The Irish Arts Center’s inaugural Irish Poetry Festival was a standing room only event last Saturday in New York, proving that the demand for a forum for Irish verse is as strong as ever.

Ronan Tynan, the famed Irish tenor, has apologized for anti-semitic remarks he admits having made which has cost him his regular Yankees 7th inning stretch appearance to sing 'God Bless America' and may damage his career.

“The Forgotten Maggies” is the title of a shocking new documentary by 22-year-old Irish filmmaker Steven O’Riordan, that tells the stories of four women whose live were marked by their forced placement in Ireland’s Magdalene laundries.

Kara Rota reports from the the Tina Santi Flaherty 1st Irish 2009 Theatre Awards, which took place at Hudson Terrance in Manhattan

O'Donoghue is one of the most popular names in Ireland. It is prevalent throughout Counties Galway, Cavan, Kerry and Cork. O'Donoghues, Donohoes, Donohue, Dunphys and Donoges are descendants of O Donnchadha, a personal name that has been Anglicized into Donogh.

The ancient O'Maille or O'Malley name is said to be derived from the Gaelic words "maille" meaning gentle or smooth, and "maglios" meaning chieftain, which is fitting as the O'Malleys were once the chieftains of the baronies of Murrisk and Burrishoole in County Mayo.

On November 2, 1759, a veritable riot broke out along several blocks of lower Manhattan. The target of the torch-bearing crowds was a man deemed to be a “rogue” and informer named George Spencer. Spencer survived the crowds’ wrath, though he was banged up with bruises and

Frank McCourt was born in Brooklyn on August 19, 1930, the eldest son of seven children. His father

While mourning the death of Irish author Frank McCourt on Sunday, his friends and relations were consoled by the knowledge that -- although taken too soon -- McCourt had lived a rich life and had achieved every goal he had set himself.

IN FOCUS: JESSICA SWEENEY. Occupation: Associate research manager at the Keller Fay Group, a word of mouth marketing research and consulting company located in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

The Catskilll Mountains will once again ring melodically with the sound of Irish music as the 15th edition of the Catskills Irish Arts Week (CIAW) unfolds in all its abundance next week in the tiny hamlet of East Durham.

It is that time of the year again when I am very much in the New York state of mind as the days rapidly approach for another gathering of the trad music universe known as the Catskills Irish Arts Week (CIAW).

Has Irish dancing, a once time-honored tradition, digressed into a parade of overly made-up children in glittering pageantry?

Marian Betancourt highlights the McAllister Towing Company, a family business that has been working the waters of New York since 1876.

"Angela's Ashes" author Frank McCourt is facing a life-and-death battle with cancer, IrishCentral.com can reveal. Sources say that McCourt was hospitalized recently in New York for treatment. McCourt, who born in New York to Irish immigrant parents, shot to fame on the release of his memoir "Angela's Ashes."

“I’m afraid we lost the run of ourselves.” So says former Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) Garrett Fitzgerald. Isn’t it refreshing to hear someone in Ireland actually point out the bleeding obvious as Monty Python used to say. Fitzgerald was speaking at an Irish networking event in New York this week and his analysis, like the governments he led in the 1980s, was both short and intelligent.

Irish playwright Sebastian Barry was in New York last week to talk about his new play “The Pride of Parnell Street."

An American cop has joined the Irish police force - and won awards along the way

Mark your calendars, tomorrow and Saturday Manhattan’s Irish Arts Center and Glucksman Ireland House at NYU will host a remarkable two day tribute to Brian Friel, the undisputed master of Irish drama, in honor of his 80th birthday.

From Dennis Lehane to Samantha Power, the best of the best Irish-American writers and Irish writers in America

  In an effort worthy of their mighty subject, the Irish Repertory Theatre in New York will stage a month-long festival of all 26 plays written by William Butler Yeats, the world’s most revered Irish poet. The Rep’s Yeats Project will begin previews on Wednesday, April

Broadway was a magical backdrop to actress Natasha Richardson’s life, which was cut tragically short on Wednesday, March 18. And, as a mark of respect, all the theaters on Broadway dimmed their lights on Thursday, March 19.

Thinking about brushing up on your Irish Studies? Check out our pick of some of the best Irish Studies programs throughout the U.S. and Canada

Without fail, whenever I sit down for an interview and hand over my resume, I watch the interviewer raise their eyebrows as they scan my academic credentials. Irish Studies? What exactly is that? Why are you interested in it? The answer is easy.

If it's cultural stimulation that you are looking for as March and St. Patrick's Day approaches, the choices abound. Here is a tour of the horizon for upcoming shows with a trad bent.

Weighing in at around 12 pounds and over 3000 total pages, "The Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing, Volumes IV and V" (NYU Press) are dedicated to "Irish Women's Writing and Traditions" (to use the collection's subtitle).

Those proper titles, however, do not convey the years-long literary battle which led to these books' publication.

Back in the early 1990s, esteemed Irish scholar Seamus Deane was tapped to oversee the first three volumes of the "Field Day Irish Anthology.

