Live Irish folk music by The Sioux Falls Ceili Band

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The Betty Strong Encounter Center will present  a program of traditional Irish folk songs, jigs, reels and bagpipe tunes by the “Sioux Falls Ceili Band” at 2 p.m. Sunday, March 13. Admission will be free.

“The Ceili Band of Sioux Falls” members are Carol Skallerud, flute and vocals; Charley Smith, guitar; Tom Parliman, bodhran (Irish drum), mandolin and bagpipes; Bill Peterson, fiddle; and Jill Groth, tin whistle and vocals.

 “Ceili” is a form of Irish folk dance that developed after house, barn and crossroads dances were outlawed by Ireland’s Dance Halls Act of 1935. The limited dances to public halls.

Tens of millions of Americans can trace their ancestry to Ireland. Pvt. George Shannon and Sgt. Patrick Gass of the Lewis & Clark Expedition were among them. Gass succeeded Sgt. Charles Floyd who died in the present-day Sioux City area on Aug. 20, 1804.

Gass’ journal, the first account of the expedition to be published, notes the Corps of Discovery’s 1804 Christmas celebration at Fort Mandan when, “…The men cleared out one of the rooms and commenced to dancing….” Gass lived to the age of 99.