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Our town is rich in the arts and here's a great place to discuss items of interest like independent and local bands, theater, museums, musical performances and the like.
Music Q&A: Bill Monaghan and Irene Molloy
Posted by:
joe on
December 12, 2007 at
12:02PM EST
On November 30, 2007, I caught up with local artists Bill Monaghan and Irene Molloy. Bill and Irene, along with friend Carl Lichtner, were performing at a Carol For Heart and Zach Attacks Cancer benefit, held Crossing Vineyards in Washington Crossing, PA. Both Bill and Irene are graduates of Archbishop Wood High School in Warminster, PA.
Bill Monaghan has been playing music professionally since graduating from the University of Scranton in 1992. His musical talents allow him to play a wide range of instruments and write music for many different venues. In addition to his songwriting accomplishments, Bill is also teacher of music, and travels to Uganda a few times a year to spread his love of music.
Irene Molloy, on the other hand, has taken a different path toward achieving her goals as a musician. Irene began her professional career as an actress, with experiences that include lead role and supporting roles on Broadway and television. After taking a brief hiatus from the stage, Irene began to write and perform her own music and has found her niche in the entertainment world.
Bill and Irene currently have a new Christmas single, entitled Love is Free (This Christmas).
Photo courtesy of Carol M. Fenton.
Joe: Bill, Your extensive musical talent allows you to play the piano, guitar, bass, drums, tin whistle, and harmonica. Which instrument is your favorite and why?
Bill: My first musical love will always be the piano; the extensive range, the dynamics, but mostly the way my fingers seem to meld with the keys. I discovered the piano at age 5 or 6 in my grandparents’ basement, and then took some lessons in Oklahoma, even though my family didn’t even have a piano. When we moved back to Philly in 1981, my grandparents gave us their piano, even though some of the keys stuck, or were missing, and the whole thing was about a half step out of tune. But, nothing can compare with the range of what a piano can do. And even with all of what others would call “flaws” in my first piano, she really meant everything to me and without those early years, who knows what I would have been doing with music. You never forget your first love…
Joe: Irene, your first big break came when you were in high school, when you were offered the lead role in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Whistle Down The Wind. Following that, you were on Broadway within a year, starring in The Civil War. What was it like to go from high school straight to Broadway and working with the legendary Andrew Lloyd Weber?
Irene: Honestly, it was like having a dream come true, just very quickly. It surprised me that putting on a professional production was frighteningly similar to putting on a high school musical. Staging, memorizing lines, bonding with the cast, all of these things were already familiar to me from high school and local productions. The caliber of talent, the precision, the costs, and the pressure to succeed were the things I had to learn about quickly in order to assimilate into the Broadway community. I'm so grateful that I was given the opportunity to dive right into the business.
A.L. Weber is a very kind, talented, and eccentric man, and I was able to work with him and stay in his home in London many times.
Joe: Bill, all of your albums are theme-oriented and completely transcend each other. What makes you choose your theme or genre for writing?
Bill: Well, Joe, part of it has to be my obsessive and compulsive nature – I mean, if there’s a collection of something, like baseball cards, or state quarters, and they have numbers, I really like collecting them. So, in music, if I get some notion of a general idea, I love the idea of fleshing it out with several musical pieces. I started writing music as individual poems with music, or actual songs, but somewhere early, Tom Feledick and I wrote a musical play called Brunswick 2057, and ever since, I have always considered it a great challenge to write songs that can complement each other or reprise each other, or even more subtly, reiterate each other with vague allusions to each other. Sometimes it’s just entertainment for me because the references are so elusive, but other times, the themes are just so darn cool and fun to play with, it just happens to be done. So, that’s an answer on a musical thematic level.
On a more literal level, from the writing standpoint, like on The Word or 9/11 CDs, there is obviously so much material that can relate to the subject, I thrive on the idea of trying to make a complete work out of several songs and ideas. It kind of goes back to my English Lit days at Scranton, studying Canterbury Tales, or Shakespeare plays, sonnets, Beethoven Symphonies, sonata form, or even the way musical theater can write complete stories with many songs woven into the play. The whole process gives so much potential for new material as well as reprisal material that relates early in the work and scattered throughout, and can be used to draw the audience in with a familiar theme, and subconsciously remind them with the music of something for which you don’t have to utter a single word! Pretty cool!
Joe: Irene, What prompted to the move from acting to music?
Irene: I found myself restricted by an actors' life. Getting dolled up everyday in tight clothes and high heels, with push-up bras, makeup and hair done at 4 a.m. doesn't really appeal to me, and I don't really crave the spotlight. I wanted to go back to school, write, learn, and try new things. I was turning into a method actor and becoming obsessed with characters to the point of interfering with my personal life. I still like to act and was lucky to perform off- Broadway this year in 10 Million Miles at the Atlantic Theater Company, with music by Patty Griffin, who is one of my heroes. Being a musician is a much better fit for me, and I'm happy that it's what I'm doing right now.
Joe: Bill, a few times a year, you travel to Uganda, Africa to teach music to children. How did you get this opportunity? What drew you towards it?
