Mullingar Town Band radio marathon

Local musicians Peter Doran and Ethan Scally will be joining Kevin Morgan during a 24-hour radio marathon, a fundraiser for Mullingar Town Band this weekend, and they are just two of many guests lined up.

Cronin will be co-hosting an hour at 4pm on Saturday. 

They’ll be playing some of their favourite music, chatting about their career to date, their recent appearance at Shane McGowan’s birthday celebrations in Dublin and their love of all things Mullingar. 

Paul Kiernan from Booka Brass band is a former member of Mullingar Town Band, and he will be joining Kevin for a chat about his time with the band and the huge success of Booka Brass Band. 

Some past and present members and staff of the band will be coming in to co-host at various intervals during the couple of days. 

Colin Hoye is now a member of King Kong Company, one of the biggest bands on the festival circuit at the moment. 

His brother Brendan still plays with the band and is a judge with Drum Corps Europe. 

They will both co-host with Kevin at 9am on Saturday, and pick some tunes and chat about their time with the town band and after they left it. 

Kevin will be chatting to Ray Dolan on Saturday morning and his cousin Vincent Dolan will be with him on Friday evening. 

Vincent was assistant director of Mullingar Town Band at one point and went on to form one of the biggest marching bands in Ireland – Clondalkin Youth Band, where he is still director today. 

Keeping on the marching band theme, Oisin Molloy, chairperson of the Irish Marching Bands Association, will join Kevin for a chat about Mullingar Town Band, its recent All-Ireland Championship win, and marching band activity in Ireland. 

Kevin Morgan’s background

“My time in radio started out when Noel O’Farrell in Midlands 103 didn’t immediately eject me from the building when I went in looking for some work experience in 2000. 

“He brought me straight in to the studio and we had a great chat about the good and the bad of radio.

“That led to me becoming part of the team of the upcoming new programme ‘The Saturday Show’ on Midlands Radio 3 Westmeath in December 2000. 

“Tony Scott was the man that was taking on the show, and I became part of the team. Tony had a natural flair for radio and had loads of ideas on how this new show would sound. I had, well... Tony!

“What followed was some great times, varying levels of quality of radio and some dodgy enough bits at times!

“So with the occasion that’s in it this Saturday, we thought, why not get the gang back together all these years later?

“Tony and I will host ‘The Saturday Show’ for one more time only, this Saturday from noon to 2pm.

“I’m really looking forward to speaking to historian Ruth Illingworth and also John Nooney of Mullingar news and views on Saturday at 10am. 

“We’ll be chatting about the earlier history of Mullingar Town Band, the changes over the years and the impact the band has had on the community over time.

“John also reported for local radio on the band’s return from a successful trip to Midsomer Norton in 2005. So we’ll be listening back to some of his recordings from the much missed bandstand in the town park from that day, and also a short interview with Hubie Magee at that time.”

More to be confirmed.

Link for donations: www.ifundraise.ie/mtbradiomarathon 
To listen: www.realcast.co.uk