The Directors and staff of Claddagh Records wish to offer their sincerest sympathy to the family of the late Paddy Moloney.
“Paddy Moloney played an enormous role in bringing Ireland’s rich cultural heritage to audiences all over the world, ” James Morrissey, Chairman, Claddagh Records, said today.
The first Chieftains album was released on the Claddagh label in the early 1960s . Claddagh had been set up by the late Garech Browne and Dr. Ivor Browne in the 1950s to preserve and record Irish traditional music and the spoken word. Sean O’Riada commented on Paddy Moloney’s pipering in a review in Hibernia: “ ‘The Boy in the Gap’ demonstrated Paddy Moloney’s virtuoso command of the instrument and even the most extreme traditionalist could have found no fault with this splendid display, with notes being snapped out with a crackling brilliance.”
In 1968 Garech Browne invited Paddy Moloney to join Claddagh as office manager on a weekly wage of £25. He later became a director. They remained lifelong friends and Paddy played at the scattering of the ashes of the Claddagh founder at Luggala in 2018.
As recently as last month, Paddy together with Claddagh and Universal Music were working on a release to celebrate the 60th anniversary of The Chieftains.
October 12, 2021
