Irish folk music has, since time immemorial, been a means of Irish self-expression and nationalism, with tunes and songs passed down through the generations preserving Ireland's lively oral tradition. With the advent of the phonograph, radio, and TV, Irish music reached a more varied, worldwide audience. This international enthusiasm produced, over the last three decades, an Irish folk music revival--a renaissance that came into full bloom in the 1970s and continues vigorously today. The ballad bands of the 1950s and 1960s, the more traditional music of pioneer Sean O'Riada, the purist...