Another writer often associated with Irish topics who has now tackled a deeply American topic is Irish-born poet and critic Denis Donoghue. In "The American Classics: A Personal Essay," Donoghue uses his famous brains, wit and ability to mingle the personal with the historical to explore the writings of Herman Melville, Henry David Thoreau, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Walt Whitman and Mark Twain. Donoghue anoints these writers the most important American authors, and contrasts their American spirit with the Irish sensibility with which he is more intimately familiar.

A provocative new book suggests that the horrific institution of slavery in America was not confined to African-Americans. In "White Cargo: The Forgotten History of Britain's White Slaves in America," authors Don Jordan and Michael Walsh outline how the North American colonies were also populated by British, Scottish and, yes, Irish slaves, as well as indentured servants. ($18.

It was certainly a tale of two countries over this past weekend as the Culture Ireland task force hit the ground running for their second year of participation at the largest gathering of arts presenters in the world in New York City. Again traditional musicians played a major role in their contingent of almost 80 people in the theater, dance and music world coming over to strategically display their wares in the Big Apple at the 52nd annual Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP) Conference at the New York Hilton held over the weekend. The gathering is said to attract 4,000 people from all 50 states and 25 countries that are seriously involved in the business of promoting and delivering the arts through the U.

A the Green Fields of America Ensemble finished the Banquet entertainment program at the recent Ireland in Dixie Weekend in Atlanta, the capacity crowd rose to their feet with spontaneous joy at the marvelous music they had just witnessed.

It was a highlight of the Comhaltas annual gathering in North America, whose mission statement proscribes the preservation and promotion of Irish traditional music.

There can be no contesting CCE importance in Ireland itself since 1951.

MEANWHILE, the annual American Conference for Irish Studies (An Chomhdhail Mheiriceanach do Leann na hEireann) presented myriad opportunities to enjoy some panels on Irish music topics and some concerts that spun out of it as well.

The amiable hosts at CUNY's Institute for Irish-American Studies under the direction of Professor Thomas Ihde with help from staffers Martin Burke, Mary McGlynn and Elaine Ni Bhraonain looked after the 400 registered guests who offered 200 topics for examination over three full days in a highly organized fashion.

On Thursday night, Brian Conway led a fantastic troupe of young musicians taught by him and his colleagues Patty Furlong, Rose Conway Flanagan, Patty Furlong and Heather Martin Bixler in concert at the CUNY Graduate Center where the conference was held and there was some serious schooling going on there.

OCCASIONALLY, I've touted the magnificently flourishing Irish music scene down in Baltimore, and maybe enticed some of you to sample it down there along with the crab cakes and beautifully revived Inner Harbor area.

Well this Friday night, we can save you the tolls on Route 95. If you make your way to Glucksman Ireland House at NYU, you can find three stalwarts of the "Ballmor" trad scene at the next Blarney Star Concert on May 11 at 9 p.

A new PBS documentary on the Catalpa rescue voyage, one of the most daring Irish rescues ever attempted, will be broadcast this week on PBS. Secrets of the Dead: Irish Escape tells the dramatic story of a group of 19th century Irish patriots and the lengths they went to for liberty. CAHIR O'DOHERTY talks to the show's executive producer Jared Lipworth about how this relatively little known but profoundly important Irish rescue story actually changed world history.

THESE are exciting times for Irish arts in Manhattan. On the heels of the recent announcement of a new master's program in Irish American studies at NYU's Glucksman Ireland House comes word of a series of new play readings and two main stage productions by one of the most accomplished New York-based Irish theater companies, Origin Theatre.

The group was founded by Trinity College Dublin graduate George Heslin, the actor and director who first made a name for himself here starring in the Broadway national tour of hit shows like Stones in His Pockets and The Colleen Bawn at the Irish Repertory Theatre.

THE World Music Institute of New York City is recognizing the 25th anniversary of the National Heritage Award winners for folk arts in America with a series of concerts all year. Of interest to readers of this column would be the upcoming "A World of Fiddles" concert that will feature Kevin Burke, one of the finest fiddlers in the Irish tradition who was selected in 2002 for his outstanding achievements in this country, and also Joe Cormier (1984), one of the foremost French Canadian and Cape Breton fiddlers who has made Massachusetts his home like many Cape Bretoners.

The concert takes place in Manhattan on Saturday, October 13 at 8 p.

Dan Barry loves New York with the same bug-eyed wonder that tourists gaping at the Empire State Building for the first time do. He also knows its back streets and the hardy folk who live and work there like a born and bred local. But the fact is that Barry isn't a local.

BOOK : "The Truth Commissioner" By David Park

DAVID Park's impressive new novel, "The Truth Commissioner" (Bloomsbury Press) is set in post-ceasefire Northern Ireland and asks a simple, terrifying question - how are we going to forgive?

In the aftermath of a bitter war, communities and individuals are still reeling from decades of senseless bloodshed. How can they come to terms with the suffering of the past?

