The Celtic Music Association
of Madison, Wisconsin

Events

Always check the celticmadison.org Events Calendar first!

• Dance Events are posted on our Dance page.
   
• Regular Celtic Music Events in Madison
  If you really never get your fill of live music, you'll have to come by Madison's public sessions:
  • Every Wednesday: The decades-long local tradition of Wednesday sessions stumbled in 2019, and 2020 wiped it out. For now?
  • Second and Fourth Sundays of the month, at McFarland House Cafe in McFarland. Outdoor session, with seating at picnic tables, in front of the Cafe under a big gorgeous shade tree. The session will not be held if it's raining. 1 pm to 3 pm (or 4 or 5 pm if people don't want to quit).
  • New, monthly Cargo Coffee East Slow Irish Session. This is a slow Irish session for beginners and intermediate players. Tunes will be played at a slower tempo to facilitate learning the traditional tunes and learning to play in a group. It is also an open session, meaning that all are welcome to join in
  • Occasional(?) Wednesdays: about 15 miles southeast, out in Stoughton, the Viking Brewpub on Main Street hosts a session, 7pm.
  • Here are some excellent tips on how traditional Irish music sessions work, from a Belfast-based Web site.

Other Calendars

• The Shamrock Club also maintains an Irish music and dance calendar for the Milwaukee area and for all of Wisconsin.
• For sessions outside of Madison, see the regional links below.

Free Newsletter

In Print - Infrequent

The Celtic Music Association publishes a free, occasional newsletter, dubbed Celtic Madison. You may add yourself to our mailing list by e-mailing your name and street address to snailmail@celticmadison.org. See archives of old newsletters below.

Via E-Mail - More Up-to-Date

We also send out the newsletter via e-mail, which you can choose to receive instead of, or in addition to the printed newsletter. This group of subscribers also receives alerts when any major Celtic music events are happening in Madison (on average, less than once a month). To be added to our e-mail list, please send your e-mail address to rcnewton@facstaff.wisc.edu. Don't worry, we do not release our mailing list to anyone else.

Archive

Past Web-ized newsletters: (older archived issues may not meet current Web Content Accessibility Guidelines)

• Spring 2005 (you'll need the free Acrobat Reader)
• Spring 2004 (Acrobat PDF)
• Spring 2003 (Acrobat PDF)
• Spring 2002 (Acrobat PDF)
• Fall 2001
• Spring 2001
• Fall 2000
• Spring 2000
• Fall 1999
• Spring 1999
• Fall 1998: CMA and the Madison Folk Music Society presented Solas.
• Spring 1998
• Fall 1997
• Summer 1997
• Spring 1997

About CMA

The Celtic Music Association is a group of unpaid volunteers which primarily organizes concerts by traditional musicians from Ireland, Scotland, Brittany, and Wales. For over 20 years, CMA has brought several acts per year to Madison, ranging from lesser-known gems like Máire O'Keeffe to big names such as The Tannahill Weavers and Altan. We are nominally (although far from exclusively) run by students and faculty of UW-Madison, and therefore qualify to register as a Student Organization at the UW. We also actively support Madison's local Celtic dance and music culture.

Contact CMA

CMA does not have a formal hierarchy of officers. Whoever is willing to take on the responsibility of a task gets to be the contact person for that area!

• Booking: If you are a touring band or agent interested in a gig in Madison, give Bob Newton a ring at (608) 219-2009 or e-mail him at rcnewton@facstaff.wisc.edu.
• Web site: If you have a suggestion for or a comment about any part of the celticmadison.org Web site, send an e-mail to Alan Ng at alan@alan-ng.nospam (use net instead of nospam).
• Free newsletter: see above.
• Donations to CMA are gratefully accepted and will make our continued existence easier by helping us cover the many expenses of booking and presenting traditional artists, publishing the free newsletter, and renting this Web server. You can also help the whole community by helping us keep ticket prices at an accessible level. Contact treasurer Craig Heilman at cma@celticmadison.org or mail a check payable to "Celtic Music Association" to Celtic Music Association, 7500 Paoli Road, Verona, WI 53593. We do not yet have 501(c)3 tax-free status, but your assistance will do just the same amount of good anyway!

Recommended Links

Local Madison Links

• Madison's Celtic musicians
  • Charlene Adzima
  • Bí Dána
  • Birch
  • Capitol Ceili Band
  • Dan Cobb
  • Turner Collins
  • Eddie Cotter
  • The Currach
  • Greenfyre
  • The Kissers
  • Killarney Blarney
  • Madison Pipes and Drums
  • Navan
  • Alan Ng
  • O'er the Border
  • Public House Ceili Band (defunct, but CD still available)
  • Rambler
  • Rising Gael
  • Rolliana Scheckler (no longer active)
  • The Snug (no longer active)
  • Tairis
  • The Tooles
  • Traditional Frequency
  • West Wind
  • Madison Zor Shrine Pipes and Drums. Any men interested in learning to play bagpipes or drums in order to become a member are invited to contact Steve Emerson 608-356-6675 or www.zorpiper@hotmail.com for more information.
• Other Madison-area Celtic music links
  • UW-Madison Continuing Studies often offers courses in Irish music held downtown.
  • Two of Madison's Irish musicians have posted extensive databases of their repertoire, which should help newcomer musicians fit right in to the scene:
    • Dan Cobb's abc collection: Cobb's Music of Ireland
    • A number of local Irish musicians maintain and share their personal repertoires using irishtune.info (see below under Global Links).
  • The Madison Folk Harp Society
  • The Madison Folk Music Society, fondly known as "Mad Folk"
  • The Wild Hog in the Woods: "Coffeehouse Style Music in the Folk Tradition"
• Madison-area Celtic dance links
  • Visit our Dance Links.
• Madison-area Celtic culture links
  • The Celtic Cultural Center of Madison, with whom we share the celticmadison.org server.
  • The Dane County Shamrock Club
  • St. Patrick's Day Parade
  • The Cambrian Heritage Society of Madison, Wisconsin
  • The Wisconsin Manx Association is based in Madison.
  • The St. Andrews society has a chapter in Madison but no Web site.
  • The Hurling Club of Madison

Regional Links

• FolkLib Index: A Library of Folk Music Links. Includes exhaustive resources on Wisconsin folk musicians.
• Milwaukee's Irish Cultural and Heritage Center
• The Shamrock Club of Wisconsin
• There is a session in Baraboo at The Village Booksmith, (608) 355-1001, on the first Friday of the month, 7-10 p.m, located right on the town square.
• Folklore Village in Dodgeville, WI sometimes hosts Celtic events.
• North Central Heavy Athletics organizes Highland Games around the Upper Midwest.
• The Rock River Valley Celtic Society
  
• There is an Irish session every Thursday in Oconomowoc, WI at The Pub, 114 N. Main St.
• Tim Britton, Iowa pipemaker and piper
• The Des Moines, Iowa "Celtic Music Association" (unrelated to us)
• Jim Wearne is a Cornish-American folksinger in the Chicago area.

General Global Celtic Resources

• Ceolas: The traditional Irish music home page for the world, offering material for musicians, fans, and tourists.
• tradmusic.com: By trad musicians for trad music
• ceili.ie is an index of Irish dance and music activity, but primarily limited to locations in Ireland.
• irishtune.info - Irish Traditional Music Tune Index, an index of recorded and printed tunes.
• Tips for Learning Irish Traditional Music
• Two Madison scholar-musicians have, via UW-Madison Continuing Studies, opened an on-line, self-paced, non-credit culture and history course on Celtic music for anyone in the world.