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Storm brews at PHCC

Titanic fans will recognize the sound even though they might not know the band's name.

By BARBARA L. FREDRICKSEN
Published January 19, 2007

The scene is one of the most lively and most memorable in the blockbuster 1997 movie Titanic.

In it, the penniless Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio) has spirited the very upper class Rose Bukater (Kate Winslet) away from the first class dining room, her ambitious mother and her stuffy fiance to race down the stairs to steerage to dance Irish jigs all through the night.

The band that got everyone on the screen dancing and every toe in darkened theaters tapping was Gaelic Storm, a five-piece Irish-Celtic band discovered in its infancy at an outdoor fair by Titanic music supervisor Randy Gerston, who brought the group to the attention of director James Cameron.

On Sunday, the band will do a show at 7 p.m. at Pasco-Hernando Community College's performing arts center.

"This is one of the best shows we'll have this year," said Arla Altman, executive director of the PHCC Foundation, sponsor of the annual series of performances that includes Gaelic Storm this year.

Not surprisingly, tickets have been selling briskly, though a few prime singles and several outer section seats were still available at press time.

Since its cameo role in Titanic, the band has released five albums, toured the world and "become much tighter as musicians and songwriters," band member Steve Twigger told Salem (Ore.) Statesman Journal writer Chris Hagan in October.

The band's latest album, Bring Yer Wellies, a reference to the knee-high boots called Wellingtons that Irishmen wear after a hard rain, has gotten universal praise for musicality, sheer energy and authenticity - the band's one Irish member, Patrick Murphy, was born in County Cork and speaks fluent Gaelic.

It's classic Irish pub music with a lot of stomping to fiddles, bagpipes, spoons, uilleann pipes (a kind of small bagpipe), drums and guitar.

The group named itself Gaelic Storm after its three founding members - lead singer Murphy, Twigger and Steve Wehmeyer - crossed traditionally mournful Celtic music with rowdy, pub-party style. Wehmeyer later left the band.

The other current members are percussionist Ryan Lacey, piper Pete Purvis and fiddler Ellery Klein. All the band members have advanced and/or multiple academic degrees in music.

Those who subscribe to the Cinemax movie channel may have seen a short documentary about the band that ran in rotation a year or so ago.

The stop in New Port Richey is one of about 120 shows the band is expected to book this year. After Florida, the band plays in Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, takes a swing through five New England states, hops to Arizona, then comes back through the southeast and Midwest, winding up at the huge, three-day Milwaukee Irish Festival in August.

If you go

Gaelic Storm

Where: Pasco-Hernando Community College Performing Arts Center, 10230 Ridge Road, New Port Richey

When: 7 p.m. Sunday

Tickets: $18, $22 and $25. Call (727) 816-3707 today; online at www.phcc.edu/tix; or at the box office before the show.

[Last modified January 18, 2007, 23:48:58]