Legendary Athboy musician back on the road with tribute act

Well known fiddler and harmonica player Charlie Arkins who retired from touring when the Covid pandemic hit, is back on the road with a new band.

Charlie, now 75, is a member of Michael McGarry's nine-piece tribute band 'The Highwaymen Reincarnated' and says with just a gig or two a week, he is enjoying being back on the road.

The Highwaymen tribute band relive the music of the decade that brought together four of the most iconic country music figures - Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, and Kris Kristofferson. Between 1985 and 1995, the group recorded three major label albums as 'The Highwaymen', pioneering the outlaw country subgenre.

The Highwaymen, managed by Eamon Fitzpatrick music, kicked off the tour at the Headfort Arms Hotel on 30th December and have also played gigs at the Glevavon Hotel, Tyrone, the Hillgrove in Monaghan, the Sligo Park Hotel and Woodford Dolmen Hotel in Kilkenny. This weekend, they are gearing up for a gig in the Shamrock Lodge Hotel, Athlone and have around ten more dates around the country over the coming months. For a chance to see Charlie and the band again locally, the show will be in the Newgrange Hotel in April.

Charlie married Mary Moloney in 1974 and it was Mary who pushed to move the family from Dublin to Athboy in the late seventies and Athboy has been their home ever since,

A highly accomplished musician, Charlie has comes from a musicial family, and they say his father Willie could make the fiddle talk. Charlie worked as a pyschiatric nurse before becoming a full time musician with the Virginians. In time he moved on and ended up in the Cotton Mill Boys who had a series of number one albums but they really hit the big time when they won the hugely popular TV talent show ‘Opportunity Knocks’ playing the ‘Orange Blossom Special.’

Charlie Arkins spent the following decades traversing the roads of Ireland, Britain, the Continent and beyond with the various bands and singers. He has played with many country bands over the years from the Virginians in the early days, then Mattie Fox, Margo, the Cotton Mill Boys, John Hogan, Robert Mizzell, the Jimmy Buckley among others.

He recorded with the likes of Roly Daniels, Big Tom and worked with great local singers such as Matt Leavy. He was in bands that had number one hits, played on some of the biggest shows around including the Late, Late.

There can hardly be a road, a town or a village hall Charlie Arkins didn't visited in those years but when Covid hit it was time to take a step back. But he continued his work in the recording studio with his youngest son, David, who runs Crookedwood Studios and is a guitarist with the Daniel O'Donnell band.

Then in the middle of last year, he joined Micheal McGarry and the Highwaymen Reincarnated band, and is really enjoying being back gigging.