Gerald Michael Anderson

In case you have been under a rock, Patrick Kielty is the new host of RTÉ’s The Late Late Show. He is the fourth permanent presenter of the programme – one of the world’s longest running late-night talk shows – since 1962. According to the BBC, Kielty said he was “absolutely thrilled”. And that it…

As you might expect, Gerry’s introduction to life as a musician on the road was neither wholly planned, nor strategically timed. Mind you, it wasn’t entirely accidental either as it was bound to happen one way or the other. As a casual musician, he, along with his fellow similarly employed musos, and, of course, the…

When we write articles for this blog, we draw on memory, the writing, photos and music Gerry left behind, plus the accounts of his friends and those he worked with. So, we get quite a well-rounded picture of Gerry as an adult. I was curious to know a little more about his childhood. So I…

We are taking a trip down memory lane this week looking at the infamous ‘On the Air’ series and the episodes that capture the wackiest and surreal moments of Dad’s adventure on the airwaves. Gerry’s Bad Day During Dad’s career, journalists and radio professionals would always ask him how he prepared for his show and…

Dad was never a big fan of fiddle-dee-dee music. But he thought Irish musicians, including Christy Moore were among the best in the world. Maybe it was due to all the time he spent in Shandrum Co. Donegal. He was surrounded by “traditional music” so it never became a special thing. It was just something…

Good Friday this year, 2023, marks the 25th anniversary of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, a true turning point in the course of Northern Ireland’s history. In the recent words of Secretary of State, Chris Heaton-Harris: “The signing of the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement on 10 April 1998 brought an end to 30…

From his earliest days of going to the cinema as a boy, Dad was crazy about cowboys and indians. He watched endless western matinees in the 1950’s. And those films left a lasting impression on him. In fact he loved to do a Jack Palance routine with Sean Coyle on his radio show: “Pick it…

Happy St. Patrick’s Day. I came across a speech that Oscar Wilde gave on 17 March 1882. He was aged twenty-seven and on a lecture tour of North America. He participated in the St. Patrick’s Day celebrations that were organised in the city of St. Paul, Minnesota. Like Gerry, Oscar rarely veered into patriotism or politics. He…

Hail Glorious St. Patrick! For many of us, St. Patrick’s Day is the day we wrap up in green and flock to local parades to watch blue-kneed, curly-wigged Irish dancers display their talents in front of the judges’ podium (the back of a container lorry). And marching bands bring colour and a sense of occasion…

Rich Pickings There are rich pickings indeed in the Belfast Telegraph column that Gerry wrote over the years – Life According to Gerry. I delight in browsing through the articles and losing myself in the reveries that they offer. In each one, he leads me down various meandering paths that somehow get tied together at…