by Eric FitzGerald
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IN April 1998, trad musician Seamus Begley launched Dolan’s Warehouse and returns this weekend with Steve Cooney to celebrate Dolan’s IMRO Venue of the Year award for 2015.
In February Dolan’s won the IMRO Irish Music Venue of the Year Award at the annual IMRO event held in Dublin. These awards are presented annually in recognition of music venues that provide the highest standards in live music entertainment. Dolan’s had won the Munster Venue award before and was awarded a Hot Press Achievement award last year, this National award was something very special for Mick Dolan.
“It was like winning an Oscar,” he beamed to Limerick Post this week.
It was overdue recognition for a venue that was first established by Mick and Valerie Dolan in 1994 when they opened a small bar on Limerick’s Dock Road. Not a prime location by any stretch of the imagination but with a policy of traditional Irish music every night of the week, which continues today, the bar became popular with musicians and punters. So popular that when an old warehouse that was once used for banana ripening came up for sale, Mick saw an opportunity to expand Dolan’s music offering beyond just nightly trad sessions and Dolan’s Warehouse was opened in April 1998.
“We felt there was an opportunity for purpose built venue. Not just for trad though, Something Happens and Emotional Fish played there in the first few months.”
With consistently high production values and a welcoming family atmosphere, Dolan’s Warehouse was soon on the national circuit and has hosted Hozier, Mumford & Sons, Snow Patrol, Kasabian, Franz Ferdinand, Stereo MCs and The Darkness to name just a few.
A weekly lineup of gigs brings jazz, comedy, trad, rock, dance, country and theatre to grace the venue’s five stages these days. “We are on the circuit, if anybody wants to play in a venue this size it is open to them,” concludes Mick.
See Dolan’s advertising and Limerick Post listings for the full weekly lineups in Dolan’s Warehouse, Acoustic Room, Kasbah Social Club, Terrace or check yourself in by the fire in the bar where it all began for the nightly trad session.
The Venue of the Year celebrations will feature a rare performance from Begley & Cooney, two of the foremost performers of Irish trad mixing Begley’s wild West Kerry accordion playing with Cooney’s ground breaking guitar accompaniment. Their 1997 acclaimed album ‘Meitheal’ is a good starting point to discover the duo’s fiery Cork/ Kerry trad dance music.
Begley recently received the prestigious TG4 Gradam Ámhranaí (Singers Award) and Steve Cooney has played on or produced over 100 albums including those for Mary Black, Sharon Shannon, Altan and Martin Hayes.
Seamus Begley and Steve Cooney play Dolan’s Warehouse this Friday April 24.
