Michael Coleman never made a commercial recording in Ireland. He left Sligo for America in 1914, and it was in New York studios between 1921 and 1936 that he cut the 78rpm discs – around eighty tracks in all – that changed how Irish traditional music is played. Copies came back across the Atlantic in the post and were worn thin on kitchen gramophones, and a generation of fiddlers learned his settings of the tunes note for note. The centre named after him sits a few kilometres from where he was born.
The man behind the centre
Coleman was born in 1891 in the townland of Knockgrania, in the Killavil district near Ballymote. His father played the flute, and the family home drew in the musicians of the district. He emigrated at twenty-three, settled in New York from 1917, and died there in January 1945. His playing defined what is now called the south Sligo fiddle style: fast, heavily ornamented, built on fingered rolls and bowed triplets, with melodic variations that became the standard way to play the tunes. In 2015 the US Library of Congress added his 1922 recording of ‘The Boys of the Lough’ to its National Recording Registry. A roadside monument, put up in 1974, marks his birthplace on the Tubbercurry–Gurteen road.
Inside the museum
Purpose-built and opened in 1999, the centre is hard to miss on the way through Gurteen: a pink-walled block with a round tower and green-framed windows. A visit starts with a 12-minute film on the history of Irish traditional music and the decorative fiddle technique of the Sligo style, then an interactive exhibition with touchscreens covering musicians of the region past and present. There is a music shop selling CDs, instruments and books, and a cup of tea or coffee to finish. As a Comhaltas regional resource centre, it also holds an archive of live recordings you can listen to.
Concerts and sessions
The heart of the place is a 140-seat tiered theatre. Through July and August it runs summer sessions with a resident group of musicians, singers and dancers, one of the longer-running shows of its kind in the country, and the annual Michael Coleman festival usually falls in August, drawing well-known players from across the tradition. Festival tickets run to around €15, and some junior sessions are free. Off-season, the theatre still hosts concerts, so it is worth checking what is on before you assume the doors are shut.
The honest bit
This is a specialist traditional-music centre, not a general attraction, and that shapes what you get. Arrive on a quiet weekday afternoon and it is a good museum and a short film. Arrive on a session night and it is a room full of live playing, which is the thing that makes the trip worth it. The two are not the same visit. Check the session and concert calendar before you travel, since the schedule is thin outside the summer and around the festival.
Learning to play
The Coleman School of Music runs lessons all year in fiddle, flute, tin whistle, concertina and other traditional instruments, taught by local players one-to-one or in small groups, from beginners up. If you are staying in the area for a while it is a rare chance to take a lesson in the style where it was made.
Getting there and nearby
Gurteen (also spelled Gorteen) sits in south Sligo, about 40km south of Sligo town and close to the Roscommon border, with the centre open Monday to Saturday, 10am to 5pm. This corner is the heartland of the south Sligo style, so the setting fits. The Owenmore River runs quietly through the same townlands, and the megalithic passage tombs at Carrowkeel sit up on the Bricklieve Mountains a short drive east, above the caves at Caves of Keash. About 5km from the centre at Mount Irwin, a replica of the Coleman farmhouse is furnished as a 1920s Sligo home.
The single most useful thing you can do is time your visit to a session or a concert. Look up the calendar first, then build the day around it – the museum is a fine hour, but the music is why the centre exists.