04 March 2022

Mac Martin, 26 Apr. 1925-28 Feb. 2022 (updates)

Friends of traditional bluegrass will learn with great regret of the death, a few weeks short of his 97th birthday, of William Dermot 'Bill' Colleran of Pittsburgh, PA, known throughout the bluegrass world as 'Mac Martin'. His birth date puts him in the same general age-group as Earl Scruggs, the Stanley Brothers, Jimmy Martin, Mac Wiseman, and other musicians who were playing bluegrass music before it was generally known by that name. Richard Thompson's exemplary obituary and biographical article on Bluegrass Today states that Mac's parents were immigrants from Galway. He remained a devout Catholic throughout his life, and musically active well into his nineties.

Update 28 Mar.: The BIB expresses grateful thanks to Ms Jeanne Colleran for confirming Mac's Galway ancestry in her comment on this post: 'My dad, Mac Martin, has his roots in Ireland. His parents Nellie (O'Toole) and James Colleran were both born in Galway.'

Richard Thompson's article includes a discography (stretching over fifty-five years), four videos, and seven photographs, of which one is reproduced above. For anyone not already familiar with Mac's music, the sixteen-minute video of his band the Dixie Travelers, playing a live show in the 1980s, is as good an introduction as one needs.

Update: A substantial 1989 Bluegrass Unlimited article about Mac and his band by Ivan M. Tribe is reproduced from archives in the 69th BU weekly newsletter.

© Richard Hawkins

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1 Comments:

At 4:56 am, Blogger Jeanne Colleran said...

My dad, Mac Martin, has his roots in Ireland. His parents Nellie (O'Toole) and James Colleran were both born in Galway.

 

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