Wolfe Tones' Brian Warfield aiming to storm America with smash-hit musical

Sunday World

01-05-2025

Warfield of dreams |
Wolfe Tones' Brian won't be slowing down with plans for a Broadway hit musical as he says 'life begins at 80'
The legendary singer, songwriter and musician turned 79 this month and with his octogenarian years on the horizon Brian tells the Sunday World : 'Life begins at 80.'
In January, Dubliner Warfield showcased a new musical he has written called Celtic Exodus. 'It went down fantastic with everyone who came to see the show,' he says. And he's now fired up with ambition to have a Broadway smash hit with the critically acclaimed production.
'Life begins at 80,' Brian laughs as he chats this week from Benalmadena in Spain. 'My aim is to have a musical similar to Les Mis, Hamilton or one of those great musicals and bring it to America. I'm excited about that.'
First up, though, are the final Wolfe Tones shows in Liverpool this June and at Limerick's Thomond Park on July 11 and 13.
The band in their younger years in 1964
The offers are still pouring in for the iconic ballad group, but Father Time has caught up with the performers.
'Tommy (Byrne) is 81 now and Noel (Nagle) is 80,' Derek points out. 'Tommy said he just couldn't go on any longer. He stretched it to this year. We are being offered loads of gigs, but Tommy is not able to go on.'
Brian was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 2019 after noticing a tremor in his right arm. The diagnosis was overturned in 2021 when his condition was identified as a neurological disorder called Essential Tremor.
'They thought at one stage that I had Parkinson's, but I got tested for it and it turns out it's a tremor,' Brian says today.
'It is annoying, but I was glad I didn't have Parkinson's, I can tell you. It's stable at the moment and I can still play.'
And banjo player Warfield reveals that the tremor disappears when he drinks a few pints.
'Believe it or believe it not, if I have about four pints the tremor goes,' Brian tells me. 'I said it to the doctor and he said, 'All my patients tell me that. No wonder they're all bloody alcoholics.''
Would you have a few pints before you go on stage? 'Well yeah, but I'm more or less retired now. We've had a great run, we can't complain…. 61 years now. It's a long time, isn't it? Wonderful years, I must say. We are very grateful and thankful to everybody for supporting us over those years. It's amazing.'
You could never have imagined that you are bigger now than at any stage of your career? 'Yeah, we probably are, but people kind of forget the past,' he points out. 'We did Pairc Uí Chaoimh for 13 years where we had anything up to 65,000 people there. I know there were other acts, but people used to say, 'we used to go down to see The Wolfe Tones beat all the other acts that came on.'
'We did the Gleneagle in Killarney for years. We played for three of the owners… the grandfather, his son and the grandson. Those are great memories for us.
'It's amazing the connection we made with people and today we have another generation. Young kids come to us and say, 'Oh my grandfather and grandma used to play you all the time and that's how I got to love The Wolfe Tones.'
'We succeeded in making a connection with every generation that came up and that's why it kept it really fresh to go see us.'
But you definitely got a new lease of life with the Electric Picnic? 'Oh, no doubt about it, the Electric Picnic was unbelievable,' he acknowledges.
Last year they were the highlight of the festival in Stradbally, Co Laois. 'When I looked out last year and saw the crowds of people it was just unbelievable,' Brian admits. I think it was the biggest crowd we ever had, it was 85,000. It was just amazing to see the sea of people.'
It's hard to believe now that The Wolfe Tones' music was once banned from being played on Irish radio because they were perceived as supporters of the IRA campaign during The Troubles.
Was the perception of them as a Provo band completely inaccurate? 'Oh totally,' Brian insists. 'But we supported the people of Belfast, Derry and the civil rights. We supported the people of the North, yes we did.
'Songs like Joe McDonnell told the story of the hunger strikes, and they were very important points in our history.
'I wrote a song called Plastic Bullets and I wrote a song about The Guildford Four and The Birmingham Six when nobody else was singing about them. Eventually they were exonerated and Paddy (Hill) said to me at one stage, 'you couldn't believe what hope that song gave us when we were in prison'…that the song was highlighting their plight.'
Brian believes that the Wolfe Tones escaped the fate of The Miami Showband in 1975 when three band members were murdered by a loyalist paramilitary group.
'The previous week we were playing in Rostrevor, Co Down, and we were escorted home across the Mourne Mountains after being tipped off about a roadblock on the main road,' he reveals. 'I believe it was the same gang that murdered the Miami lads the following Wednesday. But we continued playing the North after The Miami massacre, slipping in one time in a hay truck, and at one stage in Gerry Adams' armoured car.'
The band's new album