Anonymous €2800, Patridge Boswell €200, Susan Clifton €400, Justin Harmon €150, Fergal Horgan €100, Kerry County Council €1500, Nicolas Molina €800, Michael Gallagher €10, Jason Mundok €59, Seán O'Connell €25, Mari Mochizuki €68, Noreen O'Shea €24, Anon. €1000, Mícheál Ó Caoimh €100, Martin O'Dwyer and Park Jieun €107, Neil Brosnan €24, Tango Street Food LTD €100 Sean Looney €800, Peter Money €25, Benedict Cosgrove €34, Mary Ann van Beuren €59, Father Tom Looney €200, Edmundo Murray €52, Susan Clifton €1040, Edward Devinney €100, Micheál O'Ciardubháin €25, Anonymous €500, John McAuliff €42, Kieran O'Brien €100, Maureen O'Riordan €500, Anto McCarthy €20, Aidan Connolly €40, Billy Kemp €67, Rene Van den Heuvel €34, Hazel Moloney €30, Paul Doyle €15, Fergal Horgan €158, Jim O'Donohue €50, Eoin O'Carra €50, Geoff Cobb €30, Chris Dove €24, Patrick Donnelly €200, Marion Hartnett €200, Sr. Margaret O'Brien €200

Raised €11212 GOAL €9800

10 days ago I uploaded the last crowdfunding video and its a been busy couple of weeks. We are now €568 off the original figure hoped for to complete the film and album two years ago. Heartfelt thanks to Patridge Boswell, Susan Clifton and Justin Harmon for helping us along the ever Trackless Wild. 

Any further support will be highly appreciated and needed. The original €9800 was quoted for when Argentina was a cheap country to record and film in. The animated segments were finished a month or so ago (thats a still above from the work of Gaby Bran). The political landscape in Argentina has turned on its head since, and Ireland hasn't got any cheaper, its a wonder we managed to get to this final stretch at all, with the film only lacking color correction and sound mix, which are being organised as we speak. 

onward and upward on the Trackless Wild,

Charlie

Raised €9262

GOAL €9800

Patridge Boswell €200, Susan Clifton €400, Justin Harmon €150, Fergal Horgan €100, Kerry County Council €1500, Nicolas Molina €800, Michael Gallagher €10, Jason Mundok €59, Seán O'Connell €25, Mari Mochizuki €68, Noreen O'Shea €24, Anon. €1000, Mícheál Ó Caoimh €100, Martin O'Dwyer and Park Jieun €107, Neil Brosnan €24, Tango Street Food LTD €100 Sean Looney €800, Peter Money €25, Benedict Cosgrove €34, Mary Ann van Beuren €59, Father Tom Looney €200, Edmundo Murray €52, Susan Clifton €1040, Edward Devinney €100, Micheál O'Ciardubháin €25, Anonymus €500, John McAuliff €42, Kieran O'Brien €100, Maureen O'Riordan €500, Anto McCarthy €20, Aidan Connolly €40, Billy Kemp €67, Rene Van den Heuvel €34, Hazel Moloney €30, Paul Doyle €15, Fergal Horgan €158, Jim O'Donohue €50, Eoin O'Carra €50, Geoff Cobb €30, Chris Dove €24, Patrick Donnelly €200, Marion Hartnett €200, Sr. Margaret O'Brien €200

The Trackless Wild is officially a 1hr 10 min documentary. The edit is locked in and I'm raring to get stuck into the sound mix (with Tony O'Flaherty) and the color correction (TBA). We're going to need one last injection of funding to get this over the line. Almost there! 

Since October, I have been working on the editing and general post production of the film “The Trackless Wild" in High St. Killarney. This documentary follows five songs of the author “A Wandering Tip,” across "the great pampa land," as the gallant man himself once said. The first rough edit is coming to fruition. The film will be between an hour and one hour and 15 minutes long, with interviews with historians, farmers, singers, artists, all woven around those five songs of A Wandering Tip. There will be a few minutes of animated segments, which we still haven't gathered the funds to pay for. I am going to post a new crowdfunding update video in the coming weeks which will le cúnamh dé rally the troops to cover some of the final costs, which include, color correction, final sound mix, animation and marketing (including festival entry fees etc). I'm not sure how I managed to put this film together on such a shoe string budget, but all I can say is I'm delighted with the way its turning out, and grateful to those who turned out to support the whole sprawling endeavour. 

