Little John Nee mesmerises his audience with a snapshot of their lives past and present, dramatised by him with a near surgical eye for the telling phrase or detail. He talks to Derek O'Connor

Little  John Nee knows how to play a crowd. In a modest school hall on the Donegal coast, on a stormy night of potentially biblical proportions, the man has a packed audience, of all shapes and sizes, in the palm of his hand. Tonight, Nee is performing Country And Irish, an evocative, amusing and emotional monologue detailing a young Donegal man's rite of passage to maturity and true love, offering en route a vivid portrait of the people and places that shaped our hero's life. As the man brings a verisimilitude of colourful local characters to life, a rapt crowd gleefully laps up every minute of it: here is a snapshot of their lives past and present, dramatised in a fashion neither condescending nor sentimental, by a writer and performer with a near surgical eye for the telling phrase or detail. It's a memorable night, another of many that Nee has presented across the country over the past few years; with little by way of recognition from the established critical militia, he has become a veritable phenomenon.

Lack of appraisal from the arts establishment is somewhere far down the ladder on Little John Nee's list of concerns. "I'm used to it at this point. On a very basic level, I actually think that the title of this show, Country And Irish, is offensive to a lot of the intelligentsia, because there are so many people who are ashamed of the rural aspect of Irishness. It's something they don't know anything about, and don't want to know. And what does that mean, anyway, 'Country' and 'Irish'? What does it mean, in this day and age, to be 'country', and what does it mean to be 'Irish'? I like the title, but sometimes I realise that it might be provocative, even offensive to some people. But then the next thought is always 'F**k them, so. If people think I'm being nationalistic, for example, then that's their problem."

With several lives under his belt to date, Nee's irreverent approach to the sacred art of building theatre speaks volumes of the man's time as minor punk rock legend-cum-street performer, a long-time Macnas associate and contemporary of the late, great Thom 'The Diceman' McGinty. As cultural hybrids go - John Nee was born in Glasgow in 1959, to Donegal parents, moving to Ireland at the age of 11 - he's managed to convert his geographical otherness into truly compelling art. The Derry Boat, the "Donegal punk western" that cemented Nee's reputation, is perhaps the performer's most sublime and resonant achievement to date, a compelling crowd-pleaser with serious cultural and social resonance. An idiosyncratic portrait of four generations of migration between Ireland and Scotland, The Derry Boat's vivid juxtaposition of the historical and the utterly personal places its creator smack in the middle of a greater storytelling tradition; the medium may, at first glance, be more formal, but the intention, the "purpose" remains true.

Indeed, the amiable charisma that Little John exudes onstage belies the sheer graft necessary to engage an audience somewhat single-handedly (Country And Irish offers versatile musical accompaniment from Kevin Duffy) for a couple of hours. "If I'm tired, it can be difficult," he offers, "so I try to make sure I'm as rested and fit as I can be, because when it all comes together and I'm on form it just goes into that sublime area, where everything clicks. There's just nothing like it. I have so little control over it, anyway - it's to do with the audience. You can walk out and somebody starts laughing, and that will set the pace, that one person will keep the pace going for the whole show. It's the loveliest thing when it happens, and it changes, constantly - no two performances are the same." Country And Irish is a work that highlights Nee's adeptness at weaving historical nuggets - he paints a beautifully evocative picture, for example, of Derry circa the second World War - within an engaging dramatic framework. Just don't, he's keen to stress, assume that all his creations are autobiographical: "My mother's definitely getting a bit worried at this point," he laughs.

"You always write to some degree about what you know about, but these characters aren't me, aren't my family. I never farmed, for example, but I do come from a farming tradition and grew up spending a lot of time on farms, so I didn't have to do a lot of research there. You end up being a bit of a magpie, really, grabbing little bits of conversation here, stories there. But I'm not 'doing' people I know. I'm a bit insulted when people assume that. A lot of work goes into making the thing up, you know?"

As Country And Irish enters the constantly expanding touring repertoire, he's already working on his next piece, one that aims to directly explore that greater performing tradition. "One of the inspirations," he muses, "is Robbie the street singer, this little red-haired guy with an accordion, he played in Dublin for many years, moved to Galway around the same time I did. He passed on recently, and very few people knew that he had died, but everybody knew him, such a character and an incredible human being. And he's gone. Louis Walsh, in the meantime, is producing all these people you couldn't care less about, but you will never, ever get another Robbie. So unique and so talented, pure class - gone and unremembered. A big part of this new show is about honouring that timeless tradition of seanachais and travelling musicians. It's an important thing to recognise."

Right now, this travelling player is cherishing his state of independence, both financial and creatively, more than ever. A resolutely adaptable touring operation means that Country And Irish can move from well-equipped theatre spaces one night to school halls the next, without remotely compromising its atmospheric staging: "There is something magical about arriving in a hall and getting to work," he says "creating a space for theatre - not that I don't mind the creature comforts of a nice cosy dressing room every once in a while."

The reason for his absence from the Dublin stage is one of mere economics - why go to the considerable expense and hassle, often with little reward, that a run in the capital demands, after all, when there's full houses across Ireland and Scotland to play to? Little John Nee is more than happy simply doing his thing.

"A change definitely came about," he muses, "one where I went from going 'God, I'm not getting my Arts Council funding, poor me'. Then copping on, saying to myself, nothing's happening - write the stuff, do it, and see what happens. Realising, basically, that nobody really cares if I do another show, people aren't fretting and the world isn't going to end. The only person who really, really needs me to do another show is myself. So get real, and if you want to do it, do it. I always think of that great Tom Waits quote: 'Get off the cross - we need the timber.' That was a very liberating moment."

Country And Irish is at the Town Hall Theatre, Galway, on Tuesday, Nov26th, then tours (in tandem with The Derry Boat) into 2003. Further information: www.derryboat.com