Bodhrán Player for Come From Away

Looking for information or a bodhran player for the percussion book on Come From Away? After two performances of this show I put this page together to help music directors and players understand what's involved.

My Past Performances:

• The sold-out Cape Playhouse production (Dennis, MA) in August 2025, alongside six members of the original Broadway cast and national tour
• North Shore Music Theatre (Beverly, MA) in September 2026 (New England's largest regional Broadway theater)

About the Bodhran Book

Come From Away is one of the very few Broadway shows with a real bodhrán book. The drum is foundational to the scoring, and is the primary instrument in the percussion book. The challenge here is that you need a player comfortable with jigs and reels in the Irish traditional style while also being able to read and follow a conductor. That combination (and the whistles and Uilleann pipes book!) is rare enough that productions often have trouble casting these two chairs, which is the reason this page exists.(If you need a player for the Uilleann pipes and whistles, Dan Meyers (also in Boston) is your guy and Tara Novak is the fiddler you want!

About Me and Come From Away

This book has been fun to play as it allows me to combine my interest in Broadway percussion and drumming along with my Celtic music background, which primarily comes from being a member of the modern Celtic group, Ishna. I have worked as a show drummer and percussionist in Boston and as a local on the national tours of Ain't Too Proud, Anastasia and Motown the Musical (see my biography page). Dan, and I, along with one of Ishna's bandleaders (Tara Novak, a theater violinist), have had fun getting to perform this show twice together as both bandmates and pitmates.

Here's a sample of me playing the on-stage bodhran during the exit music along with Dan and Tara (mentioned below):

After talking to the original Broadway percussionist about the show, I learned that the books out for rental have incorrect parts — essentially, they were printed prior to the final edits to the music. As such, the only instruments played by the percussionist in the show are:

• Bodhrán
• Udu
• Djembe
• Shaker (I add a caxixi on the Cardiologists number)
• Ugly stick (on stage) - see video below

The other instruments are not required and were never played. Having played the show twice now, I agree that omitting them is the right musical call.

In both productions I have done, the props department created the ugly stick, and both were excellent. You may want to ask props to tack on a metal plate (ala tap shoes) to the bottom of the boot to get more sound. You can see me playing this on stage at North Shore Music Theatre at around 2:20 in this clip:

For the bodhráns, you can do this with one drum, but depending on whether the staging calls for the bodhrán player to be on stage, you may want two: one with a mic pack attached (and a strap), and another to remain at the player's station. I use contemporary deep-shelled, smaller-diameter bodhráns for the show. I don't think the style matters much, as the show requires amplification. I prefer a Shure KSM137 on the rear of my bodhráns for this show.

For the udu, I have a mic hole with a rubber gasket, allowing an internal lavalier or vocal mic to be suspended inside the chamber. This gives the best possible bass sound on an instrument that would otherwise be inaudible. A doumbek would be the most logical substitute given the story of the show and the playing style, but the udu makes for a more unique orchestration. During our North Shore Music Theatre run in 2026, the audio team routed the udu to the subwoofers beneath the stage, which really added to the ending interrogation scene.