Welcome to the “Old Blog Road” and thank you for visiting. This blog was created to offer my thoughts and opinions about Irish Music. It is my hope that you will find something here of value to reflect upon and remember. My knowledge of Irish Music is based on several decades of performing it. I speak only for myself as an Irish-American musician. My opinions do not represent the many members of this organization, or the Irish people of the world.   I’ve found that Irish Music has hundreds of faces, so defining it may be like trying to nail gelatin to a tree. Each of us will probably have our own definition, however, there is a question that inevitably arises. “Is it the music of a race of people, or the music of a nation restricted to the confines the Irish border?” Personally, I think both are true. Without people we don’t have an Irish nation. Without the Country of Ireland we don’t have any Irish people. We Irish are everywhere, from Ireland, the E.U., and the United States, to the North and South Poles.  Irish Music, however, is not a generic label that can be used at will. Most Irish music is based in the Irish language, the interpretation and phrasing thereof. Technically and musically speaking, it incorporates the wide use of a five-tone scale (Pentatonic) and an ancient Greek eight-tone scale (Mixolydian), Dorian, in melodies.    I’ve much more to ponder and discuss in the entries to come, but for now I hope that this organization, members, websites, and the discerning listener, will join together to support the Irish culture and its ways of musical expression.  Failte.   May the road rise to meet you, R.T. Reeder