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Biograpy
Concerts, Recitals, Workshops,Weddings
contact: dickydeegan@gmail.com
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Dicky Deegan is immensely proud and grateful to have been awarded the Australian International Celtic Artist of the Year 2020 by the Celtic Council of Australia. Additionally, and in such a difficult creative year as 2020, Dicky feels honoured to have been chosen to play the Uilleann Pipes for Julien Temple and Johnny Depp's new film, CROCK OF GOLD – A FEW ROUNDS WITH SHANE McGOWAN, (released 4th Dec 2020 and 7th Dec worldwide). The additional icing on the cake for 2020 was Dicky also being invited in late November to perform the Uilleann Pipes by Na Piobairi Uilleann, Dublin, for their series, ‘Piping in the Parlour’.
Bonkers 2020 started very well early January with Dicky, as part of The Kilburn Cowboys, sharing the stage with the Riverdance in Singapore before flying on to Miami and Las Vegas via London and Detroit (great bar, great beer & great people at Detroit Airport) with the Kilburn Cowboys!
Besides regular sessions in London, Dicky Deegan has also played in London for:
Film producer Guy Richie (Sherlock Holmes 1 & 2, Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels etc) and Jude law (Dicky is one of the original embers of Guy Richie’s Punchbowl Band-The Punchbowl, Mayfair); Piers Morgan-(The Hansom Cab, Kensington); Anya Hindmarsh, (The Star, Belgravia, re-branded The Bag and Bottle); He plays regularly for Stella McCartney and friends: Cameron Diaz, Gwyneth Paltro, Gwen Stefani, Cheryl Cole, Liv Tyler, Kate Moss and Ringo Star-The Cow, Notting Hill/The Royal Institute, Mayfair.
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Dicky Deegan (born north of London, parents are from Adamstown, Co Wexford and Emo, Co Laois) has been playing the Uilleann Pipes for 30 years and Irish Traditional Music on the Tin Whistle for over 45 years (formal lessons through Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann[tutors Brendan Mulkere and Paul Gallagher] in the early to late 1970’s at St Joseph’s, Leagrave, Luton, and The London Irish Centre, Camden Town).
Favouring the parlour ‘gentlemen mould' of solo piping, with subtle and intricate use of the regulators (he plays a Geoff Woof full set in the key of C#), his playing has been recorded for, and by, the Traditional Music Archives, Merrion Square, Dublin.
Dicky also plays a D set (chanter in boxwood by Matt Kiernan) for sessions, studio, ensemble playing etc.
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In addition to many Irish/Folk/World Music Festival appearances over the years, Dicky has also performed several times in the Sydney Opera House + once on top of the Opera House Sails. He is also honoured to have been invited by Richard Tognetti and the Australian Chamber Orchestra as their guest artist to performin the fabulous ‘Barrel Room’ for the prestigious Huntingdon Estate Music Festival in New South Wales (The concert space known as the 'Barrel Room' is reputed to have “...one of the best acoustics on the planet.” Richard Tognetti).
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Way back in Sydney ’94, Dicky teamed with the Aboriginal Didgeridoo legend Mark Atkins where they became the first musicians to hold a concert from on top of the Sydney Opera House Sails. This special concert, organized by the Sydney Opera House Trust, drew to a close the spectacular events and celebrations marking the Sydney Opera House's 21st Birthday that year.
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Dicky played Uilleann Pipes for the IMAX film, ‘Horses –The Story of Equus’. USA 2002
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Has toured Australia with IHOS Opera.
Has travelled through outback and country Australia, performing and holding tutorials/workshops on the Tin Whistle for small community schools.
Dicky lived in Tasmania and mainland Australia for 21 year, first cutting his teeth on stage playing with the Hobart based Dance Band, The Collywobblers Their close affiliation to The Tasmanian Wilderness Society ensured that Dicky’s earliest antipodean gigs in Australia were held on the edge of Tasmania’s South West Wilderness (Wilderness Society Base Camp) for the Gordon -below-Franklin blockade.
(The Gordon Riverand one of the world's last wild rivers, the Franklin, were eventually saved from being flooded in 1983).
