Dan Sheerin to launch new album at 83 years of age

At the ripe old age of 83 most of us would be sitting back with our feet up and taking it easy – but not Dan Sheerin. He is just about to launch his own album, but not only that, he has also written ten of the 11 songs on that album!

“It took me 50 years to write ten songs,” he admits, with a hearty laugh. “In fact, it's 52 years since I wrote the first song, and I kept them all to myself all down the years and never told anybody I had them written until I decided I'd record them.”

One of the catalysts for making the decision to record an album for the veteran musician who is known the length and breadth of the country as the founding member of the Sheerin Family Band was not having any recordings of his own father, who was a gifted concert flute player.

“My own Dad collected and played thousands of tunes in his lifetime, and our house was known as a rambling house, so people would come to house dances and he would play the tunes. My mother was a sean-nós singer, so we grew up surrounded by music.”

Dan's family home was in Ballydrown, Castledaly, where he was one of ten children born to the late Joe and Theresa Sheerin. “I was always able to sing and Master Ryan used to have choir once a week in the national school in Castledaly, so if I wasn't singing in school I was giving it a go at home,” he says.

Growing up in such a musical household, it was no surprise that when Dan met and married his late wife, Mary (née Slevin), and they had their own family of six sons, Paul, Des, Danny, Kieran, Tom and Simon and five daughters, Janette, Ann, Noeleen, Marian and Carmel, that music would figure strongly in the lives of the family, who made their home in Maghera, The Pidgeons, between Athlone and Ballymahon.

“To tell you the truth, I never planned anything in my life,” says Dan Sheerin “but I started playing music because I was in a dead end job and I thought it would bring in a few extra bob.” He recalls that the family were living in a rented house for which they were paying £9 a week and they had no car.

“Mind you, we were still as happy as Larry,” he recalls.

With his beloved wife at his side and three children in tow, Paul (10), Des (9) and Janette (8), the Sheerin Family Band went on the road in 1973, and the band has been going strong ever since – albeit with many line up changes along the way.

The band played at supper dances, weddings and all manner of social functions across the Midlands until Dan and Mary finally decided it was time to retire 32 years later, in 2005. “We used to get £1 a piece when we started out first, and it has only been in recent years that the members of the band have been able to make a living out of playing music full time,” says Dan.

As well as acting as the manager of the Sheerin Family Band, and singing on stage up to three nights every week, the late Mary Sheerin – who passed away in August 2021 at the age of 78 – was also presiding over a very busy home and tending to the needs of her 11 children.

Dan recalls the family band as being a bit like a game of musical chairs, because as soon as one of his sons or daughters left, he would have another one primed to take their place on stage! “They are all self-taught musicians,” he says, “they all taught each other how to play, I suppose the music was in them from the start.”

Music has created a very strong bond among the Sheerin family, with the only one of the 11 siblings living the further away from the family home being Paul – and he is just over the road in Mullingar! “It has definitely kept the family together,” says Dan, “and despite the fact that they all played in different bands over the years they always kept the Sheerin Family Band going.”

After his retirement from the band in 2005, Dan Sheerin reckons his voice “got better” and he recorded his first album with his wife about ten years ago. Proving that he can still hold his own alongside his musical offspring, he is proud to be able to say that he recorded all ten songs for his new album on the same day!

The Sheerin Family Band is made up of Dan's six sons and one of his daughters, Carmel, and he is is delighted that he was able to persuade each of them to sing a verse of one of the songs on the new album which he wrote just a year ago. He admits, however, that it did take “ a lot of persuasion” for some of them to sing as they are more used to playing a range of musical instruments.

The only song on the new album which wasn't written by Dan Sheerin is a duet he sings with his newest daughter-in-law, country music singing sensation, Cliona Hagan, who is married to the youngest member of the family, Simon.

Despite the launch of his new album, Dan Sheerin jokingly says it doesn't mean he is “starting out again” in the music business, though he still joins his family on stage for a song or two during their 'Summer Nights' series of gigs in Cooney's Hotel in Ballymahon, and he also sings at old folks' parties around the local area.

“Other than lie down and die, I keep going and I keep an interest in everything,” he says. “At this stage I don't get excited about anything and the only reason I am doing the album is so that my own family and their families will have something to remember me by when I am no longer around.”