Michael ‘Mickey’ MacConnell, a veteran journalist and songwriter best known for composing the iconic ballad “Only Our Rivers Run Free,” has died.
Videos by Suggest
MacConnell passed away on Thursday following a “short illness,” according to the Irish Independent. He was 78.
According to The Irish Times, MacConnell, who wrote for the publication as a journalist, said he was born during the “unparalleled snowstorms of 1947” into a musical family in Bellanaleck, near Enniskillen in Co Fermanagh.
He wrote “Only Our Rivers Run Free” as a teenager, a song about the partition of Ireland. It has been covered by Christy Moore and The Wolfe Tones, among others.
“It was a classic example of the right song in the right place at the right time, recorded by the right artist, Christy Moore,” MacConnell later recalled, per The Irish Times.
“I was 17 when I wrote it and had just come back from covering a council meeting for the local paper in my native south Fermanagh, full of frustration over the bigotry I witnessed in the meeting, with the allocation of houses to single Protestants over Catholic families. It was never a republican song per se, but a song about the love of one’s country,” he added.
MacConnell released two studio albums during his career: Peter Pan and Me in 1992 and Joined Up Writing in 2000. He later recorded Mickey MacConnell Live in John B Keane’s in 2002.
Michael “Mickey” MacConnell Work as a Journalist Influenced His Songwriting
One of the standout tracks from his debut album, “The Politician Song,” offers a sharp and satirical critique of the language often employed by politicians. The track was informed by his day job as a reporter.
MacConnell worked as a journalist for the Irish Press and later for The Irish Times. He spent years covering Seanad debates, which he described as a “fart in a hurricane.”
“When working as a journalist in Dublin, I was forced to endure many painful hours reporting in the national parliament,” he admitted in the sleeve notes to ‘The Politician Song,” per The Irish Times.
“In those days, I had a very good Pitman’s shorthand note. I began to notice how many cliches kept coming up again and again. I gathered them together and wrote this song,” he explained.
He was one of three brothers in media; his late brother Seán was The Irish Times’ agriculture correspondent, and Cormac worked for the Irish Press and Irish Central.
MacConnell is survived by his wife, Maura, his two daughters, Kerry and Claire, several grandchildren, and his brothers, Cathal and Cormac. He was predeceased by his brother, Sean.