G? with Declan Flanagan

dances in the Ashdown Park Hotel. Richie Halpin has regular Saturday nights in the Rhu Glenn. There's a Sunday night dance in the Talbot Hotel in Wexford thanks to John and Leslie. If you'd like a weekly list sent free to your phone just give me a txt.

The Ardattin Inn is holding its own very well with both its Friday night and Sunday night dances thanks to a lot of hard work by Ger Mellet.

The Parkview House Shilleagh has put itself squarely on the map as a go-to venue on Saturday nights. Mellissa and Eugene leave no stone unturned when it comes to giving customers what they want, and I hear they have plans in the pipeline to extend their dance floor which would be the icing on the cake for what is an already fabulous venue.

New song releases:

Derek Ryan - "Pure And Simple". From his new album of the same name this is nice and lively. The album has a great mix of songs so well worth the purchase.

Ciaran Rosney - "Green Green Grass".

A recent hit by George Ezra and a great choice by Ciaran as regurgitating the same American country songs can become a bit monotonous. Very popular and I'm getting asked to play it at classes which is always a good sign.

Gavin Gribben - "Pub Crawl”. I'm delighted Gavin decided to release this lively version of Nathan Carter's 2012 song from his Wagon Wheel album as I have it nearly worn out.

Mike Denver - "Clare To Here". This

1976 hit from one of my favourite artists Ralph McTell. "Can you hear the old man, as he walks the streets of London", how many times have we heard that sung in the pub or at house parties. But it was while he was working on a building site in 1963 (the year I was born) and listening to an Irish gang talk about back home that he asked one of them called Michael, "You must find it strange here in London coming from Ireland?" To which Michael replied, "It's a long way from Clare to here." And the rest is history as we say. Now Mike's very lively version of this song is great but is going to take me a bit of time to get used to as I often sang it in many's a pub in London while I lived there. And for all of us emigrants, it really tugged at the auld heart strings.

So that's all for me for this issue of the Slaney News and I hope to see you all here, same time, same place for our March edition.

– Declan Flanagan