“Wow, what a question - nobody has ever asked me that before.”
It has always occurred to me that people who end up as musicians and/or songwriters meet their Muse as they travel along different paths in life and so I wanted to know what made Mike Hanrahan of Stockton’s Wing a songwriter in the first place.
Was it just because he had a natural talent for it? Was it because he had a message he wanted to share with the world? Was it to make loads of money and chat up girls?
After the shock of the question, he takes time to answer.
“I love song writing,” he says.
“And if it was to do with money, then I wouldn’t be writing the songs I’m writing. I write because it allows me to connect and to express aspects of my life and the people I’d meet.
“I think it’s a great gift to have been given and I’ve worked very hard over the years. I’ve learned from the masters and I try to write songs that people will tune into. At the end of the day, it is really has nothing to do with number one singles for me. It has all to do with people tuning into your song and listening to it.
“For instance, I wrote a song last year with the Men’s Shed in Westport. We wrote a song about Christmas and what Christmas means to retired men. We had 35 retired men, some of whom had been retired for many years. And we wrote a song together and recorded it for the craic, live in the shed.
“That’s why I do what I do. And that’s my number one hit single there so I don’t need to chase the charts anymore. It’s all about the songs.”
However, Mike and Stockton’s Wing did sample chart success with their songs Beautiful Affair and Walk Away in the 1980s. The band had come together in 1977 as a straight trad band but when Mike joined after having been with Maura O’Connell as a duo, the Tumbleweeds, Stockton’s Wing took a new, more folk-pop direction.
“I think the lads took a chance on me,” says Mike.
“They knew I was writing my own songs and they knew that my songs were contemporary. I wasn’t a traditional singer by any stretch of the imagination so they took a chance on me but I also think, by them doing that, that they were also connecting to their own contemporary attitude to trad because they really wanted to drive the music; it was new, refreshing and aggressive and exciting.
“So I think it was natural for them to go down to contemporary route because that’s where they were. That’s where their hearts were anyway.”
My gig now is very simple - I just want to promote that whole notion that it’s not the end of the world to have dementia. We need to break the stigma associated with dementia and we need to view people with dementia with as much equal rights as the rest of us. And we must promote agency for those people to continue to continue their lives as normal as possible
— Mike Hanrahan
That drive and excitement meant that Stockton’s Wing were one of the best live bands of the 1980s and such was their reputation that they shared stages with Michael Jackson and Prince.
However, Mike decided to call it a day and move away from music after 10 years with the band and to become a cook, working at his best friend’s restuarant, that friend being Pat Shortt, the great actor and comedian.
Mike was also head of IMRO for 12 years, leaving at a time when the digital world was beginning to threaten the livelihoods of millions of songwriters and performers but now his life is “consumed” by something which is both personal and universal.
“I was deeply touched by a family member who had dementia over a long period of time,” explains Mike, “and it inspired me to write a song which I recorded with the Forget Me Nots choir, an age friendly and dementia friendly choir in Dublin.
“Also, my mum died a few years ago. And I think her passing wish for me was to try and see where I could develop better ways of promoting the creative arts – along with the science – to people living with dementia.
“I have done that in numerous ways, but one of them was I took up a fellowship in Trinity College with the Global Brain Health Institute.
“My gig now is very simple - I just want to promote that whole notion that it’s not the end of the world to have dementia
“We need to break the stigma associated with dementia and we need to view people with dementia with as much equal rights as the rest of us. And we must promote agency for those people to continue to continue their lives as normal as possible.
“So we need to reframe how we approach people with dementia and, my studies have shown me that all the arts – poetry, song, dance, mime, drawing, art, acting – any of those have a huge impact a positive impact on people living with dementia.”
However, the music goes on in tandem and this St Patrick’s Day, Stockton’s Wing and the great John Spillane will be playing a special gig at The MAC in Belfast. It’s something Mike is looking forward to, singling out Dónal O’Connor for special praise.
“I think Dónal flies such a great flag for Irish music on radio and on TV but live as well,” says Mike.
“And I love the fact that he’s got so much energy to keep the music alive and bring it to people and, and, with Belfast City Council, he saw the notion of bumping up the Paddy’s weekend and making a festival of it.”
Mike says one of his “greatest gigs ever” was in Belfast, playing with the legendary Sean Maguire.
“I will never forget that as long as I live, because we grew up with this incredible hero that we used to go and watch as kids doing the Hungarian Rhapsody and all these mad things in the fiddle. And then, there he was on stage with us in in Belfast... I’ll never forget it,” says Mike.
