A Dublin quartet with an all-star pedigree
Patrick Street formed in Dublin in 1986, and MusicBrainz's tags — celtic, dublin, folk, irish — barely hint at just how significant its founding lineup was within Irish traditional music. The group brought together fiddler Kevin Burke, fresh from his years in The Bothy Band; Andy Irvine on mandolin, bouzouki, harmonica, and vocals, previously of Sweeney's Men and Planxty; button accordionist Jackie Daly, formerly of De Dannan; and guitarist Arty McGlynn. On their first US tour, the band was even billed, only half-jokingly, as "Legends of Irish Music" — a fair description given that each member arrived having already helped shape the sound of modern Irish traditional music in a different influential band.
A long, steady run
Burke, Irvine, and Daly remained the group's core throughout its history, with other accomplished musicians rotating through the lineup over the years. Patrick Street stayed active from 1986 until 2014, a remarkably long run for what began as essentially a gathering of session-circuit veterans, and it produced a body of studio and live recordings that are still touchstones for the genre. The MusicBrainz record's alias list — including "Andy Irvine with Patrick Street" and "Patrick Street and Declan Masterson" — reflects how the group's billing shifted depending on which member's name carried the most weight for a given release or tour.
Why the "supergroup" label fits
Unlike bands that build a shared identity from scratch, Patrick Street's appeal always leaned on the individual reputations its members brought with them — Planxty and The Bothy Band both being foundational acts in the 1970s Irish folk revival. Bringing those threads together in one lineup let Patrick Street explore fast reels, slow airs, and song traditions with a level of interplay that only comes from decades of separate mastery meeting in the same room.
For listeners tracing the lineage of modern Irish traditional music, Patrick Street sits at a genuine crossroads — a band where the past and ongoing evolution of the genre played out in real time, for nearly three decades.
Sources
Formation details, lineup history, and touring information were drawn from web research alongside the MusicBrainz artist record.