The List is a weekly feature highlighting something remarkable, offbeat, or otherwise noteworthy from the world of Ignatian spirituality.I’m not surprised to run into Jesuits with offbeat hobbies and unusual talents, but Ryan Duns, SJ, stands out. He’s a master of the Irish tin whistle. This is no mere hobby. He plays professionally. Last semester he taught a course “An Introduction to the Irish Tin Whistle” in the Irish Studies department at Fordham, where he was studying philosophy.
Ryan has taken his art into cyberspace. His 76 tin whistle videos on YouTube have been viewed more than a million times. These include an entire course on learning to play the tin whistle. Here is Lesson One. Below, Ryan plays the classic “Wild Rover.”