The world accordion to Burke

“It’s amusing now to think of the fees then,” said 64-year-old Joe Burke, one of the most influential and admired button accordionists in the history of Irish traditional music.
In about 1959 he made two 78-rpm solo recordings for Dublin’s Gael-Linn label. “They were the last two 78s ever recorded and released in Ireland,” Burke said recently from his home in Kilnadeema, East Galway, “and I got paid six guineas [a guinea is a pound and a shilling] for each. If anyone had mentioned the word ‘royalties,’ we would have thought it had something to do with Buckingham Palace.”
The first public performance for the Leitrim C