Peter Mooney (31 January 1932 – 12 March 2022), known professionally as Pete St John, was an Irish

folk Folk or Folks may refer to: Sociology *Nation *People * Folklore ** Folk art ** Folk dance ** Folk hero ** Folk horror ** Folk music *** Folk metal *** Folk punk *** Folk rock ** Folk religion * Folk taxonomy Arts, entertainment, and media * Fo ...

singer-songwriter. Born in

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

, Ireland, he was best known for composing "

The Fields of Athenry "The Fields of Athenry" is a song written in 1979 by Pete St John in the style of an Irish folk ballad. Set during the Great Famine of the 1840s, the lyrics feature a fictional man from near Athenry in County Galway, who stole food for his ...

Life and career

St John was born in

Inchicore Inchicore () is a suburb of Dublin, Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Located approximately west of the city centre, Inchicore was originally a small village separate from Dublin. The village developed around Richmond Barracks (built 1810) and Inchi ...

, Dublin in 1932. Educated at

Synge Street CBS Synge Street CBS (colloquially Synger) is a boys' non-fee-paying state school, under the auspices of the Edmund Rice Schools Trust, located in the Dublin 8 area of Dublin, Ireland. The school was founded in 1864 by Canon ...

and trained as an electrician, he emigrated to Canada before returning to Ireland in the 1970s. He wrote "The Fields of Athenry" in 1979, and it has been recorded by several artists, charting on the

Irish Singles Chart The Irish Singles Chart is the Republic of Ireland's music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by the Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) and compiled on their behalf by the Official Charts Company. Chart rankings are ...

on a number of occasions. A recording by

Paddy Reilly Patrick Reilly (born 18 October 1939) is an Irish folk singer and guitarist. Born in Rathcoole, County Dublin, he is one of Ireland's most famous balladeers and is best known for his renditions of " The Fields of Athenry", " Rose of Allendale" ...

, which was released in 1982, remained on the Irish charts for 72 weeks. St John also composed a number of other modern

ballads A ballad is a form of verse, often a narrative set to music. Ballads were particularly characteristic of the popular poetry and song of Great Britain and Ireland from the Late Middle Ages until the 19th century. They were widely used across Eur ...

, such as " The Rare Ould Times" and " The Ferryman", which have been recorded by several artists, including

the Dubliners The Dubliners () were an Folk music of Ireland, Irish folk band founded in Dublin in 1962 as The Ronnie Drew Ballad Group, named after its founding member; they subsequently renamed themselves The Dubliners. The line-up saw many changes in pers ...

James Last James Last (, ; born Hans Last; 17 April 1929 – 9 June 2015) was a German composer and big band leader of the James Last Orchestra. Initially a jazz bassist, his trademark "happy music" made his numerous albums best-sellers in Germany and ...

, and

Mary Black Mary Black (born 23 May 1955) is an Irish folk singer. She is well known as an interpreter of both traditional folk and modern material which has made her a major recording artist in her native Ireland. Background Mary Black was born into a m ...

. A version of "The Rare Ould Times", as sung by Danny Doyle, spent 11 weeks on the Irish Singles Chart, reaching No. 1 in 1978. St John's songs, including "The Rare Ould Times" and "The Ferryman", sometimes express regret for the loss of old certainties (for example the loss of

Nelson's Pillar Nelson's Pillar (also known as the Nelson Pillar or simply the Pillar) was a large granite column capped by a statue of Horatio Nelson, built in the centre of what was then Sackville Street (later renamed O'Connell Street) in Dublin, Ireland. ...

and the Metropole Ballroom, two symbols of old Dublin, as progress makes a "city of my town"). St John won several awards, including the

Irish Music Rights Organisation The Irish Music Rights Organisation (IMRO) is a national performance rights organisation based in Ireland. It administers the performing right in copyright music on behalf of its members (who are Irish songwriters, composers and music publishers) ...

's "Irish Songwriter of the Year". He died in Dublin on 12 March 2022, at the age of 90. After his funeral, Paddy Reilly and

Glen Hansard Glen James Hansard (born 21 April 1970) is an Irish singer-songwriter and musician. Since 1990, he has been the frontman of the Irish rock band The Frames, with whom he has released six studio albums, four of which have charted in the top ten o ...

performed "Fields of Athenry" at Beaumont House in Dublin as a tribute.Paddy Reilly and Glen Hansard, Fields Of Athenry
video on YouTube, 4 April 2022

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External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:St John, Pete 1932 births 2022 deaths Irish folk singers Irish male singer-songwriters Irish singer-songwriters People educated at Synge Street CBS Singers from Dublin (city)

Life and career

See also

References

External links