The cognoscenti of Irish traditional music need no directions to Gort na mBo. Lazily translated as Bofield, the small Mayo townland four miles south-east of Ballina has made an immeasurable contribution to music-making over the last 100 years.
And though it may have taken a century for them to work up to it, members of the Bofield Ceili Band will be marking history tonight. They will be releasing the band's first album, along with a book about the musical tradition of the area.
Entitled The Bofield Ceili Band - 100 Years a-Growing, the album was recorded at the Old Monastery Hostel in Letterfrack, Co Galway, last year. The hostel was hired for the month of November by music box wizard Sharon Shannon, and during a break from her recording the Mayo band took up residence.
Directed by RTE music producer Peter Browne, the album is billed as a testament to the Bofield tradition.
Priests, ramblers, marches and mountains are some of the themes of the many jigs, slides, hornpipes and reels.
The Priest in His Boots (or it may be The Priest and His Books) is a jig which came from local box player Martin Conlon, while Peter Neary, the band's leader, composed another tune about a cleric, Father Patrick Peyton, the rosary priest.
Neary, a piano player, is a full-time music teacher who has done much to keep the tradition alive in Gort na mBo. The group was originally a string band and then moved into ceili. The Loftus family were founder members and they marked Christmas night in 1938 with the opening of their Laurel ballroom. It was situated at the crossroads beside their house.
Now vacant, the house is marked with an inscription recording the significance of its former residents, and there are plans to acquire it and restore it as a "teach cheoil".
The band has won many awards and was recorded by RTE in the 1950s. It played extensively in Ireland and overseas.
There were, however, low periods when it did not play at all, says Neary. "But there were also a few musicians around for the revivals when they came."
Though there are no Loftuses in the current line-up, it does boast some of the relatives of Ned Hallinan, a teacher who appears in one of the earliest photographs of the band now reproduced in sepia on the album's front cover. The contribution of Hallinan, and other teachers like James Brennan in the 1950s, is highlighted in a history written by Neary, entitled Gort na mBo - A Century of Song. It is published by Ballina Printing Company.
The band has overcome its shyness about celluloid and the digital age to the extent that it has its own website, on which you will find details about the album and the book. Tonight's release in the Downhill Hotel, Ballina, is to be recorded by Peter Browne for RTE radio.
The website is www.bofield.com