Mickey Finn’s life was short and had many of the elements of tragedy for Mickey drank himself to death.
In ‘No Cure for Mickey Finn’ Finn’s life is remembered by his family and his wife, Lena Ulmann.
In a sense Mickey Finn has not been forgotten, his image decorates many of the pubs in Galway to this day.
He was a fine musician. His music was improvised and flamboyant. He was photogenic and became a legendary character in the Galway of that era. He was sharp-tongued and quick-witted. He busked on the streets, became part of an emergent music scene centred around the Cellar Bar; one that spawned Mary Coughlan, Sean Tyrell and De Danann.
The short life and death of Mickey Finn are emblematic to that time, a time when Galway began to expand; when people drank with no notion of the price that would one day be paid. ’
No Cure for Mickey Finn’, tells his story, the relentless search for alcohol, through the memories of his family and his wife. But this is also a documentary about a time and place and about the symbiotic relationship between traditional music and alcohol and the consequent waste of this single life.
http://www.rte.ie/radio1/doconone/mickeyfinn.html
