Arising from the Troubles
Arising from
the Troubles.
Songs and stories
of conflict and peace.
Songs and first-hand stories from Northern Ireland, exploring conflict, hope and the search for peace.
This Tommy Sands concert programme is based on his album, Arising from the Troubles.
The songs on the program will be complemented by Sands' narrative of his first-hand experiences in this sometimes sad, sometimes hopeful time in Northern Ireland.
Through the swirl of smoke and sulphur came the rebel songs of Tommy Sands. Not in the sense of whooping it up for violent struggle, but in rebellion against the hatred which has pock-marked our history and shredded the happiness of successive generations. This collection provides a soundtrack for days of darkness, days of hope, days of weary peace: soul songs telling our troubled story with a deft eye for exact detail and pitch-perfect appreciation of political nuance.
Northern Ireland is a savage place drenched in decency. Perhaps it cannot be understood other than by an act of artistic imagination. Arising from the Troubles offers a more eloquent and expansive account of our awkward reality than any shelf load of academic analyses.