Jeremiah Patrick O'Brien was born in 1899 in Kinsale, County Cork, Ireland, to Cornelius and Mary O'Brien, and was one of eight siblings. As a young man, O'Brien became a hedgerow teacher of Gaelic and was forced to flee to Massachusetts in 1921 in order to avoid hanging by the Black and Tans. He joined his brother, Timmy, near Gloucester, Massachusetts, and worked as a butler. He became a naturalized United States citizen in 1928. Jerry O'Brien taught himself to play melodeon and also practiced step dancing. He became a professional accordionist, recording with O'Leary's Irish Minstrels and teaching Irish music throughout Boston. In 1928, he also made one solo recording before the Great Depression brought most Irish-American recording to a halt. O'Brien married Mary Egan in the early 1930s, and they had six children together. The family moved to Dorchester around 1936 while O'Brien worked as a welder at the Quincy shipyard, and then moved to Dedham around 1942. He began recording again after World War II, both solo and with fellow accordionist Joe Derrane, whom he had taught. O’Brien also worked for the O’Byrne DeWitt Irish Professional Accordion company as a clerk, producer, and accordion teacher, and published two tune and tutor books for accordion. O'Brien died on April 30, 1968, of a heart attack.

Sources:

"Irish Music Archives Acquires Joe Derrane’s Accordion," Boston College Libraries News, May 30, 2018. https://library.bc.edu/newsletter/irish-music-archives-acquires-joe-derranes-accordion/. Accessed May 29, 2024.

"Jerry O’Brien’s Accordion Instructor," Irish Traditional Music Archive. https://www.itma.ie/notated-collections/job_acc1/. Accessed May 29, 2024.

"Jerry O'Brien," The Traditional Tune Archive, January 21, 2023. https://tunearch.org/wiki/Biography:Jerry_O%27Brien.

Varlet, Philippe. Liner Notes. Irish Accordion Masters. Joe Derrane and Jerry O’Brien. Copley COP-5009. CD. 1995.

Joseph P. Derrane (1930-2016), was born in Boston to Patrick J. Derrane and Helen E. (Galvin) Derrane, Irish immigrants. Derrane grew up in Roxbury and attended Mission Church High School. From age 10 to 12 Derrane took lessons on the single-row melodeon with Cork-born Jerry O'Brien. As a teenager, Derrane taught himself to play piano accordion and the two-row D/C# button accordion. He performed regularly as a soloist and with groups, at house parties, Dudley Street dance halls, and other venues, as well as on live radio. Copley Records invited high-school senior Derrane to record commercially. The resulting recordings, with accompaniment by pianist John Connors, were praised for their precision, ornaments, and rhythmic variations. He went on to record with various collaborators. Derrane married Anne Connaughton in 1955 and by 1959 they settled in Randolph, Massachusetts. With a family to support, and with Irish dance hall audiences declining, Derrane shifted his musical focus to piano accordion, keyboard, and synthesizer. Between 1962 and 1989, while holding various administrative positions at the MBTA, he performed jazz, pop, and repertoire from other ethnic traditions, including ten years in a duo with his son. In the late 1980s, Derrane retired from the MBTA, then from music, and took up part-time office work for St. Timothy's Catholic Church in Norwood. In 1993, Rego Irish Records and Tapes compiled Derrane's earliest recordings and re-released them on CD. Following this re-release, Derrane was persuaded to try the button accordion again. An invitation to Virginia's 1994 Wolf Trap Festival ended his decades-long hiatus from the button box. The success of Derrane's performance with piano accompanist Felix Dolan prompted Derrane's return to Irish music, launching international performances, recording, and teaching. In 2004, the National Endowment for the Arts recognized Derrane with a National Heritage Fellowship. Derrane died in 2016.

Sources:

Boston Globe. 2016. Obituary of Joseph Derrane. July 26.

Derrane, Joe. Interview by Paul MacDonald. Mapleshade, August 2004. (accessed April 25, 2018)

Gedutis, Susan. See You at the Hall. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2004.

Hitchner, Earle. “Derrane, Joe.” In Companion to Irish Traditional Music, edited by Fintan Vallely, 207. Cork: Cork University Press, 2011.

Hitchner, Earle. Liner Notes. Give Us Another. Joe Derrane. Green Linnet GLCD 1149. CD. 1995.

Hitchner, Earle. Liner Notes. Grove Lane. Joe Derrane. Compass 7 4544 2. CD. 2010.

Holtzberg, Maggie. Keepers of Tradition: Art and Folk Heritage in Massachusetts. Boston: Massachusetts Cultural Council, 2008.

Ní Chaoimh, Máire. “Journey into Tradition: A Social History of the Irish Button Accordion.” PhD diss., Irish World Academy, University of Limerick, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10344/1616.

Varlet, Philippe. Liner Notes. Irish Accordion. Joe Derrane. Copley COP-5008. CD. 1993.

Varlet, Philippe. Liner Notes. Irish Accordion Masters. Joe Derrane and Jerry O’Brien. Copley COP-5009. CD. 1995.