Great Music Backbone of "American Wake"

Irish eyes weren't smiling much in 1847, when the potato famine devastated that green and pleasant land, but there are smiles, clap-alongs and sing-alongs in "An American Wake" by singer/composer Barry Cloyd and storyteller Brian "Fox" Ellis.

This original show, written and produced by Prairie Folklore Theatre, opened Friday night and repeats at 2 p.m. today at the Illinois Central College Peforming Arts Center in a benefit for the ICC Core Values scholarship program.

Its theme, taken from an Irish tradition of holding a "wake" when a member of the village left for America, allows Cloyd and Ellis to put together traditional folklore, folk songs, poetry and ballads to the music of the Roundstone Buskers.

Just in time for St. Patrick's Day, the Buskers reel off jigs for the company to dance on stage and step lively tunes for the Flynn School of Irish Dancers.

In the story of "Rory O'Donnell and the Leprechan," told by Jerry Johnson in his role as the village "Senachie" - an old man who is blessed with the gift of gab -the dancers appear to Rory as a dancing troop of fairies, and later they show off their skills at that straight-armed step dancing.

Music is the show's backbone, and the Roundstone Buskers bring accomplished musicianship with Shannan Sullivan as fiddler and violinist, Tom Jones keeping the beat on bodhran drum, dumbek and penny whistle, and Tom Grafton on guitar and hammered dulcimer. Jones' drum solo won big applause.

Cloyd, in the role of the young man leaving Ireland for a better future he hopes to find in America, is well known to audiences for his singing and guitar playing, and he joins the Buskers on guitar and mandolin as well as playing solo ballads.

He went to Ireland to research part of this show in the library of Peoria's sister city, Clonnel, and he composed original songs.

Ellis has traveled the world as a storyteller and he's in top form here telling the enchanting tale of "Oisin In Tier Na Nog" (The Isle of the Ever Young) with its beautiful princess and gleaming white stallion with silver hooves, and the young man who falls under the princess' spell.

Filling out the cast are storyteller, Fran Moss as the mother; Sullivan as Barry's girlfriend; Kim Holdham as Brian's wife Kathleen; and a half-dozen youngsters as the kids in the family.

There's a cozy, inviting Irish cottage setting for this show, designed by the producers and assembled with the aid of ICC crews, with lighting by Randy Phillips and sound by Dan Greuter. The ICC costume department supplied period clothing in addition to that of the actors' own choices.

A program note says, "In writing and producing this musical we were stunned by the ways in which 1,000-year-old stories prophesied the future. …We were also awestruck by the ways these old stories were relevant to current issues."

In the show, family members complain bitterly about their English landlords, wondering why they have to pay rent "for their own land," and vow retribution.

Both Cloyd and Ellis have recorded CDs, and these are available in the lobby.

Theo Jean Kenyon
Peoria Journal Star
March 2003