Report Paul Murphy
The launch of a new book – My Saxophone Saved My Life – by Miami Showband survivor Des McAlea and journalist Ken Murray at the Hodges and Figgis bookshop in Dublin on Monday was never going to be without emotion – and there was emotion aplenty. Certainly, among the 130 people who packed into an upstairs room of the store there were people who know about trauma and emotion – Des himself, his fellow survivor and bandsman Stephen Travers, Eugene Reavey and his sons Anthony and Fergal (relatives of Anthony, John Martin and Brian Reavey murdered in an attack on the family home in Co Armagh in 1976.

The last picture of The Miami Showband before the tragedy struck,  50 years ago on 31st July 1975. There will be memorial events planned in Newry tomorrow.

Even Fr Brian D’Arcy, known for his close attachment to the showbands as an unofficial chaplain, has had more than his share of trauma – sexually abused at 10 years old by an adult, comforting the victims of terrible violence over decades of the Troubles, and being involved in no less than five heart-stopping negotiations on behalf of victims of kidnap (two of them known publicly and three others secretly).

Pictured above is Des McAlea signing his book, My Saxophone Save My Life with Fr D’Arcy behind him and sons of Dickie Rock getting the book signed at the launch. Immediately to the left is Stephen Travers and Donie Cassidy.

FR D’ARCY GUEST SPEAKER

As guest speaker he spoke about the need for peace in a society, how people need to be able to accommodate and live with one another despite having great differences between them. “This room is full of people who have suffered great trauma, some of which is known and some of which is not known. But the silent suffering of a person who has survived trauma has a two-fold thing – first of all the trauma itself which changes your life completely, You can never be the same person again. You might be a better or worse person but you can never be the same person because it changes everything in a most unusual way. And the other thing we have to try and understand is that if we
harbour the resentment or harbour the difficulties of living with trauma we are actually doing something hard on ourselves. We’re taking poison ourselves and then expecting your enemy to die.

We cannot let the awfulness of bitterness or lack of forgiveness take over our lives. We have to be able to draw a line somewhere”.
He said that his wonderful friend Gordon Wilson who lost his daughter Marie in the Enniskillen bomb atrocity. They would often speak of what happened and pray together. “He lost a lot of his unionist friends by saying that he didn’t hold a grudge against the people who blew up the 12 people, especially his daughter. That was misinterpreted as saying ‘I forgive the people who did it’. Gordon never said that. He said ‘I don’t hold a grudge against them – the only one who can judge them is God’.

Ken Murray addressing the guests at the launch which was well supported on the evening.

Fr D’Arcy said Wilson had said he was going to claim his own life, that he prayed every night that he could get up the next day and live a life without holding a grudge against those people “because holding a grudge against them only allows those people to have control over one’s life. He and his wife Joan prayed every night and morning to be allowed hold no grudge against anyone for fear it would disturb their peace of mind.

Speaking directly to Des McAlea, Stephen Travers and Eugene Reavey he said that the world owed a great debt of gratitude to them because they had stood up and told the truth about what evil had done to them in a horrible way. “They had rooted out the truth and they had stuck at it for 50 years to ensure that the actual truth is known and the truth is that there was a collaboration between what is supposed to be called security forces and the other evil loyalist groups. It takes great courage to stay at that all your life”.

Introducing Des McAlea Ken Murray said that many bands made headlines but the Miami had made history and world headlines “for all the wrong reasons”. Theirs was a very special story and a very special week. He said he was introducing a man who said that he had outlived Michael Jackson, Prince, Whitney Houston but who was “still going strong”.

He paid tribute to Anne Barrett who had pushed him at times when he wanted to give up the writing of the book. He ranged over a career that saw him obsessed with music in his home town of Belfast, through the showband years, the decline of the showband era, his time as a musician in apartheid South Africa, the personal tragedies of losing his wife Brenda and their son Gary but, of course, the Miami murders in which fellow band members Fran O’Toole, Tony Geraghty and Brian McCoy were gunned down by terrorist UVF members.

Gavan & Orlaith Duffy, Ciara Lynch-Burke and Senator Sharon Keogan at the well attended launch at Hodges Figgis in Dublin.

THE DAY THE MUSIC DIED

He quoted Fr Brian as saying on the day after the Miami murders that that was “the day the music died”. They had now reached the 50th anniversary of that fateful day but the book he and Ken Murray had written was not just about the tragedy but also a life growing up in Belfast but also the showband days until the time of the tragedy when the showband scene went downhill and eventually into the pages of history.

ATTENDEES

Among the attendance at the launch were Senators Sharon Keogan and Alison Comyn, former Senator Donie Cassidy, Tommy and Geraldine Swarbrigg, Ken Doyle of Bagatelle, Aonghus McAnally, Dickie Rock’ sons Jason and Peter, former Dublin correspondent for BBC Shane Harrison, former LMFM CEO Gavan Duffy, former RTE news director Theo O’Grady, former Mayor of Drogheda Frank Godfrey, Wayne Harding Cathaoirleach Meath County Council, Fr Iggy O’Donovan, Ciara Lynch-Burke of Sage and Stone Duleek, Cianan Murray Duleek, Garath Monerawela of Meath Live, Kay Deignan Kells Local Heroes community group, Ken Sweeney of the Irish Sun, Eddie Rowley Sunday World, Tony O’Brien former Irish Independent music writer, Pat Hynes of Glencree Peace Centre, Eamon Torsney of Newstalk Radio, Rob Reilly of BBC Northern Ireland, Alan Roantree of UCD, former Sunday World journalist Sean Boyne, Chris Murray of Left Radio, Enda Murray of the Irish-Australian Film Festival, and Pat McCarthy former musician with the Miami Showband. The book is published by Red Stripe Press a division of Orpen Press.