Town mourns passing of music legend Syd Shine

The town of Athlone was saddened to hear of the passing of Syd Shine over the weekend.
Syd, who was one of Ireland’s best known bandleaders and showband legends, passed away on Saturday night after a short illness. He was 94 years of age.
He spent the past four years of his life at Stella Maris Nursing Home and before that, Syd lived on a barge on the River Shannon, close to Custume Barracks, since 1942.
He was born in July 1920 and the family home was Hillside House in Bower View, which his father had built the year before. Syd had three brothers, Frank, Billy and Noel and one sister, Clare.
An accomplished pianist, Syd was a leading tenor in Ss Peter and Paul’s Church Choir for a number of years from when the church first opened in 1937.
He was the bandleader of the resident Crescent Big Band, either with a quintet, sextet or the thirteen piece. Syd and his family continued to run the Crescent shop in the daytime and the ballroom at night.
He started his own band the ‘Crescent Swingtet’ in the late 1930s. In the years that followed, Syd, who was bandleader in all his various groups, also played at many countrywide venues, as well as at the Crescent.
The demise of the Big Band era happened in the early 60s with the coming of the Showbands, so in 1963 Syd set up a five piece group called Syd and the Saints. The group was recorded by Peter Sullivan, the man who turned down ‘The Beatles’.
Later Syd changed the format of his group to an eight piece band entitled - ‘The Saints Showband’. The original line up for this group were: Syd Shine on organ, Joe Flynn on vocals and bass, Frank Somers on drums, Pete Keighery on lead guitar and vocals, Finbar O’Keefe on rhythm guitar and vocals, Liam Meade on trombone, Frankie McDonald on trumpet and Brian Sullivan on lead vocals and tenor saxophone.
Syd and ‘The Saints Showband’ were very successful and played in dancehalls all over Ireland.
Syd successfully circumnavigated the other aspect of his life around his music, and that of course was his love of the River Shannon. In 1957 he bought the barge ‘The Fox’, but it wasn’t his first home on the water, as in 1942, Syd had bought his first barge, which like The Fox, wa also a 60ft bate.
He was an acknowledged authority on the waterways of the River Shannon, and the oldest member of the Lough Ree Yacht club.
In July 2001, Syd gained a special honour at Aras an Uactarain from President Mary McAleese for his contribution to the Irish showband scene in the1960s.
In 2010, when Syd turned 90 years old, many Athlone musicians paid tribute to the first man of music of the town at a reception at the Shamrock Lodge Hotel.
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