Ireland’s internationally-renowned trad band, Dervish, had two big things lined up for 2007. The first ­was representing Ireland in the Eurovision last May with ‘They Can’t Stop The Spring’, written by journalist John Waters. With the full might of RTE behind them, the project was launched amid much hope and excitement. They would be seen in over two hundred million homes around Europe. Win, lose or draw, it might be the makings of them...The result was disastrous: they romped home in last place of the 24 contestants. It was Ireland’s worst ever Eurovision final performance, leaving a sour taste for all concerned. One might have thought that after that the band would be involved in a damage limitation exercise for some time to come. Au contraire, however, Dervish’s other project – their brand new album entitled Travelling Show – turned out to be a real cracker.
It’s just too doggone awkward to start my interview with Cathy Jordan, Dervish’s vocalist and frontwoman, by mentioning the Eurovision debacle. We kick off instead with the band’s gorgeous new album, which is a must-buy for trad-lovers of every age and ilk.
Dervish’s hallmark is to make old tunes sound new and new songs sound old – and Travelling Show brings this talent to the bridge. It really is an extraordinary record. Jordan’s take, for example, on ‘Gypsies Tramps And Thieves’ makes Cher’s big hit from the 1970s seem like it was written two hundred years ago. Meanwhile, tracks like ‘The Coolea Jig’ and ‘The Master’s Return’ infuse the energy and verve so present in contemporary Irish trad into tunes whose origins are ancient. And aside from the thrilling music, Travelling Show, with its beautiful artwork and design, and fascinating sleeve notes, is a joy to the eye and the mind as well as to the ear.
It’s a pleasure listening to Jordan describe what first captivates her about a song and makes her want Dervish to transmute it.
“I think it’s the words. Old-worldy words. Like ‘The Queen And The Soldier’ sounds like it was written in the 19th century, but in fact it was only written 20 years ago, by Suzanne Vega. But it has that old-fashionedness about it. Modern language like ‘baby’ isn’t there.
“I’m a traditionalist at heart,” she observes. “All those traditional tunes and songs, as they’re passed down from generation to generation, they gather the experiences and love and loss and longing and the energy of all those people. I would feel an obligation to pass that on, to keep the wheel turning.
“Songs are stories,” she adds. “They’re a document of history. The one thread we all had in common when we started Dervish was the desire to keep the music alive and bring it to as many far flung places as we could. We were interested in the face of Irish music abroad, and what it does for Ireland’s image. The more exposure Irish music gets abroad, the more exposure and appreciation it gets in Ireland.
“But where once I might’ve worried about the future of Irish music, I definitely don’t any more. There’s so many brilliant players out there that are keepers of the grail, more than ever before, and the standard is absolutely phenomenal. And they keep coming – 15 and 16 year-olds, cool and trendy-looking kids.
“That’s what I love too about playing this kind of music: it encompasses all age groups. You’d get the 80-year-old with the 15-year-old, and they’re both having as good a time as each other.”
Originally from Roscommon, Jordan has made Sligo her home. She speaks warmly of the musical culture there, which is vibrant and eclectic.
“The thing about hanging around Sligo for as long as Dervish have, is that all the musicians of all the different genres intermingle and swap musics. You’d see the bluegrass people at the trad session and vice versa; you’d see the rock people at the jazz session and vice versa. We all know each other and play together, and we’re all friends as well. Every Christmas there’s a gathering of all the Sligo musicians, and you never know what direction the music is going to bring you in. It’s a fantastic town from that point of view, and always has been down through the years.”
It’d be impossible to finish an interview with Cathy that looks back over 2007 without mentioning the fact that Dervish came last in Eurovision 2007, garnering just five points – from Albania! – in the process
“You want to use the ‘E’ word, don’t you?” laughs Jordan. “Well, I’m delighted the new album’s out, because it’s an excellent antidote to all of that.
“Whatever about the result – and it was the worst result you could’ve wished for ­– I think our regrets would’ve been much bigger had we not done it. We did it, we tried it, we gave it our best shot and it didn’t work out. But the experience was fantastic – the people we met along the way, the whole razzmatazz of it.”
Was it mortifying while the voting was being called out?
“It was a kind of out-of-body experience,” she recalls. “At one stage the cameras flashed on us and there was nothing but long faces. I think that was the worst part of it all, during the votes. But the Eurovision is what it is, and geographically and musically and everything else, we weren’t what the masses wanted. The first text I got on the night after the voting was from a friend who’s from London which said, ‘Dahling, it’s an honour to come last in the cheesiest music competition in the world.’
“My whole family was over for it, and my niece in her seven-year-old innocence reckoned that the scoreboard was upside down. And my brother said, ‘It was perfect in every way, from start to finish, except for that small bit of voting at the end’. And that’s the way to look at it. It was perfect in every way, and we had a ball, and it was great craic and the parties out there were fantastic and we did things we never would have done otherwise.”
Were you worried about the kind of impact coming last in the Eurovision might have on your future careers?
“I don’t think we allowed ourselves to go there,” says Jordan. “And then a week later we were back up on the horse. We went to Latvia and Lithuania with President Mary McAleese, and that was a great antidote. There was fantastic reaction to that concert, and the website traffic was way up.
“But for the first couple of months afterwards, it was like, oh god, how can we face people? And for ages, meeting new people that you hadn’t seen in a while, it was like the elephant in the room. It’s history now, but I suppose it’s history that will always be pinned to your collar. Every time the Eurovision comes up and whoever’s involved doesn’t come last, it’ll always be like, well at least they didn’t do as badly as Dervish...
“But it hasn’t done us any harm at all in terms of record sales,” she adds, mischievously. “In fact, it’s all good. A great story for the grandchildren!”
Judging by her sense of humour, and the fulfilment and delight that she takes – and deservedly so – in Dervish’s new album, Travelling Show, the Eurovision experience has clearly done no long-term damage to Cathy Jordan’s musical self-esteem. Respect to a great Irish trad band!

Travelling Show is out now on Whirling Discs