Paddy Canny

Who was Paddy Canny?

Paddy Canny was an Irish fiddle player. In a career that spanned over six decades, Canny was instrumental in popularizing Irish traditional music, both in Ireland and internationally. He gained initial fame in the late 1940s as a founding member of the Tulla Céilí Band, which made its first appearance on RTÉ Radio in 1948 and had positioned itself as the top céilí band in Ireland by the late 1950s. Canny captured the All Ireland fiddle championship in 1953 and was featured on the landmark 1959 recording, All-Ireland Champions: Violin. Although he stopped performing for large audiences in 1965, he returned briefly in the 1990s to record his critically acclaimed solo album, Paddy Canny: Traditional Music from the Legendary East Clare Fiddler.