The unpredictable weather meant some of the outdoor gigs were moved indoors, in one case, to a giant sports hall fulfilling one our life long ambitions to play a stadium gig!!!  On our last night the gig was cancelled due to rain, despite this we managed to fulfill our second life long ambition, to play Irish music in a English pub namely the ‘Cockney London Pub’!!!!

As per usual the trip was full of self inflicted mishaps. Backing up the notion from Paul McCann that the willingfools are not a band but a ‘Drama Group’. The misadventures included Conor losing his passport, Cathal losing his passport, Abe Doran having his flight delayed and diverted to another airport, Cathal landing in an airport eight hours away, the entire group missing their planes home and to top it all, Barry treating mister Hertzs petrol car to some Diesel when heard that petrol prices had increased!!!!

Despite all this, we honestly found this tour a great adventure, thanks to the great atmosphere within the band. 

One of the highlights of the tour for the band was performing at the world famous Cafe Pedrocchi in Padua.

Joining us on tour for the 1st time is Caroline Jamieson - Vocalist, Bodhran player and Flower arranger!

Paul McAnn on the Bass guitar was another great addition to the band bringing wonderful tones and textures to the music.

As Always, it was a pleasure to have Patrick Martin on Uillean Pipes and Flute. We were lucky enough that Patrick was available to play with his busy schedule. It’s a pity he wasn�t as generous with cigarettes as he was with his pipe playing!

The Willingfools would like to extend a huge thanks to all the people we met during our tour. It was pleasure to be in Italy and we hope to be back next year.

Performance in Tel Aviv Museum

On this particular tour the Willing Fools were lucky enough to have two special vocalists accompanying them on their trip. Ann-Marie Sweeney from Newry, County Down and Jackie Rooney from Kilkeel, County Down apart from being two lovely girls, their harmony vocals brought a new facet to the Willing Fools sound.

Also joining us on our trip was Israeli man Abe Doron, ex-Riverdance percussionist now playing in his own band Evergreen, whom it was an honour to have playing with us. His rhythmic patterns enriched the overall sound of the music for which are very greatful.

The bands new look was used on an Italian television show, in front an audience of five thousand people and countless TV viewers. This has increased the bands fan base immensely receiving great praise for the performance despite this being the first time the band has mimed! Meeting the cream of Italian musical acts made the evening a great experience.

The biggest news on the creative front is the welcome addition of the bands own recording studio.Purchasing a state of the art pro-tools recording system complete with a thirty-two channel mixing desk will mean the band will never again have to record elsewhere. Overlooking the Irish sea it the perfect setting for inspiration and will undoubtedly increase the bands output of music.

The band visited Italy twice and enjoyed a very warm welcome on both visit.the gigs were on all occasions fun and on most ocassions wild. One fantastic element of each show was the surprise for the audience of the switching from an Irish reel to the Italian world cup theme song mid tune. This caused great elation and rapturous singing along. The Willingfools recommend that all bands should tour a country after they have won a major sports trophy!!

During this tour the male female balance in the band was more even with the addition of two female singers (lovely girls) who also added to the texture of the gigs with flute playing and Irish dancing.

A regular in the line-up on Uillean pipes and whistle is Darragh O Heiligh whom was able to join for these trips. Darragh, who would practice his pipes until callous appeared, was a huge hit with the Italians having never come in contact with Uillean pipes. One of the Italians said that he found Irish Uillean pipe players ‘Interesting’

The Rhythm section kept the band solid in the steady hands of David ‘Toaster’ Mohan on Bass and Damien ‘Cement mixer’ Brennan on Drums. This was the first time the lads had been on a ‘Fools’ tour and were a pleasure to be with. Not only did they play their part musically, they also were on hand to bail rainwater out of a flooded apartment block during a flash flood in Padova. The flood came during the night and the morning revealed a shocking scene for the bands instruments which were lying in inches of water. There followed frantic efforts to dry the instruments using hairdryers, thankfully all instruments were saved for that nights gig. We will always remember that night titled by Damien as ‘The Great flood of 2006′!!!

All profits from the tour have been donated to ‘CrossCause’ a charity foundation operating in Romania helping special needs children and families in poverty stricken circumstances. Conor and Barry have been involved with CrossCause since it began in 2001. To find out more go to www.crosscause.org.

We would also like to say a huge thanks to everybody who helped make the trip so pleasurable ie. Soundmen, tour promoters (the Barions), and the person who invented Sat Nav without who we would probably still be trying navigate our way out Rome airport!!!

In July, Grainne Duffy joined the band as guest singer. Grainne plays guitar and bohrain and has been singing and playing bands for five years. Soon after joining us rehearses begun for our Italian tour which took us the lenght and bredth of Italy, from Sicliy in the south to Lake Garda in the north. Grainne was a huge hit with the new audience and broke many hearts.

Patrick Martin who had just finished his tours with Riverdance was luckily available to join us on our Italian tour, making a huge addition to the sound the Italian audience were in awe of his piping During the concerts Patrick played some solos, spellbinding the audience with his haunting melodies.