Pecker dunne…part 1
PECKER DUNNE – LAST OF THE TRAVELLERS
By
Tom O’Brien
A play with music about the travelling musicians of Ireland, mostly concentrating on Pecker Dunne and Margaret Barry. They were both from travelling families, Tinkers, and were marginalised by Irish society. Looked down on, indeed persecuted for their way of life. Both were great singers and musicians, and along with the great Johnny Doran, did more to promote Irish traditional music than almost any other person of our times. Both are dead now and the play is set in a kind of imaginary ‘halting site’, where departed souls are temporarily resident while awaiting transport to somewhere permanent.
Characters
Pecker Dunne………………….40-60 yrs
Margaret Barry……………….30-50 yrs
Guard Sergeant……………….. 40’s
Richard Harris/John Power….50-60yrs
Kathleen……………………………early 20’s
Johnny Doran……………………..late 30’s
Mary…………………………………..mid 20’s
Tinker Man…………………………30-40 yrs
Step-Mother………………………..early 40’s
Farmer…………………………………40’s
Apart from Pecker and Margaret, all the other characters can be played by one male and one female actor if need be.
Some musicians may be required, possibly a banjo/fiddle player and an accordionist.
Margaret Barry has a pronounced Cork accent, even when singing.
PECKER DUNNE – LAST OF THE TRAVELLERS
By
Tom O’Brien
Scene one
A darkened stage, then a spotlight. PECKER DUNNE appears, carrying a banjo case. The case has Pecker Dunne stencilled across the body. Bearded, he wears a wide black leather belt with silver buckle on his trousers, and could be anywhere between 40/60 years of age. He sings I’M THE LAST OF THE TRAVELLIN PEOPLE (c) Pecker Dunne)
PD: Me name it is Paddy, I’m called Pecker Dunne I walk the road but I never run, I’m the last of the travellin’ people
With me banjo and fiddle I yarn and song, and sing to people who do me no wrong But if others despise me I just move along, and know I’ll find friends in the morning Arah money is money and friends they are friends, And drinking with them is where all money ends But it isn’t on money it’s on them I depend When friends and the guards are against me.
From Belfast to Wexford from Clare to Tralee, a town with a pub is a living for me I haven’t a home but thank God I am free, I’m the last of the travellin’ people
The road isn’t aisy but it’s what I choose, I’m not always a winner but I’l Summer and winter keep travelling I will But the road it is long and I know it will kill The last of the travelling people.
As Pecker finishes the stage lights come up. There is a blank screen as backdrop. Towards the front we see what looks to be a travellers halting site; campfire, cooking utensils etc – the impression being given is that the wagons etc are just out of sight. It should be a hazy, sort of unreal-looking place, with a few people seated at various points. Some of these can be musicians.
PD: Where the bloody hell is this place?
On screen we can now read HAPPY 80TH BIRTHDAY PECKER.
PD: Birthday? Eighty? What’s goin’ on here?
MARGARET BARRY appears from the mist with her banjo. She sings THE GALWAY SHAWL (traditional)
MB: At Oranmore in the County Galway,
One pleasant evening in the month of May,
I spied a damsel, she was young and handsome
Her beauty fairly took my breath away.
Chorus:
She wore no jewels, nor costly diamonds,
No paint or powder, no, none at all.
But she wore a bonnet with a ribbon on it
And round her shoulder was a Galway Shawl.
We kept on walking, she kept on talking,
‘Till her father’s cottage came into view.
Says she, “Come in, sir, and meet my father,
And play to please him The Foggy Dew.”
She sat me down beside the fire
I could see her father, he was six feet tall.
And soon her mother had the kettle singing
All I could think of was the Galway shawl.
I played The Blackbird and The Stack of Barley
Rodney’s Glory and The Foggy Dew
She sang each note like an Irish linnet.
Whilst the tears stood in her eyes of blue.
‘Twas early, early, all in the morning,
When I hit the road for old Donegal.
