Fionnuala Maxwell and Trish Reilly will join us in September to research and collect local traditional songs within the Traveller community in Leitrim.
Fionnuala Maxwell is an award-winning traditional singer, composer, researcher, and educator. She has spent years researching traditional singing and co-ordinates The Leitrim Larks Project which seeks to rediscover and revive the forgotten songs, singers, ballad writers, folklore and hidden history of Leitrim and its surrounding counties. She is currently working with Leitrim Library supported by Creative Ireland to curate an accessible online collection of Leitrim’s traditional music, song and dance. She also passes on her knowledge of song and tradition to the next generation through the Heritage in Schools programme.
Trish Reilly is a member of the Traveller community and is a singer/songwriter currently living in Athlone. She plays guitar and harmonica and grew up in a musical family with traditional music, mainly oral and narrative - both her parents sang and played harmonica.
Through her music and song, she seeks to create awareness of the situation for Irish Travellers both culturally and politically. She has participated in various events, including "Song Lines" for RTÉ, which featured many of her family and showcased her own compositions. She has appeared as guest artist at events such as Knockcroghery Singing Festival, Temple Bar Tradfest and Whitby Folk Festival, where she is always keen to celebrate the heritage of song that she carries from the traveller tradition.
About her personal lived experience and motivation, Trish tells us: “At the age of eight, myself and my four sisters were forcibly removed from our camping place in the State’s attempt to assimilate Travellers. I was placed in institutional care for ten years. One of my most popular original songs is "Broken Lines" which narrates the story of the impact of the 1963 report on the Travelling Community and in particular, myself.”
Broken Lines was also featured on a recent documentary on RTÉ called " Mincéir" and was released on Trish’s album “Chapters”. It has become somewhat of a signature song for her, such is its popularity.
Many of Trish’s ancestors were born and travelled around the Leitrim area, mainly the McDonaghs, Reillys and Heaneys and within this family, they had a huge repertoire of Child ballads as well as other favourites that were passed down for many generations. John (Jacko) Reilly was her father’s first cousin. As John's repertoire was shared within the three families, she learned most songs directly from her father, who would have learned them from his parents, Mary (Molly Heaney) and Bernie Reilly. John was inducted into the hall of fame in 2018 and Trish had the honour of accepting the award on his behalf for his contribution to Traditional music.
It is this lineage and the traditional songs and singers who were based around the Leitrim area that Fionnuala and Trish are keen to explore, document and revive in a bid to pay homage to the contribution that these singers have made to the traditional singing heritage. They aim to work in a way that is respectful and fair to the traveller community and the memory of all those who have gone to their immortal rest, but live on in the songs they so lovingly carried.