Tributes are being paid to renowned uilleann piper Paddy Keenan, a founding member of The Bothy Band, who has died aged 76.

Born on 30 January 1950 in Trim, Co Meath, Keenan’s family was steeped in traditional music, with both his father and grandfather celebrated uilleann pipers.

Keenan’s father John was from the Travelling community, while his mother Mary, an accordion player, was from a settled background. They moved to Ballyfermot in Dublin, to set up their family home.

A young Keenan took up the pipes at the age of ten and played his first major concert at the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin when he was just 14 years of age.

He went on to play with the rest of his family in a group called The Pavees, before performing with groups in the UK. Returning to Ireland after a few years, he played on and off with The Pavees in Dublin.

In the following years, he began playing with Mícheál Ó Domhnaill and his sister Tríona Ní Dhomhnaill, fiddler Paddy Glackin and accordion player Tony MacMahon.

Flautist Matt Molloy subsequently joined their group, followed by Dónal Lunny, and the loosely knit band began calling itself Seachtar, the Irish word for “seven people”.

Those musicians went on to form The Bothy Band, which had a significant influence on the development of modern Irish traditional music during the 1970s.

As one of the band’s founding members, Keenan’s Bothy Band-mate Dónal Lunny once described the piper as “the Jimi Hendrix of the pipes”.

Keenan’s self-titled solo album was recorded and released in 1975 and featured his brothers Johnny and Thomas, as well as fiddler Paddy Glackin.

After The Bothy Band disbanded in 1979, Keenan pursued a solo career, bringing traditional music to audiences around the globe.

He played with Irish musicians including Arty McGlynn and Liam Ó Maonlaí while developing musical collaborations with fellow artists around the world.

Keenan’s contributions to traditional Irish music were honoured in 2002, when he received the TG4 Gradam Ceoil Musician of the Year award, and in 2011, when he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Irish Music Association.

He was part of the line-up of The Bothy Band that reunited in recent years.

A piper who played a crucial part in the story of Irish music, Keenan said in an interview with the Irish Independent in 2020: “I love to see a new generation take on the pipes, but I won’t pretend they’re easy to learn,” adding: “But when you get the hang of it, however long that takes, it makes music like nothing else.”