Bill: The first time I saw Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes – Live” video, complete with African dancers, and the rhythms and the harmonies, I was lured to the source of these sounds, images, and spirit. I knew it was Africa, and through my music since then (I was then 19) I have incorporated as much of this as possible. Just last year, August of 2006, a priest named Father Joseph Sserugo from Uganda was visiting my parish and casually invited anyone in the congregation, “So, does anybody want to come to Uganda?” I was raising my hand and jumping out of my seat. Most people think I’m doing mission work, which I’m sure I am, but I know that it’s the lure of the music and the people who can make such wonderful music that is at the source of my inspiration to go to Africa.
I arranged to travel to Uganda in February, stayed with Father Joseph in the town of Ibanda in the west of Uganda for 3 and one half weeks. I have since returned in June and in October, and my work has included teaching music and working with the children and adult choirs, visiting the school and teaching some English and Math, teaching some guitar and piano lessons to the choir master and some other parishioners, and a little of working with the deaf. I was filming footage of the Babies Home, school, and parish life for a documentary on life in Ibanda, Uganda and how we may be able to help them, through prayers, support, sponsorship, even pen pal letters.
But the work I have done is far outshined by what the people have given me and taught me about their culture, music, spirituality, and love. I am hooked, and will strive to return at least once a year for life – my eyes have been opened to their wonderful, simple world, in which there are so many basic problems, that I will continue to spread the news about Uganda and build a bridge from America to Uganda, from children to children, people to people, even musicians to musicians. Father Sserugo’s message, even more than “In Your Eyes,” has changed my life!
Joe: Irene, you are now working on your first LP since the release of your debut EP, The Irene Molloy EP. How is the process going? Who are your major influences?
Irene: It has its ups and downs. Writing the album has been the most challenging part. A producer I met introduced to me the concept of "classes" of songs, which guided me to really seek the best of my songwriting and of myself on this album. The other pieces of the puzzle, i.e. working with musicians, recording, artwork, etc., are very exciting and rewarding. I hope to release it by early spring 2008. As far as my major influences are concerned, my favorites are Allison Krauss, Joni Mitchell, and Patty Griffin. My introduction to each of these artists profoundly changed how I wrote and listened to music. I also love jazz, Cassandra Wilson, Norah Jones, and Richard Bona. I love songs that combine storytelling, emotion, dynamics, and sensitivity, and, of course, I love great musicians.
Joe: The two of you have penned a new Christmas song entitled Love is Free (This Christmas). What brought about this partnership?
Bill: Irene and I first met in a community production of “Oliver!” and have been friends ever since. I have told people now for about 17 or 18 years that Irene has the best voice I have ever heard, and we’ve sung or played music together off and on over the years. But we’ve also had a friendship beyond the music, with elements of philosophy, art, spirituality, and lots of humor! I’ve learned so much from her, and she has such a great grasp on music, from the inside out, that she is a true inspiration. It’s a natural extension of all these things that led to this collaboration on “Love is Free (this Christmas).” We kind of set out to write a Christmas song in March of 2006, but it was also, if I recall, a celebration of the fact that she had kind of come back to our area after being out in the world, around the world, wherever. So, for me it was just a joyous opportunity to write a song with my friend of so many years.
Irene: Bill and I have known each other for about 17 years, and over the past few, have been working together a bit. We wanted to see what we could create together. We are friends and we come from different musical perspectives, so we thought it would be an interesting challenge. I think in the end we made something very beautiful.
Joe: Any plans for recording anything together in the future?
Irene: Not yet, but it is likely. We are both currently working on solo projects, so we'll see.
Bill: We would love to, though!
Joe: Finally, what are you guys listening to right now??
Irene: Oh, this is my favorite question, to be asked, and to ask people! Okay, right now I'm listening to: Sigur Ros' new album, Radiohead, Richard Buckner, Raising Sand, Iron & Wine, Children Running Through, old Neil Young, Lori McKenna, Brandi Carlisle, Ingrid Michaelson, William Fitzsimmons, Regina Spektor, anything produced by T-Bone Burnett, The Once Soundtrack, Tori Amos' new record, Birdie Busch, Amos Lee, Waking Vision Trio, Pat Metheny, ...just to name a few!
Bill: Lots of African tapes I’ve made in Africa, some other world music, Peter Gabriel, those Christmas stations, some Irene Molly of course, a smattering of Indie music on XPN and STW, and anything that’s new and fresh, or old and vintage!
Irene Molloy will be performing on Saturday, December 15 at Chaplin’s Music Café in Spring City, PA and on Monday, January 7, 2008 at the World Café Live in Philadelphia.
Bill Monaghan and Irene Molloy will be performing ‘An Evening of Christmas Favorites’ together on Wednesday, December 19 at 7:30 pm at St. Vincent DePaul Church in Richboro, PA. Admission is free, but donations are encouraged. All proceeds go the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.
Bill and Irene’s new single, Love is Free (This Christmas), can be purchased at http://irenemolloy.bigcartel.com.
Joseph M. Jamison is the Music & Arts Contributing Editor for the Newtown Ourburbs Community website and has a weekly column at www.memeticians.com. He can be reached at jmj@memeticians.com.
(2) Comments
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Posted by: Bill on December 12, 2007 1:27PM EST
This is great Joe! Thank you so much! I've lived it, and I even enjoyed reading it - the way you've put it all together is very nice!
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Posted by: Teri Molz on December 14, 2007 8:02AM EST
What a great article!
It's so nice to read about my favorite musicians!
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