The Celtic/folk music duo “Four Shillings Short” will perform at Itasca State Park from 7-9 p.m. on Tuesday, Aug. 4. The free, family-friendly concert is part of the park’s Music Under the Pine series. Meet inside the Forest Inn (across from Douglas Lodge.)
The husband-wife duo bring musical diversity to their performances with a collection of songs, captivating storytelling and humorous side notes. “Four Shillings Short” comprises Aodh Og O’Tuama from Cork, Ireland and Christy Martin from California. Together, they perform traditional and original music from the Celtic lands, Medieval and Renaissance Europe, India and the Americas on a fantastic array of over 30 instruments, including the hammered and mountain dulcimer, mandolin, mandola, bouzouki, tinwhistles, recorders, Medieval and Renaissance woodwinds, North Indian sitar, charango, bowed psaltery, banjo, bodhran, guitar, percussion, vocals and even a krumhorn.
Touring in the U.S. and Ireland since 1997, “Four Shillings Short” are independent folk-artists who perform 150 concerts a year. They have released 12 recordings and live as full-time troubadours, traveling from town to town performing at music festivals, theatres and performing arts centers, folk societies, libraries, house concerts and schools. O’Tuama received his music degree from University College Cork, Ireland and received a Fellowship from Stanford University in California in Medieval and Renaissance performance. He sings both in English, Gaelic and French. From the age of 15, Martin studied North Indian sitar for 10 years, five of them with a student of master sitarist Ravi Shankar. She began playing the hammered dulcimer in her 20s. She sings in English, Irish, Spanish and Sanskrit. For more information, contact Itasca State Park at 699-7251 or itasca.statepark @state.mn.us.
