Goodman, James

Born in Ballyameen [SW of Dingle], Co. Kerry; One of the 8 pipers among the 23 "Reverend musicians", mentioned in O’Neill (Chapter XVII: p.168-179); A native Irish language speaker, he was ordained curate of the Church of Ireland in 1851 [1853?] and appointed to Creagh Parish (Co. Cork); Appointed, 1858, curate of Killaconagh in the Beara Peninsula, he lived in Ardgroom, where he compiled his great collection of Irish music, and, according to John Smithwick Wayland of the Cork Pipers’ Club, commenced the study of the Union pipes; In 1867 he was appointed professor of Irish in Trinity College, Dublin, and, being promoted Canon of Ross, posted to the parish of Abbeystrewry, where he remained till his death; To commemorate him, a statue of James, playing his Uilleann pipes, was erected, in 2006, at the gate to the Abbeystrewry parish church in Skibbereen.