Tuscany buffet dinner for 2 $130
Cocktails and wine $44
Tip parking attendant $1
Hearing Ciarán Sheehan perform to a private audience Priceless!

As it turns out, a parishioner is a close friend to Ciarán. Ciarán has performed in over 1,000 appearance as The Phantom. He performed two works tonight: You'll Never Walk Alone and Music of the Night from Phantom.

I've been to Broadway plays before, but I have never been so overtaken by a voice so powerful and intense in the intimate atmosphere of a restaurant dining room. He was honored with a standing ovation and rightfully so.

Ciarán sat at an adjacent table to mine. Actually I was seated directly behind him. After the flood of well-wishers came by to applaud him personally and after he finished his dinner, I moved to a vacant chair on his left and offered my personal thanks, telling hm his performance was worth more than the price of admission tonight. I asked Ciarán for his website which is posted here. You really should visit it.

I told Ciarán about my own musical ability. How in the 6th grade Sister Mary Ricci decided to start a boys choir and that ALL the boys had to be in it. At the first practice, we boys sang whatever. I couldn't hold a note to save my life. As we were singing and I was off the octave scale, Sister Mary was making faces trying to track down the terribly off key voice. Yours truly was the first boy kicked out of the choir in less than 5 minutes of practice. I was the idol of every 6th grade boy who didn't want to be in the choir.

Now Ciarán Sheehan, on the other hand, related his story. He wanted to be an altar boy but turned up unknowingly at choir audition. He couldn't figure out why he had to sing so many songs for the nun or priest. He just wanted to hold the plate as the priest served Communion.

How different his life could have been had he not joined the choir.

Ciarán, at every chance I chide my Irish friends of 40 years, Walsh, Higgins, D'heron and Doughtery that all Irish cuisine can never hold a candle to one Italian Dish.

Well, Ciarán, you are to music what Italians are to food ... a love affair.

Thanks for a memorable evening.

Posted by Cap'n on September 21, 2006  http://captainslogblog.typepad.com/captains_log_blog/2006/09/ciarn_sheehan.html

• As good as, if not BETTER THAN, anything ever seen in London, New York, or Toronto. - Toronto Radio
• Intense and poignant, acted with depth and sensitivity. Sheehan's Phantom was beautifully sung He moved from moments of raw vocal power to an achingly gentle and compelling despair, always with flawless control. His Music Of The Night was exquisite. - Toronto Review
• Sheehan has the kind of soaring stage voice from which indelible Broadway moments are made. - New York Times
• The great discovery here is Ciaran Sheehan, who sings beautifully, acts without affectation, and avoids the puffed chest heroics that so often go with the territory. He and Tracy Shayne have real sexual chemistry, too - more, at this point, than she has with the Phantom. - Seattle Times
• May be the best Raoul yet...balancing the Vicomte's earnestness with a charismatic gallantry. - Jeremy Gerard, Variety
• On the singing side, the standout performance was Ciaran Sheehan's as Raoul, the young man who defeats the Phantom and wins the girl. His voice is as handsome and smooth as the man himself, and he used it with aplomb, making every word count. - Speight Jenkins, Seattle Times
• "An impressive tenor" - Clive Barnes

FROM BROADWAY TO IRELAND

Ciaran's debut performances in Ireland in May, 2004 were hailed by critics and audiences. He received a lengthy standing ovation in his native Dublin where he performed at the National Concert Hall, and after his guest appearances with Irish radio-television host Pat Kenny, was praised for his "amazing talent" and "fantastic voice". Kenny commented that he had "never heard a finer rendition of Music Of The Night."

Continuing the success of their Ireland In Song concerts, Eily O'Grady Patterson and Ciaran join with guest artists presenting selections from the traditional Irish songbook as well as Broadway and operatic favorites.

Eily O'Grady Patterson, is a recipient of the prestigious gold medal of the Eire Society of Boston, Massachusetts, in recognition of her outstanding contributions to Irish culture in the United States. She performs and teaches harp, as well as other instruments. She is the Founder and Director of the Gaelic Singers of New York and the Eily O'Grady Irish Harp Orchestra. Together with her husband Frank Patterson, she has appeared all over the world,and has performed on several acclaimed BBC and PBS specials. Eily has appeared with the finest orchestras and at the world's leading concert halls. She is Dublin-born, and comes from a well-known Irish musical family which includes her sister Geraldine, Ireland's leading violinist.

