You’ll get those four nights in Manhattan with direct flights, four nights in Manhattan and concert tickets from €1199pps.
And if Wee Daniel isn’t our cup of tea (and we’d suggest to whisper that in Ireland, and particularly Donegal) then they have tickets for another international sensation.
For Dutchie it was his first paying gig and few better places than BB’s Blues Club, he was what he‘d always wanted to be… King for the day in Memphis.
You don’t, of course, have to possess the guitar-playing abilities of Dutchie to fulfil your musical dreams in Memphis.
Or be asked by Muriel to do a little number at ‘the Hollywood’ to be rockin’ in Memphis.
You just ideally need the services of insiders who know the town.
Like, say our friends at Irish travel providers Cassidy.
Anyone for Tennessee
King’s way: On Beale
Memphis, and Tennessee as a whole, has indeed been richly blessed for music.
Maybe that’s down to the gospel choirs or their antithesis, the devil’s drinking dens that spawned the likes of Robert Johnson.
Who famously sold his soul to the Devil so he could play perfect Blues guitar.
But Memphis, adopted home of WC Handy, BB, Elvis Presley, Isaac Hayes and actual birthplace of JT, Justin Timberlake, is the gift that keeps on giving.
As are Cassidy’s, who again bring us another package ‘Rhythms of the South, which is music to our ears, a four-nighter from €1,529 with flights from Dublin.
You’ll travel out on December 2 and get to stay four nights at the 3* Holiday Inn Nashville.
And three nights at the 4* Doubletree Hotel Memphis.
A night at the Opry
Music City: Nashville
Now in a state so richly blessed for music as Tennessee there’s naturally a friendly rivalry.
As to which is considered the most musical city.
Of course, you can always settle that debate by just claiming it, as has Nashville.
By putting it in your marketing… Nashville Music City.
Because Nashville, home of the Grand Ole Opry and country music has become more, much more than that.
Nashville boasts 150 live venues, many of them Honky Tonk bars.
Where you can hear the best With more country, rock’n’roll, jazz, bluegrass, folk, and Americana.
Tale of two Southern cities
Ten feet off of Beale: Walkin’ in Memphis
Now should you be curious to know the difference between Memphis and Nashville and that’s the journalist in me.
Then my old friend Tennessean Heather, from our unforgettable Tennessee and Mississippi trip to trace Martin Luther King’s last days, helpfully explained.
If you want to meet someone in music in Memphis you just go up and introduce yourself.
In Tennessee you get your people to talk to their people and then you’re up and running.
Heather, is, of course a Memphian, and the best representative a city could want.
I was lucky enough to be introduced to their people, the Nashville delegation.
The King and I: With Elvis
When they visited Dublin and partied with us.
And yes, they offered to introduce me to their people and come out to their city.
Which doggone I couldn’t at that time because I was jet setting off somewhere else.
Of course good ole Southern folk never forget y’all so we will get over.
Made of New Orleans
So whether you want to be King for the day in Memphis or Cash in in Nashville then just put yourself forward (Dutchie did) and let Cassidy do the rest.
And if you’ve the time complete your Southern musical odyssey down in ole New Orleans, home of jazz.
Cassidy offers aUSA Food Tour of Nashville, Memphis & New Orleans
Tastes and Sounds of the South is a ten-days/ five cities/nine nights/nine breakfasts/four dinners bonanza.
They promise jazz, soul food, country music, and a whole lot of rock’n’roll.
Showcasing the rich culture of Memphis, Nashville, Natchez, and New Orleans, plus a trip to Graceland.
From €3,000pps, flights not included.
And when you do get to New Orleans say hi to me to jazz great Kermit Ruffles.
Nice one Wirral as they say in these parts, but what more can we tell you about the Mersey peninsula where the Open Golf Championship is being played?
And where we spent our first night on Merseyside, in New Brighton, ahead of a year working in Liverpool, where I also penned a golf column.
It was while there that I got a call one day from friends at Royal Liverpool, Hoylake, to tell me that a golf legend had shown up.
And whether I wanted to interview the legendary Gary Player, who was completing a round for a Japanese television show.
Twas ahead of the Masters golf tournament in Augusta, Georgia, and we spoke of his fellow South African Ernie Els’s chances.
Gary was in good company in the peninsula, a magnet for sporting celebrities with Liverpool footballer and golf fanatic Ian Rush owning half of the Wirral.
New Brighton new wave
Beacon of hope: Old New Brighton lighthouse
And so back to New Brighton, where we started this Wirral odyssey.
And a reinvented holiday resort for those from the big city and further afield.
New Brighton has touches of the Brighton on the south coast, tower, ballroom and pier.
And an artsy Victorian Quarter with New Brighton priding itself on its street art.
Quick on the draw: New Brighton’s street art
While the 800-seat Floral Pavilion on the prom regularly hosts comedy shows, performances, pantomimes and plays.
And if you’re lucky you might see local comedians John Bishop and Jason Mumford.
Let’s go crazy, Prince would even at the pensionable (imagine) age of 65 this year. Because his hometown Minneapolis is holding a star-studded inaugural festival this year, the TC Summer Fest.
Star-studded we say. Well, only the biggest band in the world are playing, Vegas‘s own The Killers.
Prince did more than anybody to put the twin cities of Minneapolis and St Paul’s on the musical map.
And we’ll expect The Killers who headline the Friday of the July 14 and 15 weekend event at the Twins‘ Target baseball park to play some Prince.
As they are wont to do when they visit a city, take on that city’s biggest band.
And it really is incumbent on every artist to mark perhaps the most versatile and talented musician of our time.
Minneapolis are rightly proud of their favourite son and are always finding novel ways to commemorate The Artist.
And we think he would approve of the bill to rename a stretch of Highway 5 in Chanhassen, adjacent to Paisley Park after him.
With the Prince Rogers Nelson Memorial Highway to boast purple highway signs.
Paisley Park and more
Twin it to win it: Minneapolis and St Paul’s
Now the ultimate for Prince fans is to visit the Mecca of Minneapolis, Paisley Park itself.
Where there is a range of purplastic tours for devotees of the Little Magician, the Ultimate Experience, the VIP Experience and the Paisley Experience.
Minneapolis truly has become a Minneapopis on the back of Prince.
And they get July off to a cracking start with their Taste of Minnesota bash in the first weekend.
There will be live music, f1rst wrestling, art market, food vendors and more in downtown Minneapolis on Nicollet Mall from noon to 8pm.
Headliners Third Eye Blind play the music stage July 2 and Big Boi headlines July 3. Tickets are free.
So let’s go crazy, Prince would… for Minneapolis and St Paul’s.