After finishing a mini tour of Kerry in October with renowned Charango player Patricio Sullivan we recorded some interviews and incorporated some of his music and musing in the edit of the film too. Until yesterday, I hadn't received any further injections of cash to keep us trucking on the Trackless Wild. 

Thankfully, I am now delighted to announce that the Kerry County Council are supporting the film through their “Eamon Kelly Arts Bursary” which will add a further €1500 to the coffers of the Trackless Wild film fund. What I proposed to them was that the bursary would go towards the work on the soundtrack, in both the recording of it and its mixing. This puts the amount collected for both the film and album over the past 2 years at €8412. Though it is not a paltry figure it still falls shorts of the goal of €9800. I'll post a video update in the coming weeks, in the meantime, go raibh míle maith agaibh go léir! Muchísimas gracias a todos por el apoyo! Special thanks to the Kerry County Council, maith sibh!  

Raised €8412

GOAL €9800

I finished up the last concert a few days ago for The Trackless Wild album tour in Argentina. I was accompanied on my jaunt across the pampas plains by the bould Aidan Connolly. 

We were supported in our endeavour by the Culture Ireland who paid our expenses on the trip. And what a trip it was, from the far famed Palacio Ferreyra in Cordoba to Museo Mitre the house of a former president of Argentina. The tour began in the same town these Irish Argentine songs were written in many moons ago. I sang there, accompanied by Manuel Momo, a mighty bandoneonista from the nearby town of Open Door. We played in a small garden outside the museum where in is housed the printing press that printed the songs I’ve been singing. Regarding this crowdfunding campaign. We had a great, and sorely needed injection. A second associate producer credit has been filled! And the first contribution from Argentina itself. Mil gracias a Nicolas Molina for his generous contribución!

We will now be able to complete one last day of filming in Argentina next month (incorporating drone shots) in a little farm outside of La Plata. We still have a ways to go to reach our goal, but we are motoring along nicely. Heartfelt thanks to all who have supported our search for “A Wandering Tip,” and “The Trackless Wild.” 

Raised €6912

GOAL €9800

Back at ground zero in Chaco, I'm sitting down at the computer again, spending the last couple of weeks at the mixing process, catching up on correspondence and formulating the plan for the release of the album in July/August. Speaking of “The Trackless Wild” the final bit of music was recorded for it at the weekend in the county of Clare. Aidan Connolly, the bould Dublin fiddler added fiddle to two tracks and whistle to one. 

Thankfully the old motor that is this crowdfunding's financial support has started churning again and we are a bit nearer the goal. As the old song “Bleak is the Pampa” says…

hearts that looks upward from hope cannot sever

for theirs is the goal at which all is divine!

Raised €6102

GOAL €9800

A highly productive month of January was spent recording this new album. As well as finishing the recording process of “Exile and Adventure,” another two and a half days of filming for the conjoining documentary “The Trackless Wild" was completed. In that spirit, I spent a day wandering around A Wandering Tip's old stomping ground of Capilla del Señor. I even sang one of his songs while waiting for the train to take me there!

The album, besides my own musings in sound, contains the musical contributions of Patricio Sullivan (charango), Facundo Flores (tiple and percussion), Manu Momobertoni (bandoneon), and Ezequiel Dutil (double bass). The only music left to record is fiddle which will be recorded by Aidan Connolly in Dublin in the next few weeks.

After five weeks in Buenos Aires I'm now back ensconced in the north of Argentina where I'm delving into the mixing process, which should take another month or so. Next step then is to concrete the plans for release, another kettle of fish altogether!

I was told by Irish-Argentine author Juan José Delaney that “A Wandering Tip” could possibly be from “A Wandering Tipo” which would translate as a wandering lad. Juan José was interviewed on our second day of filming in the iconic “Club Fahy” in Belgrano, Buenos Aires. Singing Tip's songs and delving into his stories, sometimes I feel like I'm singing out a self fulfilling prophesy, unknowingly carving my own story into “The Trackless Wild” and these 19th century songs of “Exile & Adventure.”