She said goodbye, sir, she cried and kissed me,
And my heart remained with that Galway shawl.
PD: God bless all here tonight. Isn’t Margaret great to turn up
for my birthday? Ladies and gentlemen, Margaret Barry.
MB: That’s the first I heard about any birthday, Pecker. I was told
there was a few shillings in it for me.
PD: Ah, g’wan now girl.
MB: Well, seein’ as it’s yourself Pecker. And it’s not as if we’re strangers. Shure, we sung together before.
PD: Aye, we did, a long time ago. A chanter supreme, that’s what you are. It’s me birthday today – apparently. What age do you think I am?
MB: I can still read, boy. (indicates the screen and laughs)
Not as ould as me, anyway.
PD: Sure you’re no age. If you were six months younger I’d run away
with you!
MB: I was born in 1917, boy.
PD: That would make you…ah…
MB: Dead, boy. T’would make me dead. (she looks around) ‘Tis a funny auld place, isn’t it?
PD: Where is it at all? Is it the afterlife – or just another bit of roadside the council forgot to fence off?
MB: The afterlife, boy! (looks around) There’s never anyone around to ask. People just seem to come and go.
PD: You sure it’s not a guard (police)) station? There’s never anyone in them places anymore.
MB: No, they’re always too busy hidin’ behind hedges and the like to give you a ticket for something or other. Don’t talk to me about the guards.
A uniformed Garda Sergeant walks into view.
PD: Well, Lord save us, if it isn’t auld Baldy Tyres himself!
MB: I know that fella! He stopped me wance in Limerick for havin – how did he put it? – a ‘defective rear light on a moving vehicle’. On t’oul caravan, if you don’t mind! The lousy fecker.
GS: Well now, what have we here? The Pecker Dunne and Margaret Barry. When did you pair hitch up together? Or is that too delicate a question?
PD: Since when did the matter of delicacy ever bother you? Or any Guard for that matter.
GS: I was only doin’ me job.
MB: That’s what Cromwell said at Drogheda.
PD: And a lot more places besides. I wonder now if Guards are descendants of Roundheads?
MB: (aside) He have the head of one, anyhow
GS: What was that? (he is walking about, looking at things) You know, you can’t park here anymore.
PD: A bit of auld waste ground, on the side of the road – where’s the harm?
PS: Ah now, it’s not as simple as that. Not like it used to be in the old days. There’s the health and safety issue to be considered for a start…
MB: Health and safety, boy? What’s that when it’s at home? We parked here in 1930, when I was thirteen years old, and we’ve been parking here on and off ever since.
PS: Not for the past twenty years you haven’t. There’s new laws these days, official halting sites, proper…
PD: He’s talkin’ about all these new EU laws, girl. Ah, shure it’s all changed since you…since you…(pause) It’s the new United States of Europe. We’re all only satellites now, being told what to do be some mush in Brussels.
MB: Is that a fact? I’m well out of it then.
PS: Be that as it may. I know you Pecker, and I know what will happen if I give you permission to stay here. There’ll be a swarm of you here before you can say ‘Ballybunion’.
PD: It’s me birthday. I’m entitled to ask a few friends round for me birthday.
PS: Have ye any horses? I don’t want any horses roamin’ the road – or the farmer’s fields for that matter.
PD: Prags? What would a traveller want with a prag these days? The only thing I travel with these days – apart from me four be four – is this. (he waves his banjo case)
PS: I’ll be keeping a close eye on all of you. I don’t want any trouble now. ( he heads off)
MB: He won’t go far, boy. He’ll be peeping from behind some hedge.
