There are roughly 70 million people worldwide who claim Irish descent. That’s more than ten times the population of Ireland itself. They live in Boston and Buenos Aires, Sydney and San Francisco, London and Lagos, Tokyo and Toronto. Most have never set foot in Ireland. But many of them carry something Irish with them — and for a surprising number, that something is the music.
Irish traditional music is, and has always been, a music of emigration. It crossed the Atlantic in the holds of coffin ships. It was played in tenement kitchens in Manhattan and at crossroads dances in the Bronx. It was recorded on 78rpm discs in New York and sent home to Ireland, where it changed the tradition itself. And today, in the age of internet radio and global streaming, it connects people to a place and a culture that may be generations removed from their daily lives.
This is the story of that connection.
The Music That Left Ireland
The Great Famine of 1845–1852 and the decades of emigration that followed scattered the Irish across the globe. Between 1820 and 1920, over four million people left Ireland for America alone. They carried very little with them. But they carried tunes.
In the Irish communities of New York, Chicago, Boston and Philadelphia, the music served a purpose beyond entertainment. It was a way of maintaining identity in a strange land. House dances, parish hall céilís and informal sessions in kitchens and bars kept the tradition alive. The music was a piece of home — a reminder of the place they’d left and the people they’d left behind.
Francis O’Neill, the Cork-born Chief of Police in Chicago, understood this instinctively. His monumental collections of Irish tunes — published in 1903 and 1907 — were not just acts of scholarship. They were acts of cultural preservation by a man who knew that without written records, the tunes would eventually be lost as the emigrant generation aged and died.
Then came the recordings. Michael Coleman, James Morrison and dozens of other Irish musicians in New York made commercial 78rpm recordings in the 1920s and 30s. These records were sold to Irish communities in America, but they were also shipped back to Ireland. The irony is profound: some of the most influential recordings in the history of Irish traditional music were made not in Ireland but in a Manhattan studio, by men who had left home as teenagers and would never return.
Sessions Around the World
Today, you can find an Irish trad session on every continent (except, perhaps, Antarctica — though someone has probably tried). The website TheSession.org lists sessions in dozens of countries, from the expected strongholds to some surprising outposts.
North America
The United States has the largest and deepest Irish music scene outside Ireland. Cities like New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia and San Francisco have vibrant session networks, annual festivals, and communities of musicians who have been keeping the tradition alive for generations. Some of America’s finest trad musicians — Liz Carroll (fiddle), Joanie Madden (flute and whistle), Mick Moloney (who recently passed) — were born in or raised in the US but are respected worldwide.
Canada, particularly the Atlantic provinces and cities like Toronto and Ottawa, has its own strong Irish music tradition. Newfoundland’s Irish roots are so deep that the music there sometimes feels more like a parallel tradition than an import.
Britain
London has been a magnet for Irish emigrants for centuries, and the city’s Irish pubs have sustained a thriving session scene since at least the 1950s. The Pogues — who blended trad with punk rock in the 1980s — came out of London’s Irish community. Cities like Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow all have regular sessions and significant Irish musical communities.
Australia and New Zealand
Australia’s Irish community is proportionally one of the largest outside Ireland, and the trad scene is strong, particularly in Sydney and Melbourne. Radio Siamsa regularly hears from Australian listeners — people who tune in during their morning or evening to hear a sound that connects them to a homeland many of them have never visited.
Continental Europe and Beyond
Irish sessions happen regularly in Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Tokyo, Buenos Aires, Hong Kong and dozens of other cities. Some of these sessions are run by Irish emigrants; others are run by local enthusiasts who fell in love with the music. The Scoil Samhraí Willie Clancy (Willie Clancy Summer School) in Miltown Malbay draws students from across Europe and the Americas every July, and many return home to start or sustain sessions in their own cities.
What the Music Does for the Diaspora
There’s something about Irish traditional music that carries emotional weight beyond the notes. For people of Irish descent living abroad, the music serves functions that are hard to articulate but deeply felt.
It’s a link to identity. When you’re a third-generation Irish-American in Chicago or a second-generation Irish-Australian in Melbourne, your daily life may have little connection to Ireland. But sit in a session and play a reel that your grandfather played, and something connects. The music carries memory.
It creates community. A session is an instant social network. Walk into a pub in a strange city with a fiddle under your arm, and if there’s a session running, you have friends for the evening. The shared repertoire — the same tunes played in Dublin and Denver, Clare and Calgary — is a common language that transcends geography.
