(This story was posted on December 15, 2013, and is updated here on the 20th anniversary of Johnny's death)
When Cunningham died of a heart attack at age 46 on December 15, 2003, Bostonians mourned one of the most talented musicians to ever grace the local scene, a man renowned as much for his wit and personality as for his music. Whether performing on stage at Harvard's Saunders Theater or telling stories around a table at Tiernan's Pub on Broad Street, Johnny Cunningham was Scotland's greatest export to Boston over the last 25 years.
That is why a contingent of local musicians traveled down to New York City for the funeral service, including fiddlers Seamus Connolly and Larry Reynolds and piper Paddy Keenan. Joining them were Tommy McCarthy and Louise Costelloe, owners of the Burren Pub in Davis Square where Johnny graced many a session, and Liam Tiernan, the Belfast singer and pub owner who performed on the Soul of Christmas album with Johnny a few years ago.
Tiernan described his friend as a bard in the glorious tradition of Robert Burns, a man who could "put a smile on your face" with his stories and jokes. Tiernan and his wife Susan invited local musicians to their pub a few days after Christmas to toast their departed friend and colleague.
Cunningham and his brother Phil, a piano accordionist, burst onto the American scene in the early 1980s. Their band, Silly Wizard, "did for Scottish music what Planxty and the Bothy Band did for Irish music," said his friend Brian O'Donovan, host of Celtic Sojourn. "They opened up the notion that traditional music was rich and diverse and could also appeal to young people."
When Silly Wizard returned to Scotland after touring America, Johnny settled around Boston, living in Newton before moving to New Bedford, where he had a place overlooking the harbor. When he wasn't touring or working in the recording studio, Johnny was a regular at local sessions, showing up at the Village Coach House and the Green Briar, or spending an afternoon at the Canadian American Club in Watertown, where he won the hearts of French Canadian and Maritime audiences alike.
"He was very relaxed and laid back," Reynolds recalled. "He never took the limelight away from others, but if you asked him to play an air, people would stop talking and listen as soon as the bow hit the strings. His interpretation of a tune came straight from the heart."
Many people consider Cunningham to be the best Scottish fiddler since Scott Skinner, who died in 1927. Cunningham's rendition of tunes like Sad is My Fate brought out "the sadness and beauty of the long, tender melancholy northern twilight," as Helen Hopekirk described Scottish music a century ago.
Cunningham's adeptness on the fiddle extended to other genres, and he played on and produced numerous albums of Scottish, Irish, new age and rock music. "The last time I saw Johnny he played at Harbor Lights with Bonnie Rait," recalled fiddler Tommy McCarthy. "Fame didn't seem to bother him at all."
"His mastery of the fiddle will always remain with me," Seamus Connolly said. "He had such control of the bow. One night in the Coach House we were playing a duet and he was egging me on to play faster and faster until finally we fell into each other's arms laughing, because we couldn't go any faster. He had a wildness to the music that brought tears to your eyes."
Comments
Post a Comment