Evening Screening and Acoustic Music Night – ITMA’s ‘Tommie Potts – The Fireman Fiddler of the Coombe’

Evening Screening and Acoustic Music Night – ITMA’s ‘Tommie Potts – The Fireman Fiddler of the Coombe’

The Kiln Theatre, Cinema (Doors 7pm)

Tommie Potts: The Fireman Fiddler of The Coombe

‘Tommie Potts: The Fireman Fiddler of The Coombe' is a musical character study on the life and work of Tommie Potts (1912-1988); Ireland’s most visionary traditional fiddler and a fire fighter with the Dublin Fire Brigade. Described by Martin Hayes as “the John Coltrane of Irish Music”, Potts came to cult prominence in the 1970s for his unrivalled avant-garde settings of Irish dance tunes as well as his notoriously reclusive personality, shying away from public performance and the music industry at large. 

Weaving a tapestry of archival footage, including never-before-seen recordings of Potts and musical performances from leading contemporary fiddlers Aoife Ní Bhriain and Liam O’Connor, the film offers a three-dimensional portrait of the enigmatic Dubliner: his music, his mercurial personality, and his many years of service as a Dublin fireman. This includes his involvement in the 1936 Pearse Street fire, described as “one of the most traumatic events in the Brigade’s history”. 

Directed by Macdara Yeates

This evening’s film screening will be introduced by Seán Potts.

Seán Potts was born in 1967 into a family steeped in traditional music. His father Seán was a founding member of The Chieftains while Seán’s great grandfather, Jonn Potts, father of Tommie Potts, was a renowned uilleann piper who came from South Wexford to live in Dublin in the 1890s. Seán Potts Snr was also former chairman and president of Na Píobairí Uilleann and he spent the latter part of his life actively promoting the instrument. Seán Potts has toured internationally and performed extensively since teenage years and has played and recorded with groups and artists such as Bakerswell, the Donal Lunny Band, Na Connerys, Tommy Peoples, Kevin Glackin, Paddy Glackin Ciaran Tourish, Arty McGlynn, Paul McGrattan, Siobhan Peoples, Steve Cooney, Paul Brady, Seán Potts Snr, John Blake, Seán Keane, Daoirí Farrell, Peadar Ó Riada & Ceoltóirí Chualann, Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh and produced a solo recording of piping, Seán Potts, Traditional Music on the Uilleann Pipes, 2002.

Appointed to the staff of the Irish Traditional Music Archive in December 2021, Seán headed up an Arts Council Commissioned project to produce the film ‘A Portrait of an Artist: Seán Keane’ which was screened at Scoil Samhraidh Willie Clancy 2022 and released publicly following Seán’s sudden death in May 2023. Seán is author of Tommie Potts: The Sorrowful and the Great, published by ITMA in October 2025.

'This event is part of London's 28th annual Festival of traditional Irish music, song and dance 'Return to London Town' which runs from Friday 23rd to Monday 26th October in the Cricklewood and Kilburn areas. This film screening is free, starting at 7pm, the event will have acoustic music before and after the film. For more details about the Festival's extensive programme, see www.returntolondontown.org'