Christy delivers set of crowdpleasers at Cork's Marquee stage

WHILE the weekend's rain was washing crowds out of it at Musgrave Park, inclement conditions couldn't stop people from converging on the Marquee on Monahan Road on Saturday night to see Christy Moore play his first gig in Cork since the pandemic hit in March 2020.

It was hardly the weather for the outdoor bar, and people were still filing in from the queue for the indoor bar as the folk legend took to the stage, flanked by cameras that gave the crowd a better view of an all-seated, one-man show via suspended LED screens.

Opening on 'Ordinary Man', Moore proceeded through a selection of tunes of his own, including perennial crowdpleasers 'Joxer Goes to Stuttgart' and 'Lisdoonvarna', as well as a brace of songs written or made famous by Cork singers, including John Spillane's 'Ballad of Patrick Murphy', 'December 1942', a tune by Ricky Lynch about the Holocaust that Moore asked the crowd to film and share on their phones, Jimmy Crowley's rendition of 'Johnny Jump Up' and a sublime 'Ride On', as written by Jimmy MacCarthy.

Heavier social moments came in the form of 'Viva La Quinta Brigada', remembering the Irish who fought fascism in the Spanish Civil War, and recent single 'Clock Winds Down', a rumination on climate change; while Moore made a mid-set dedication to the memory of a young fan who was in attendance at his last Marquee excursion in 2019.

Live at the Marquee 2022 concludes next week with performances from Crowded House, Chic ft. Nile Rodgers and pop sensation Olivia Rodrigo - while the long-running concert season's current site has been earmarked for the city's Marina development plan, promoters are now anticipating one final year on the Monahan Road, before moving one of a number of prospective new sites.