LAist Interview: Liz Carroll
Born and raised in Chicago, award winning fiddler Liz Carroll has Irish music in her bones. She has composed dozens of traditional tunes, many of which have become standards among her peers. At the young age of eighteen, she won the prestigious Senior All-Ireland Championship and is also the recipient of the prestigious National Heritage Award. This weekend she and guitarist John Doyle will fill the Throop Church in Pasadena with the powerful sounds of Irish music.
These days it is getting more common to find women musicians in the Irish music world, but it wasn't always that way. What inspired you to start playing traditional Irish music?
I started playing music when I was pretty little. My dad is an accordion player. My mother's father was a fiddle player. They really liked the music. I think maybe because we were a smaller family, it's just a brother and myself, that when we got to around five or six my parents liked to take us out to the local pub where somebody was playing. Usually it was like a Sunday night thing. On Sunday nights they used to have a radio show here in Chicago on the South Side at "Hanley's House of Happiness". There were great musicians on stage and they usually had a dancing school perform too. Very young kids who would hop out and do a jig or do a reel whether it was a solo or a three-hand or an eight-hand dance. It was cool to bring your family, so they brought us. When I think about it, most of my mom's family, she's one of thirteen and my dad is one of thirteen and all of those brothers and sisters had at least five kids. So they didn't get to go out, but my folks did take us out. I always feel like the reason that you didn't see as many women musicians pre-1950's is because they were from huge families and didn't get out as much. When the girls got married, they didn't have just one kid or two, they had a lot. Where as if the husband was a musician, he could go out, but the moms were stuck at home.
When did you first start playing and how did you choose the fiddle?
I actually started on the accordion when I was five or six years old. I was playing it around the house. My parents bought me a little toy accordion which eventually got stepped on by my brother. Then I started on the real accordion. I was always interested in instruments. They brought a tin whistle into the house. A little penny whistle. I started learning my tunes on that. I was nine when I finally could pick an instrument at school. Luckily we had a nun there who was teaching violin. As soon as I got the violin, I started also trying to figure out my tunes that I already knew on the accordion and the whistle. I didn't feel like I had to wait for a lesson to start figuring this thing out.
What do you remember about your first trip to Ireland?
We went to Ireland when we were quite young. I went first when I was five. The grandparents, my mom's parents, were over there. We went again when I was ten. You didn't go very often because it was expensive. I had gotten into the music already here. When I started playing my parents used to take me to seisuns (sessions) where people were sitting around playing. People from all over Ireland and people from Chicago of Irish parents. So the trips to Ireland were rare until I was about fourteen. We went with my Irish dancing school to tour Ireland. They competed in a competition and then I played in a competition.
When you were young you started winning competitions in the All-Ireland Championship. By the time you were eighteen you won the Senior All-Ireland Championship. What reactions did you get from the other competitors when you, an American woman, won the competition?
Well I always thought it was a good reaction, but I think I was expecting the best from folks. If you play, you play. That competition over there was always very international. People know that the all Ireland Fleadh Cheoil is a town taken up with this music. Every pub and every little street corner in the town has music going on. You can just walk down the street and on the left side of the street there is a big session going on and it's a bunch of accordions and whistles and flutes and maybe somebody backing it on a guitar. And you walk down the street and on the right, there's a piano, accordion and somebody is singing. There's German tourists. There's French. There are people over from England of Irish decent, but a lot of people are tourists. They are coming from Amsterdam. They are coming from Switzerland. It's just a big international deal. There are people from France playing Irish music. There are people from Greece playing Irish music. I don't think it was that huge of a deal for them to have an American playing, especially one whose parents were from there anyway. They took it pretty well.
Your compositions are played and recorded by many of your peers. When did you start to compose original tunes? What inspires you to write a new piece?
I always wrote tunes, even before I started the fiddle. I don't know what really causes that. I just happened to do it when I was young. I would hear extra melodies beyond the ones that I was learning. There are plenty of tunes. No one ever has to make up a tune because there are just thousands of them. When you think about it, it is just such a small little format. It's a first part that has eight measures, a second part that has eight measures. Usually they can't be completely exclusive of each other. There has to be some reference from the first part to the second part, that's going to make these two parts make sense. It's a very small little format, except that there are an infinite number of tunes that have been composed around that little thing. Plus there are different timings. There are jigs. There are reels. I always thought that way. People ask me if I have made up other types of music. I might be influenced by other types of music, but this format really works good. It's like a person that wrote sonnets- that was kind of good, there are nine lines and so many words and you can fit that in. Or a haiku. It's really worked out and I love doing it and I love it if they get picked up by people. I've been lucky to be a good enough player that I do do recordings and on those recordings a lot of times I am able to put on my little pieces.
When you play in Pasadena on November 11, you will be joined by guitarist John Doyle. How did that collaboration come about?
We've been playing a good bit since I did a record ("Lost in the Loop") with John some years ago. I did another solo record ("Lake Effect") and John figured prominently on that one as well. Then we finally and album called "In Play" and called ourselves Liz Carroll & John Doyle. We skipped having any back up and just did it ourselves. He's a great great player. I think if you hear him on there, you would probably know why anyone would enjoy playing with John. He's solid as a rock timing wise, he's as inventive as all hell, and there is such a great spirit and push to his style that suits me. Suits a lot of people. He plays with a lot of people on their recordings and on their tours. His playing is strikingly vibrant.
Tell me about what you have planned for the performance this weekend at the Throop Church?
We'll grab some old little gems that we have been playing. We've been touring a lot. I keep writing new tunes and so does John. We did a long tour in Ireland and Northern Ireland and came up with a lot of different things there. We'll be playing a bunch of sets of new tunes.
Where is the best pub scene in LA?
I'd love to know. I've played in Pasadena three times. I'd love to find a session in LA. I'd like to play a few tunes with all of the local folks.
What is your drink of choice?
Lately I've been liking Newcastle Dark or a nice glass of single malt scotch.
You can hear Liz Carroll and John Doyle fill Throop Church with their tunes on Sunday, November 11 at 7:30 PM. You can buy tickets and get more information at Folkworks.
photo by Knuff Photography
Liz Carroll with the String Sisters
Liz on NPR's All Things Considered.