Pecker and Margaret sing DANNY FARRELL (by Pete St John)
I knew Danny Farrell when his football was a can
With his hand-me-downs and Welliers and his sandwiches of bran
But now that pavement peasant is a full grown bitter man
With all the trials and troubles of his travelling people’s clan
He’s a loser, a boozer, a me and you user
A raider, a trader, a people police hater
So lonely and only, what you’d call a gurrier
Still now, Danny Farrell, he’s a man
I knew Danny Farrell when he joined the National School
He was lousy at the Gaelic, they’d call him amadán – a fool
He was brilliant in the toss school by trading objects in the pawn
By the time he was an adult all his charming ways had gone
I knew Danny Farrell when we queued up for the dole
And he tried to hide the loss of pride that eats away the soul
But mending pots and kettles is a trade lost in the past
“There’s no hand-out here for tinkers” was the answer when he asked
He’s a loser, a boozer, a me and you user
A raider, a trader, a people police hater
So lonely and only, what you’d call a gurrier
Still now, Danny Farrell, he’s a man
I still know Danny Farrell, saw him just there yesterday
Taking methylated spirits with some wino’s on the quay
Oh, he’s forty going on eighty, with his eyes of hope bereft
And he told me this for certain, there’s not many of us left
He’s a loser, a boozer, a me and you user
A raider, a trader, a people police hater
So lonely and only, what you’d call a gurrier
Still now, Danny Farrell, he’s a man
Lights fade, then Spotlight on Margaret Barry
MB: I was born on the first of January 1917 in the city of Cork. Peter Street. Me mother was seventeen years married to me father when she died. I was about twelve then. She was a beautiful woman; I don’t think there was a lovelier woman to be got in Cork. Lovely black hair, you know. She used to wear it in a plait right around her head, and all got up in a big bun at the back, with a big hairpin stuck in it. She got double pneumonia and it killed her. I remember her calling me to her bedside in the hospital and saying ‘Margaret, my Margaret’. I never got over her dying. Never. Me father re-married, but I couldn’t get on with them, so I set off on me own when I was sixteen and settled in the North of the country. I sang through the fairs. And the markets. And I had very enjoyable times. And more times it wasn’t so nice because there was wind and rain, and I’d get wet coming back on me bicycle from somewhere. But I enjoyed every minute of it. Me heart was delighted when I went through the fairs and could keep on singing all the time. But as soon as ever I’d finish up at some fair or a market I’d actually go to some house. I used to always be hired. They knew me that well. Around Castleblaney, Monaghan, Crossmaglen, Armagh, and all these places. And they used always come along for me and say ‘we’d like for you to come up to the house some night, and play a few tunes and sing a few songs’. And there I was, I used to go to the house at eight o clock in the evening and from then until maybe seven in the morning I’d keep on playing for them and singing. I’d get a rest about twelve o clock and get something to ate. And then off I’d go again. I’d play some half sets, and if there was room enough in the place they’d take away the furniture, and they’d dance away the night. It would just be a sociable thing; it wouldn’t be a wedding or a wake or anything like that, it was the way they were around them parts, the way they enjoyed themselves. They loved that kind of life you see, the dancing and the craic. It was what they called a house ceili. And naturally enough, it was never without drink. (shakes her head) All gone now, boy.
Margaret sings THE FLOWER OF SWEET STRABANE (traditional)
MB: If I were King of Ireland and all things at my will
I’d roam through all creations new fortunes to find still
And the fortune I would seek the most you all must understand
Is to win the heart of Martha, the flower of sweet Strabane
Her cheeks they are a rosy red, her hair golden brown
And o’er her lily white shoulders it carelessly falls down
She’s one of the loveliest creatures of the whole creation planned
And my heart is captivated by the flower of sweet Strabane
If I had you lovely Martha away in Innisowen
Or in some lonesome valley in the wild woods of Tyrone
I would use my whole endeavour and I’d try to work my plan
For to gain my prize and feast my eyes on the flower of sweet Strabane
Oh, I’ll go o’er the Lagan down by the steam ships tall
I’m sailing for Amerikay across the briny foam
My boat is bound for Liverpool down by the Isle of Man
So I’ll say farewell, God bless you, my flower of sweet Strabane
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