The amount raised for the completion of all this work hasn't moved a jot since the last update seven weeks ago, I've had no time atall to spend on that aspect of things. Something will have to give in that respect, or I'll be wandering the Trackless Wild eternally. Speaking of which, I'm half thinking of naming both album and film “The Trackless Wild.” I think it encapsulates better than “Exile and Adventure, Irish Song of the Pampa" the wild places those first immigrants found themselves in. Although most every song on the album is one of exile, that title “Exile and Adventure” I first came up with when I was hoping to get a grant for the recording. Since not a penny was raised in that sense, I'm thinking the more poetic “The Trackless Wild," as a title, tells a better story than “Exile & Adventure.” 

Thanks eternally to all who have supported this worthy work, bail ó dhia ar an obair. 

beir bua,

Cha

A week from now we'll begin the recording process of “Exile & Adventure, Irish Song of the Pampa” in Buenos Aires (after a 24 bus journey from here in Chaco!). Last weekend another day of filming for “The Trackless Wild” was completed, on the farm of one, Fernando Sheridan. Fernando's grandfather lived in the same town and at the same time as 'A Wandering Tip' (the writer of many of these Irish-Argentine songs). I sang “The Jolly Shepherd Boy" for Fernando and he told me about how his family came to Argentina and worked in that profession of shepherding when they first came to the country. Amazingly, Fernando's grandfather was a child of the famine, who arrived in Argentina in the late 1860's just before the songs I'm singing were published. 

I am a jolly shepherd boy and live upon the plain  

Oh! once I was my parents’ joy e'er first I crossed the main

The crowdfunding effort to see this film to fruition has again crawled up a little more towards the goal, though still it is lacking a major injection to get this worthy work done.

GRMMA!

Mícheál Ó Caoimh €100

Martin O'Dwyer and Park Jieun €107

Neil Brosnan €24

Tango Street Food LTD €100

Sean Looney €800

Peter Money €25

Benedict Cosgrove €34

Mary Ann van Beuren €59

Father Tom Looney €200 

Edmundo Murray €52 

Susan Clifton €540

Edward Devinney €100 

Micheál O'Ciardubháin €25 

Anonymus €500 

John McAuliff €42 

Kieran O'Brien €100

Maureen O'Riordan €500 

Anto McCarthy €20 

Aidan Connolly €40

Billy Kemp €67

Rene Van den Heuvel €34

Hazel Moloney €30

Paul Doyle €15

Fergal Horgan €158

Jim O'Donohue  €50

Eoin O'Carra €50

Geoff Cobb €30

Chris Dove €24

Patrick Donnelly €200

Marion Hartnett €200 

Sr. Margaret O'Brien €200

Raised €4426

GOAL €9800

All is quiet on the northern front here in Chaco, though wider spheres of politics & culture have been beating their incessant drum. Tipperary's last bard, Shane MacGowan, passed away, Argentina now has an anarcho-capitalist president, Javier Milei, and there is even talk of war on the shores of South Americay, way up in Guyana. 

As for my own machinations, I've been busy organizing the logistics of recording in Buenos Aires. Besides my own contributions, multi instrumentalist Facundo Flores will be both recording and playing on this album “Exile and Adventure.” The amount collected hasn't moved alot from the last update. Though we have tipped over the €4000 mark, its still quite a distance from the hoped for amount that would see both the album and film completed. As it stands, both projects will be wholly funded by those that support this campaign. The work will come to fruition as much from the support of those who dig what I'm doing as from my own volition. 

From the generous contributions already received I have money to pay Facundo and have rented an apartment near his home for the month of January. Thank you all kindly for your belief and support of the rekindling of the fire in these Irish-Argentine songs of old. 

Resurrecting in songs, spirits long gone  

This ballad below “Bleak is the Pampa” had no obvious air, have a listen to the one I composed for it in the ‘song sketches’ above. Bleak is the Pampa nods to the ancient isle of Hy Brasil in the lines 

“had I ne'er quitted my own island dwelling, in search of a phantom in lands far away.”

Raised €4026

GOAL €9800

Having had to run off to Córdoba for a week (a 16 hr bus ride each way!) I haven't been as present at the helm as I'd like to have been the past week of this crowdfunding push. Thankfully, I'm ensconced in the hot north of Argentina again and can get back to making Exile & Adventure and The Trackless Wild film happen. Below is another one of the songs “Donovan's Mount” as it appeared in the old newspaper “El Monitor de la Campaña.”

Resurrecting in song, spirits long gone. 

The plan is to record the album of these old Irish-Argentine songs in January/February in Buenos Aires, we will also have another couple of days filming there at least. 

Raised €3640

GOAL €9800