Frankie’s million miles of music

Legendary local musician Frankie McDonald will launch his autobiography in Athlone next week.

Entitled 'A Million Miles of Music', the book, written entirely by Frankie himself, tells the story of a young Clones boy, who grew up in house heavily influenced by music and who went on to become a member of the famous Drifters band for almost 40 years.

The book will be launched on Thursday, November 10, in the Shamrock Lodge Hotel at 7pm by Ben Dolan, brother of the late Joe Dolan, with whom Frankie played in The Drifters.

Frankie is married to Mai (nee Kelly) and the couple have lived throughout their lifetime together in Athlone. They have three children, Keith, Lorraine and Peter.

Frankie's father was a violinist, played in a dance band, as well as selling insurance, and music and the culture of gigs and concerts was part and parcel of his upbringing.

It was no surprise so that the young trumpeter joined the Army School of Music at the age of 14, before moving to Athlone and enrolling in the Band of the Western Command in the early 1960s.

From there, his musical career brought him to stages as far away as Russia and to sample the height of the Showband craze in Ireland in the late 60s and early 1970s.

Frankie has been working away on the book for almost eight years. He explained he was prompted initially to put pen to paper through encouragement from friends of his daughter Lorraine McDonald who were in the printing trade.

He was also sparked into action by a quirk of fate that saw a notebook full of anecdotes and memories emerge undamaged from an encounter with the River Shannon!

Throughout his time in the business, he had always jotted down stories, for his own interest. The paperwork was stored on a small cruiser Frankie owned. When the boat was retrieved after it had sunk, one of the only things to remain undamaged was the notebook of memories.

It sparked Frankie into more serious preparation for the book.

“I started writing on planes, trains then. Wherever I went, I brought a folio with me,” he explained.

The story is told mainly chronologically and details Frankie's life in music, from the Band of the Western Command, including a stint in Cyprus on a UN peacekeeping mission, through The Eamon Robinson Showband, The Ciaran Kelly Band, Sid and The Saints, The Drifters, Brendan Grace, and up to his time with The Showband Show, with his children Keith and Lorraine.

It's full of memories, anecdotes and insights with his time with Joe Dolan and the other members of The Drifters featuring heavily.

Along the way there are tales about Neil Armstrong, John F Kennedy, life on tour in Leningrad, a stint in the bright lights of Las Vegas and much, much more.

It's a fascinating insight from one of Ireland's premier musicians, who continues to ply his trade to this day and shows no sign of hanging up his trumpet.

The book will retail at €20 and will be available at the launch in the Shamrock Lodge Hotel.

Details of further stockists next week.