,
                                                                and its red petals drop like blood that won’t stop from a wound
                                                                and then the flower without any power lies ruined.
 
                                                                The heart is the same, the stream in the vein gives it life;
                                                                cut off the flow and it won’t go
                                                                        for blood is the source of all that force in the beat,
                                                                        body and soul need it to roll for heat.
 
                                                                And fire won’t glow if wind doesn’t blow on the hearth;
                                                                the yellow blaze smoulders and fades,
                                                                and you’re left to poke at the cinders and smoke that remain,
                                                                        but without air you would despair of the flame.
 
                                                                O when my first flame died and you became my love
                                                                a fresh breath of air made sparks appear
                                                                and my heart, like coal lit up and my soul took fire,
                                                                while out on your bed you grew blushing red, my flower.
 
                                                                                        ______________________________
 
                          
 
                                                                      Corner Shop
                                                                    ____________
 
Wasn’t it Ezra Pound who said at a low point in his career that he wished he had become a small time
shopkeeper instead of a poet, for peace of mind’s sake. Well this little frustrated songster has lately been forced to open his own little corner shop, due to frustration at lack of support of major stores to keep my modest body of work (six albums, a lifetime’s condensed work) stocked on their shelves.
       Like all new stores, my little corner shop is opening with a flourish. Buy my new album, Just Another Town, and we will throw in a copy of my Don Quixote album free of charge. The main reason for this generosity is that the first edition of Don Quixote has almost run out, and I’ve decided to expand a second edition with several songs taken from other albums, and rechristen the collection TO THE LIGHT. I like to think that Don Quixote will become a valuable collectors item in time (I’ve always been a dreamer), so grab a copy while you can.
       To avail of this limited offer, press Shop
                                                       ____________________________
 
 
 
 
Happy New Year. 2008
 
Nothing like starting a new year with a new song. Song of the Bird was inspired partly by fellow Limerick man, John Griffin, who sent me some poems & stories just before Christmas. Though I was unable to set any of John’s pieces to music I was deeply moved by his work, especially pieces related to his mother. I used the title from one of the poems to put wings to the following song, the lyric of which was inspired by my mother, who, as far as I remember, introduced me to John many years ago. My mother died in March 2007. On her deathbed, I was struck by the bird-like expression on her face, which reminded me of a dove about to take flight for the heavens. It also brought back to me the bird with the broken wing referred to in the opening verse, which acted as the DNA for the song.
 
                                Song of the Bird
                              (for John Griffin)
 
                    She let him nurse a frail bird
                    With a broken wing;
                    She gave him bread for the bird
                    And the bird began to sing.
 
                    She came alive in the boy
                    Who now hungers for the word
                    To tell the world of the joy
                    Of the song of the bird
 
                    And so I sing to the world
                    Of what was heard
                    In the song of the bird.
 
                    She lost her mother as a child
                    And as an orphan bride
                    She lost a son. She lost her mind
                    And her spirit all but died.
 
                    But she came alive in the boy
                    Who now hungers for the word
                    To tell the world of the joy
                    Of the song of the bird.
          
                           And so I sing to the world
                    Of what was heard
                    In the song of the bird.
 
                    She gave him faith in the Sun,
                    He gave her hope in the light.
                    And now he prays, as a son,
                    For her song to take flight.
    
                    She came alive in the boy
                    Who now hungers for the word
                    To tell the world of the joy
                    Of the song of the bird.
 
                           And so I sing to the world
                    Of what was heard
                    In the song of the bird.
 
                    
 
 
                                _________________________________________________________________
 
            
 
 
 
                        
 
 
I had a phone call recently from a guy who asked me why I never print the lyrics of my songs in my album booklets. I told him that the main reason was because I feel that lyrics are best appreciated when they’re slowly discovered from the singing voice rather than the written page. However, as it happens, I have been working for almost two years on a book of my complete lyrics & accompanying stories. The book is divided into four chapters - JUST ANOTHER TOWN, TO THE LIGHT, THE VOYAGE, and THE BEACON. The overall title is TO THE LIGHT - Johnny Duhan, Unsung.
 
                                       Prologue to the book
                                                            
                                                                
In a recurring dream I’m on the stage of a large theatre (much larger that the art centres and folk clubs I’m accustomed to perform in) about to start singing to a capacity crowd that have just greeted me with the most enthusiastic round of applause of my career when a fire breaks out at the back of the hall that sends the audience scurrying for the exit doors, leaving me alone and bewildered in a pall of smoke on the stage.
    This dream illustrates my deepest fears regarding the performance side of my career, which has never been that successful. Despite that, I decided to present this book of my collected lyrics in the form of four separate stage performances, mainly because the stories that bind the collections together came to me on stage and seem the most natural way of introducing a reading audience to my work, but also to display my entire life’s work in the prism of just four sequential chapters.
    The title TO THE LIGHT seemed appropriate on a number of levels, mainly because there is a celebration of light running throughout my work, starting with my boyhood love of sunlight and moonlight in Just Another Town; my hankering for limelight in To The Light; a yearning for the family hearth-glow in The Voyage, and, finally, my quest for spiritual light in The Beacon.
    These four chapters of my unsung story offer a clear picture of the scope of the lyrical side of my design, but another aim in producing this book was to try and awaken interest in my musical albums, for it is the melodies that accompany my words that transform lyrics into song.