Background
Sonny Brogan was born in Dublin, the eldest of three children born to Alicia Brown and Andrew Brogan. On a holiday trip to Kildare as a young boy, he first heard Irish music played on the accordion by his great uncle, Thomas Cleary. His mother, when opening luggage on returning home, found a melodeon hidden there 'stolen' by Sonny who had taken a fancy to it. He was allowed to keep the instrument and taught himself to play it.
Growing up he attended music classes for piano, and learned how to read basic music notation. He soon found, however that his ear served him better as a teacher, and abandoned "paper music" as he called it. The teacher in question offered to teach Sonny free of charge if he returned, but he declined.
Sonny had a great love of music in general and possessed many 78rpm records of artists like Amelita Galli-Curci, apart from a huge collection of Michael Coleman, the Sligo fiddle player, who he admired more than any other musician.
Read more about this topic: Sonny Brogan
Famous quotes containing the word background:
“In the true sense one’s native land, with its background of tradition, early impressions, reminiscences and other things dear to one, is not enough to make sensitive human beings feel at home.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“They were more than hostile. In the first place, I was a south Georgian and I was looked upon as a fiscal conservative, and the Atlanta newspapers quite erroneously, because they didn’t know anything about me or my background here in Plains, decided that I was also a racial conservative.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“Silence is the universal refuge, the sequel to all dull discourses and all foolish acts, a balm to our every chagrin, as welcome after satiety as after disappointment; that background which the painter may not daub, be he master or bungler, and which, however awkward a figure we may have made in the foreground, remains ever our inviolable asylum, where no indignity can assail, no personality can disturb us.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)