Irish musical influence

A chara, – I read with great interest Conor Pope’s article outlining the recordings that influenced 13 public figures (“Records that shaped me: by Ray D’Arcy, Chupi Sweetman, Joe Duffy, Pauline McLynn, Paul Howard and more”, Music, April 20th).

Of the 64 recordings cited, only 10 were by Irish artists (U2 scored twice). The list was devoid of Irish classical, jazz, blues and traditional recording artists despite there being an abundance of performers of international renown of this island.

In the case of traditional music / musicians this makes me wonder, as received wisdom is that this form of music has greatly influenced a number of other international genres and is greatly popular across the globe.

On the basis of the chosen recordings, a statistician might conclude that music created by Irish musicians is neither popular nor influential. Musicians take note. – Is mise,