Today we’d like to introduce you to Ken Fleming.
Hi Ken, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstories with our readers?
I have played music since I was kid at age 9. I began playing a banjo ukulele belonging to my father and then guitar. By 12, I was playing in a rock band and, at 15, playing professionally in officer’s clubs in Germany where my dad was stationed at the time. When I returned to the U.S. in 1969, my band gathered in California and I attempted to make my living playing music there and then to Alabama. We weren’t very successful so I returned to my family who had moved to Colorado and I began playing folk music and particularly fingerpicking-style guitar melodies in the Denver area. I played some gigs but mostly I was woodshedding my skills.
I moved to Dallas in 1980 and became interested in bluegrass but mostly I played gigs where I soloed on guitar fingerpicking blues, ragtime, and some Irish tunes. I went to the Winfield Folk Festival in Kansas in 1981 and saw an Irish band called “De Dannan” and was blown away by their energy, and the music really resonated with me like nothing I had known before. I came back to Dallas and immediately bought a tenor banjo, started playing Irish music and began looking for others with whom to play. I found four others and formed a band in 1982 called “Tinker’s Dam” which played regularly at the NFL (Nick Farrelly’s Lounge) Bar, George Wesby’s Pub, the Saloon, Poor David’s Pub, and the Cedar Pub in Dallas and the Pig & Whistle in Fort Worth. There were other bands in the area, and we soon connected with each other and became friends.
In 1983, a few of us organized a one-day festival called the “First Texas Ceili” at the NFL Bar which was very successful and led to the formation of the Southwest Celtic Music Association (SCMA.) The following year we changed the festival name to the “North Texas Irish Festival (NTIF)” and held it at Fair Park in Dallas where it has been held ever since. I served as the president of the SCMA and the director for the NTIF in those beginning years. Our band Tinker’s Dam played festivals all over the region and a few times at the Milwaukee Irish Festival and the Kerrville Folk Festival. I married my bandmate Peggy Davis in 1988, and we quit the band and ended my roles with both the SCMA and the NTIF to begin raising a family.
Peggy and I still performed but with a smaller ensemble called Waifs & Strays that later changed its name to Jigsaw. For more than three decades the band performed, primarily at the Trinity Hall Pub in Dallas and more recently at the Celt Irish Pub in McKinney. The band ended in 2020 during the pandemic, although Peggy and Ken and their children Kevin and Katie have now formed a new family band called “KinFolk.”
In addition to performing Irish music, I have always felt that music education was important in keeping the Irish music tradition alive in Texas and around the country. In 2004, I started a music camp called the “O’Flaherty Irish Music Retreat” that offered two days of Irish music instruction on a variety of folk instruments. We held it at the Springhill Retreat Center in Richardson and it was a great success, so much so, the event was moved to Camp Hoblitzelle in Midlothian, Texas and increased to three days. The retreat was named for Jim O’Flaherty, a friend to those who played Irish music in the early 80s in Dallas. We would have “potluck sessions” at his home in Corinth where players of Irish music would gather and enjoy hours of playing Irish tunes and have dinner together. It was at these sessions that a music community was formed and served to fuel the passion for Irish music in the DFW area. To keep that community connected, in 2004 I created opportunities for the area players to get together and play on a regular basis at Trinity Hall Pub and later at the Celt Irish Pub, Each Sunday an ensemble of rotating players would perform together at both pubs promoting traditional Irish music while building relationships among the players.
With the successful O’Flaherty Retreat, I then formed the “Traditional Irish Music Education Society (TIMES)” to further expand our music education mission. In 2008, I founded the O’Flaherty Irish Music Youth Camp for kids to learn Irish music, and then a “TradCamp” featuring week-long instruction on Irish fiddle. In 2012, I helped form the North Texas School of Irish Music based in McKinney to help young students learn and perform Irish music year-round.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
Finding places that feature traditional Irish music has always been an issue. Many pub owners have tried to feature Irish music but moved to more Celtic rock or other more profitable music genres over time. People tend to think about Irish music on St. Patrick’s Day and less so during other times, so competing with Country Western, Rock, Jazz, Blues and other forms of music is a challenge. Still, there is a very loyal audience that has made pubs like Trinity Hall Pub (now closed due to the pandemic), the Celt Irish Pub, the Crafty Irishman, and a few others good venues.
Also, both for the NTIF and the O’Flaherty Retreat, it took some time to get respectability for our events. It was hard for those outside of Texas to understand that we had a thriving Irish music community. In the beginning, it was hard to attract Irish bands and teachers to Texas for the NTIF and O’Flaherty Retreat respectively. Times have changed considerably in that bands and teachers want to come to Texas and Dallas in particular.
We’ve been impressed with Group Dynamix, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
I am co-owner of Group Dynamix, a company that offers group outing and team-building events for youth and adult groups. Formed in 1998, we facilitate about 150 events per month and serve more than 60,0000 participants each year. My experiences in helping create an Irish music community in DFW informed my efforts to create a team-building company.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk-taking?
With most things I’ve accomplished, some people believed they wouldn’t succeed, mostly because of the risks involved. Almost anything worth achieving comes with risks, and my experiences have shown me that the greater the risks, the greater the rewards. We evolved a thriving Irish music culture in our area without the benefits found in other major cities like a large Irish population, legendary Irish musicians, strong cultural ties to Ireland, local funding and grants supporting Irish music, etc. Still, we have one of the nation’s largest Irish music festivals in Dallas each March and we have a music camp in October that is world-renowned. We have an Irish music school and an Irish music camp for youth. Irish music is performed in nearly a dozen area pubs and many community events throughout the year. We risked making Irish music a staple of Texas, and it now is very much a part of the musical landscape.
Contact Info:
- Email: director@oflahertyretreat.org
- Website: http://oflahertyretreat.org/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/oflahertyretreat
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCr_gomZW1c6eiwqU1T63QKA