It’s portable. You don’t need a concert hall or a recording studio. You need an instrument, a few tunes in your head, and someone to play with. Irish music is designed for small rooms and informal gatherings. It travels easily because it was always meant to be played anywhere.
It’s honest. There’s no stage show, no costume, no performance in the theatrical sense. A session is people sitting in a circle playing tunes for the pleasure of it. For diaspora communities that can sometimes get caught up in a sentimental or commercialised version of Irishness, the trad session is the real thing — unpackaged, unsponsored, unpretentious.
The Digital Connection
The internet has transformed how the diaspora connects with Irish music. Before the web, if you lived in a city without a session, your access to the tradition was limited to whatever records you could find. Now, the entire tradition is available at the touch of a button.
Radio Siamsa exists because of this reality. We stream traditional Irish music 24 hours a day to listeners in over 100 countries. Our postbox is full of messages from people in Germany, Spain, Australia, Japan, Canada and the United States who tell us that the station is their daily connection to Ireland. A listener in Québec wrote: “I picked up this radio station in Ireland tonight. Beautiful traditional Irish music at its best.” A listener in Hamburg: “Excellent choice of tunes. It always lifts the spirit.” A listener in Australia: “Trying late in life to become a fiddle player and Radio Siamsa really helps.”
These aren’t just compliments. They’re evidence of what the music means to people far from Ireland. The station doesn’t replace a live session — nothing can. But it maintains the thread. It keeps the sound of Ireland in the ears of people who need it.
The Tradition Goes Both Ways
It’s important to recognise that the relationship between Ireland and its diaspora isn’t one-directional. The diaspora didn’t just receive the tradition — it shaped it.
The most influential recordings in Irish music history were made by emigrants in New York. Francis O’Neill’s tune collections, assembled in Chicago, are still the most-used reference books in the tradition. American-born musicians like Liz Carroll and Joanie Madden are respected worldwide. The folk revival of the 1960s, which revitalised trad in Ireland, was partly inspired by the international success of the Clancy Brothers in America.
Today, the influence continues. Musicians from the diaspora attend summer schools in Ireland, bring tunes and styles back to their home communities, and contribute to the tradition’s evolution. The session in a pub in Brooklyn and the session in a pub in Ennis are part of the same living tradition — different branches of the same tree.
Listening from Afar
If you’re part of the Irish diaspora — or if you simply love the music and feel connected to it regardless of your background — here’s how to stay close to the tradition:
- Listen to Radio Siamsa. It’s free, it’s 24/7, and it’s the closest thing to having a session running in your kitchen all day.
- Find a session near you. TheSession.org has a global directory. There may be one closer than you think.
- Attend a festival or summer school. The Willie Clancy Summer School, the Fleadh Cheoil, and dozens of smaller events welcome participants from everywhere.
- Learn an instrument. The tin whistle costs a few euros and the basics can be learned in a week. It’s the gateway to the tradition.
- Share the music. Play it for your children. Bring a friend to a session. The tradition survives because people pass it on.
The Irish diaspora is vast, scattered and diverse. But the music is a thread that connects all of it — a sound that says “home” regardless of where you’re hearing it. That’s what it’s always done. That’s what it will always do.
Read our complete guide to Irish traditional music
Listen now — see our guide to how to listen to Radio Siamsa
Frequently Asked Questions
How many people of Irish descent live outside Ireland?
Approximately 70 million people worldwide claim Irish descent, compared to Ireland’s population of roughly 5 million. The largest diaspora populations are in the United States (over 30 million), the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and Argentina.
Where can I find an Irish music session outside Ireland?
TheSession.org maintains a global directory of sessions searchable by location. Sessions run regularly in cities across North America, Britain, Australia, continental Europe and beyond.
Can I listen to Irish traditional music online from anywhere?
Yes. Radio Siamsa streams traditional Irish music 24/7 at siamsa.ie and through free apps on iOS and Android. It’s available anywhere with an internet connection.
Did Irish emigration affect the music tradition?
Profoundly. Emigration both threatened the tradition (by draining rural communities) and preserved it (through recordings made by emigrants in America, tune collections assembled in Chicago, and sessions sustained in diaspora communities worldwide). The tradition today is as much a product of emigration as of Ireland itself.
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