Gary Hastings and Cathal McConnell. Photo: Alan Whitsitt

She was a youngish fiddler, a newcomer to the session and appeared not to know too many of our tunes, ‘our’ referring to the older regulars, Bernie, Deirdre, Spike the fluter and myself. No harm in that. When the time was right we’d ask her to play one of her own, and join in after a few bars if we knew it, and if we didn’t we might nod appreciatively and murmur a word or two of praise at the end of it and ask her what it was, or had she a name for it, or we might not, all depending. But for now the music is beginning to come together, everyone listening out for the others, getting into the groove, when the newcomer...