Tenor Ciaran Sheehan, a veteran of Broadway's "The Phantom Of The Opera" and "Les Miserables" and several productions at the Irish Repertory Theatre, heads the bill. The little band of transplanted Dubliners led off with a heartfelt rendition of "America the Beautiful" with Sheehan following up with a silken version of "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen". It seems fairly safe to say that [audiences] would be both pleased and warmed by the manner in which these excellent musicians carry on the musical traditions to which [Frank Patterson] devoted so much of his life.

Joseph Hurley, The Irish Echo

Ciaran Sheehan, of the dark curly hair and matchless tenor, all over the place accompanied by the beautiful Eily O'Grady.

"Prologue" - The Irish Repertory Company

March 17, 2001 HA'PENNY BRIDGE, Ciaran's debut album, was introduced on Adrian Flannelly's Public Radio program on Saint Patrick's Day. Ciaran was Adrian's guest throughout the Saint Patrick's Day special, and treated listeners to a preview of songs from the album. "Impressive debut album...stirring and sensual. Highest recommendation!"

"THE IRISH" Returns to NYC's Irish Repertory Theatre

"Even better...stronger, subtler, more resonant than it ever was in the past. The company radiates an unmistakable quality of being thrilled to be working their way through McCourt's theatrical scrapbook once again, and their enthusiasm seems to clarify and heighten the impact the show has on audiences seeing it in this joyous revival." "Ciaran Sheehan performs admirably, his enthusiasm and his ringing, crystalline tenor voice constituting, now as before, one of the show's primary assets. The Dublin-born Sheehan, whose contributions to McCourt's show include particularly effective renderings of such songs as "I'll Take You Home Again, Kathleen" and "Danny Boy", has recently begun a series of concert tours with the late Frank Patterson's widow, pianist Eily O'Grady. "The Irish..." provides enormous pleasure in a world that could use all the pure joy it can summon up." Joseph Hurley, The Irish Echo.

THE HOSTAGE

* Irreverent humor...finely acted - served up by a first-rate cast, who intermittently and zestfully burst into song. The crucial role of the music is immediately established with an opening song by Ciaran Sheehan who, besides having a beautiful voice, also accompanies (musical director) Mark Hartman on several instruments. - Elyse Sommer, Curtain Up

* Beautiful, rich language and thought-provoking ideas. Unusual, off-beat dark satiric comedy - does not disappoint. Exceptional was the beautiful singing by the Irish tenor, Ciaran Sheehan. -Marjorie Shapiro, Talkin' Broadway

* Has the shape and spirit of an exuberant binge. Opens with a party, proceeds in hilarity with a rueful wink, as though it were all a self-indulgent hoot. Cast seem to be having a great, deadpan good time - highly original. A swaggering and careening piece. (Sheehan) addresses the audience in midline, enlists the accompaniment of the piano-player for an outbreak into song - you feel the playfulness in it. It's fun. - Bruce Weber, NY Times

* Brazenly joyous, refreshingly raucous - impossible for even the most soulless spectator to walk away from the show unmoved and unsatisfied. Congratulations. Opens on a surprisingly serious note, with tenor Ciaran Sheehan , whose ringing voice is one of the Irish Rep's most remarkable assets, crossing the stage as the house lights are dimming, to sing "Red Roses For Me" - evocative and poignant. - Joseph Hurtley, The Irish Echo

*Brendan Behan's l960 play is set in that year, a moment of relative peace in Ireland, and it raises the question of whether anyone other than a few fanatics really cared anymore about the country's entanglement with England. Set in a boarding house-cum-brothel run by a hero of the l916 uprising, the show is an odd but stirring mix of song, dance, gibes, and storytelling; a plot slowly sneaks in. though, and turns it into an examination of how much the Irish of the time did mind English rule and whether they could stand to use terrorism as a weapon. Forty years on, Behan's political views are still fresh, and the play itself is a fascinating mixture of tragedy and vitality and fun, like a good pub tale. The talented cast is directed by Charlotte Moore. - New Yorker Magazine, Nov. 20 2000