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Dicky has performed at many of the Australian Irish/ Folk/World Music Festivals including:
The Great Hall, Montsalvat (Victoria)
The Australian National Folk Festival (Australian Capital Territory)
Malaney and Woodford Malaney (Queensland)
Newcastle Folk Festival (New South Wales)
Katoomba/Blue Mountains Folk & Blues festival (New South Wales)
Der Spiegeltent (South Australia)
Adelaide Fringe Festival (South Australia)
Adelaide Arts Festival (South Australia)
Longford Folk Festival (Tasmania)
Georgetown Folk Festival (Tasmania)
Cygnet Folk Festival Tasmania)
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Dicky conducts workshops and tutorials on the Tin Whistle (accessible to most folk) as well as Uilleann Pipes(playing, maintenance, tuning) and reed making for the Uilleann Pipes. In this capacity he was the invited guest of the Nelson School of Music and NZ Uilleann Pipers Society, flown in from Tasmania to hold Master Classes on Uilleann Piping and Reed Making. This also included a series of recitals.
Reed maker for the Riverdance
In Hobart 1998, Dicky made and tailored an Uilleann Pipe chanter reed for the Riverdance piper, Declan Masterson, for their Australia/SE Asia tour. Declan has recently informed Dicky that this very same chanter reed he made for him all those years ago in Hobart, has been playing problem-free (in extreme temperatures, humidity and altitudes) these last 23 years for the Riverdance and still shows no signs of wear!
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Dicky Deegan’s own Uilleann Pipes (with 7 reeds + double-bass regulator - see photo below) performed magnificently under duress in the Big Top Tent at the Woodford Malaney Festival in the Glass House Mountains, Queensland, where the heatwave temperature on stage at 1.30 pm reached 52C (126F) in 95% humidity!
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Dicky has worked with many artists including:
Jackie Daley
Mairead O’Sullivan
Donal Lunny
Brian Kelly (ex-Pogues)
Billy Moran
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TV and Radio performances include:
ABC Classic FMRadio (Australia)
Canal+ TV (France)
RTE (Ireland)
Raidio na Gaeltachta(Ireland)
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Now based in Hull in the UK, Dicky performs regularly throughout the UK, Europe and Ireland, eg:
Festival Interceltique, Lorient (Bretagne)
Festival Cornouaille, Quimper (Bretagne)
Festival Landerneau(Bretagne)
The Galway Inn, Lorient (Bretagne)
International Arts, Montmatre, Paris(France)
Willy Clancy Festival, Miltown Malbay, Clare 2015(Ireland)
Cobblestone, Dublin (Ireland
Scoil Acla (Ireland)
Theberton Concert/Recital Series(Suffolk)
Palimpsest(Cambridge)
C-Fab Fest(Lincolnshire)
Small World Festival, Badger Farm(Lincolnshire)
Whitby Folk Festival(Nth Yorkshire)
Musicport, Bridlington/Whitby(Yorkshire)
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Dicky has four albums of mostly solo Uilleann Piping:
1-By the River of Gems (1989)
2-An Phib (2002) – released with the assistance of Na Piobaire Uilleann at the Willy Clancy Festival, Co Clare.
3-Music of the Irish Celts (2005)
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In addition to playing in various London sessions, Dicky has recently teamed with the fiddle player Milo Thelwell, and Bodhran player Tommy Randell, to perform a series of Fiddle/Uilleann Pipe recitals in intimate and acoustically friendly venues along the North Yorkshire coast.
.Dicky has also performed with Derby based singer/songwriter Matt Williams.
Dicky also plays in and around London for Sean Brady and occasionally performs in his band The Kilburn Cowboys.
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When not performing or holding workshops, Dicky teaches Tin Whistle, Flute and Uilleann Pipes. He is also Reed Making, recording a solo album of 19thcentury Union Piping in appropriate acoustic spaces and notating a detailed collection of Uilleann Pipe music.
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Maintaining a 30 year tradition, Dicky is available for your Wedding on request.
Go to: www.wedding-piper.com
Reviews for the Album - An Phib
Irish Sunday Tribune Review of 'An Phib'
"Here is a hugely-interesting player in the 'gentleman' mould, greatly involved with his instrument and all its wondrous potential, particularly on airs. A soft spot for the harmonic is there in keyboard chordal drones, and adventuring into didgeridoo shows he is not shy of experiment. This is rather overwhelming, but if Paddy O'Brien's is humerously zany, and his tricks on 'Ask my Father' approach stuck-CD precision, curios like using regulators for melody notes and a great launeddas-like blast at times leave little room for tedium. His obsession with the technicalities of tight fingering and regulator effects is a constant lift - in moments pure Clancy or again Ennis, on perfectly tuned, high-quality instruments".
Irish Sunday Tribune, Dublin - Fintan Vallely