Park imagines one solution by inventing a fictional truth commission, modeled after the Truth and Reconciliation Commission established in post-apartheid South Africa, to give voice to festering wounds.

Beginning with that simple premise, Park's beautifully written new book vividly reminds us that the war on the streets may have ended, but it endures in hearts and minds, and we'd be foolish to ignore the fact.

THE idea of producing a full scale Irish theater festival in New York City is a notion so mad, so bewilderingly ambitious that most Irish theater makers here would have suppressed it immediately.

But George Heslin, 36, artistic director of Origin Theatre Company, has

stamina and the gift of remaining clear and concise under pressure.

Within a minute of meeting him he can convince you that a New York Irish theatre festival should have happened years ago, and that he's person with the vision to now get it done.

This week New York's first ever Irish theater festival will take to the stage, featuring nine exciting new plays by Ireland's most celebrated playwrights. CAHIR O'DOHERTY talks to the festival's artistic director George Heslin about how and why he made this extraordinary new festival happen.

THIS weekend New York's first ever Irish theater festival, called 1st Irish 2008, will begin at the Theaters.

YOU'LL remember a few weeks back we told you that sweet little Peaches Geldof, the still teenaged daughter of Bob Geldof, took off for Vegas and got hitched to her American indie musician beau of only a month. Needless to say, Sir Bob wasn't too thrilled at the time.

Since then, Peaches, 19 going on .

QUITE a coup for the U.S. board members of the National University of Ireland Galway.

ONE of the enduring objectives of folk music is its ability to remind us of our common humanity and bonds that should unite us rather than divide us.

Sometimes, though, the harsher side of life informs and inspires us to appreciate when life is good to us, and that no matter how bad things may get in the current economic crisis there are always so many who are worse off.

Music and charity, especially for the Irish, become worthy allies at times so we can help those less fortunate and feel good inside and outside.

NYU'S Glucksman Ireland House will feature a special performance by Seosaimhin Ni Bheaglaoich (Josephine Begley) of the famous Dingle family that has been in the forefront of traditional music from the West Kerry Gaeltacht for so many years.

Educated at Trinity College in Dublin, she hosted a 1980s CCE TV series for RTE called The Mountain Lark that featured traditional music and dance, and with Radio na Gaeltachta where she was recognized as one of Ireland's finest singers in the Irish language.

She was also a founding member of Ireland's first all female group MACALLA where her rendering of the title track of their first album Mna na hEireann still stands out in my memory.

ANOTHER family with an Armagh connection is the Quinn family of Long Island, whose patriarch, Louie Quinn, came from Newtownhamilton in Armagh.

Louie Senior was a very fine Irish fiddler who played a huge role in promoting and preserving traditional Irish music not only in New York but also around the country through his friendship with so many great musicians, and also his organization skills through the Irish Musicians Association, a forerunner in many places for Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann in North America.

He got his family involved in Irish music and dance in a big way out on Long Island, and the oldest boy, Sean, has continued to teach music both in the public school system and with Irish music pupils on the fiddle.

Christmas is almost upon us, and what better way to get yourself into a cheerful holiday mood than with Dylan Thomas' dreamlike reverie, "A Child's Christmas in Wales," now playing at the Irish Repertory Theatre in New York?

Directed by Charlotte Moore, and featuring traditional music and songs, the show runs through January 4, and will send you home glowing with good will toward all.

"One Christmas was so much like another, in those years around the sea-town corner now and out of all sound except the distant speaking of the voices I sometimes hear a moment before sleep..

He would be 49 now, close to Barack Obama in age and sharing this moment with him. Maybe he'd be in elective politics, perhaps as Hillary's replacement in the Senate. Or he might even have been thinking to run for the job his father once held. We will never know.

SOUTH BEND, Indiana - Sometimes a place can feel like heaven on Earth. Notre Dame on a cool fall football weekend comes pretty close.

Last weekend the old campus never looked better.

A DREAM chance of owning a brand new condominium in the heart of Manhattan has turned into a nightmare for dozens of Irish-based investors who signed contracts to purchase apartments in a new development on the East Side two years ago, only to be recently informed that the entire building was sold to New York University.J.D.

Only 19-years-old and headed to divorce court. Yep, Peaches Geldof, Sir Bob's problem child, is ending her six-month marriage to American musician Max Drummey. Such a shock, right! Deploying the "we'll always be good friends" line of defense, the couple, who wed in Las Vegas after a courtship, if you could call it that, of only a few weeks, issued a joint statement.

Those We Lost

Michael Joseph Daly

Michael Joseph Daly, 83, died July 25 of pancreatic cancer in his home in Fairfield, Connecticut. A lieutenant and later a captain in the Army's Third Infantry Division, he was awarded the Medal of Honor from President Harry Truman on August 23, 1945. Credited with single-handedly fighting off and killing fifteen Germans as well as demolishing three machine-gun emplacements - one from ten yards away - during the battle for Nuremberg in the Second World War, he was evacuated the day after the heroic event after sustaining injuries from a bullet to the face in a separate firefight.