Claxton Showband Feature (1961-1968)

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The Story

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The first advert for the Claxton Showband from Drumquin, Co. Tyrone that we can find is from April, 1961. More recent accounts of the band's history stated that the band was formed in 1963, but this is clearly not the case, although it may coincide with their decision to turn professional (as bands often did). The band was managed by Barney Curley and the advert said the band featured "Patsy - Rock n' Roll Star" (Patsy was Pio McCann). The band, which started life as the "Patsy McCann Rocking Four," was soon augmented by 2 additional musicians and hit the road as a showband.

We are not 100% sure, but we think the original line-up was Frank Donnelly (trumpet), Brendan Sweeney (guitar), Pio McCann (bass), R.J. Catterson (drums), Peter Brown (sax) and Hugo Hughes (trumpet). Throughout 1961, the band seemed to be playing pretty regularly but mostly across the northern part of the country (Ulster) rarely going as far south as Sligo and Drogheda in their early days. For the next couple of years they did a steady business in and around Ulster in the main.

By November 1962, Mike Kelly (keyboards) had joined the band making them an eight piece outfit for the first time. and a year later Jimmy Magee would become lead singer with Hugo Hughes leaving the band. Sometime (we think) in 1964, the band underwent some major changes with four new members joining their ranks including Jimmy Magee (vocals), Colm Devine (guitar), Patsy Gormley (sax) and Shane McGahan (trumpet). It appears Shane did not stay too long as by 1965 the band was back down to a seven piece and he was no longer in the lineup. 

In 1964 the band was named in an interesting court case (which had nothing to do with the band but is included only as an interesting reflection of things bands had to endure back in the day. A young man went to a record shop and claimed he was the Claxton's new manager and proceeded to fraudulently take 11 records and an harmonica from the proprietor (see story below).      

By 1965, the band was travelling regularly into Donegal, Mayo, and even Galway for gigs, but still had cracked the southern half of the country as far as we can tell from adverts for their gigs. In May 1965 it was announced that Belmullet-based singer Mary McGonigle was joining the band on vocals (see below). In the same article it was reported the band would soon be making their first record. Adverts for the band's gigs over the next few months did mention Mary as being the band's vocalist, but we are not sure whether Jimmy Magee was still the lead singer.  

In January, 1966, a blurb in the Evening Herald announced the band was now managed by Tom McCluskey or Navan. The photos which accompanied the article did not include Mary, so we are unsure whether she was still with the band. However, we did note that adverts for the band once again touted Jimmy Magee, so it seems he did not leave the band when Mary joined.  By late 1966 the Claxton had also started playing much further south than previously and had finally truly become a "nationwide" showband as they were playing Cork regularly.

In January 1967, Jimmy Magee left the band to join the Dawnbreakers (formerly the Carnegie Showband from Irvinestown) and he was replaced by Tommy Fee who had been with the Maurice Mulcahy Band for three years and would eventually join the Cajun Sound in the 1970's. Despite the change in lead vocalists, the band didn't miss a beat and continued to expand their reputation and their ballroom circuit.

In an interesting twist, in September, 1967 an article in the Drogheda Independent reported that Jimmy Magee was backl in the band having been ill (despite newspaper adverts saying he was in the Dawnbreakers...along with four former members of the Claxton). We assume Tommy Fee went back to the Mulcahy band as later reports said he had been with them four five years.

An article about he Dawnbreakers in October 1967, reported that Frank Donnelly, R.J. Catterson, Shane McGahan were all with the band. 1968 would be the band's last year on the road as Brian Coll, who had previously been with the Polka Dots and Plattermen, decided iot was time to go out on his own and he drafted four members of the Claxton, to provide the basis for his new band, The Buckaroos. They were Brendan Sweeney (guitar), Pio McCann (bass), Freddie Armstrong (drums) and Gerry Quinn (sax).

We think that by the time this happened, the band had already more or less stopped playing as there were very few adverts for them after March, 1968. However, we did find an advert for what must have been their last gig on June 23rd, 1968 which was more than two weeks after the debut of the Buckaroos in the Astoria, Bundoran on June 6th, 1968.   

More to come.....

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Discography

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Audio Clips

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Where Are They Now?