Artist Bios

Artists are listed alphabetically by last name

Anita Bennis

Anita has taught fiddle-lessons from the age of 16. Since then, she has completed the TTCT and the B.Ed Primary school teaching degree and has made school and music-teaching her career. In 2009, she graduated with first class honours in the MA Irish Traditional Music Performance at the University of Limerick. She continues to teach and perform fiddle, whistling and piano-accompaniment. In more recent years, she has become better known as a whistler, having won the All-Ireland Whistling title at Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann no fewer than five times. In 2019, she recorded a 5-track E.P. which includes 3 tracks of whistling, some singing and a taste of fiddle-playing.

Michael Collins

Michael Collins is a renowned banjo and flute player. Michael plays regularly in the Silver Dollar in Newcastlewest and is a former Senior All-Ireland Winner and a member of the Shannon Vale Ceili Band. 

Mary Crowley & John Connolly

Mary Crowley and John Connolly have been residing in Listowel Co Kerry for many years. Mary, originally from West Cork is recognised as one of the finest exponents of the Piano Accordion, John plays both accordion and fiddle and hails from Neagh, Co Tipperary. John is a keen exponent of the Paddy O Brien style, winning the Senior All Ireland Button Accordion competition in 1984. 

Ger Culhane

Gerald Culhane grew up in the townland of Ballyguiltenane near the picturesque village of Glin, Co. Limerick. The village and the castle lie on the banks of the Shannon estuary and the castle was once home to the Knights of Glin for centuries.

His interest in traditional music, and the accordion in particular, goes back to childhood where he attended weekly music classes at the Old Courthouse in Glin and the Friday night sessions at Collins bar in Athea. He was inspired by the many great musicians and characters that make up the West Limerick tradition of music, song and dance. He now resides in Beaufort, Co. Kerry with the majestic McGillycuddy Reeks as the back drop to daily life.

In 2025, in conjunction with Matt Cranitch, he published a book of 67 of his own compositions called ‘The iron bridge‘.  Some of his compositions bear names such as The devil’s ladder, Cnoc na péiste, The road to Beaufort, Churchtown, Tomies wood, O’Sullivan’s cascade, The iron bridge, The wishing bridge and The Blackstone’s, all inspired by his adopted Kerry home.

Shannon Dunne

Shannon Dunne is an American sean-nós and set dancer, concertina player, educator, and community organizer. She has performed internationally at venues including the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage, Symphony Space in New York, and the Shetland Folk Festival.

She learned her dancing from the Devane family from Connemara, as well as Roisin Ni Mhainin, Seosamh O’Neachtain, and Paraic o’hOibicin. Her style has been praised for its musicality and rhythmic sensitivity. She is a passionate teacher and community builder. In 2007, she founded Shannon Dunne Dance, a multigenerational company that focuses on sean-nós and set dancing, with multiple students placing at the All-Ireland. She also created a comprehensive traditional dance and music program at the University of Notre Dame, including academic classes, events, field study, and competition. In 2021, she established the Irish Music Club at Westville Correctional Facility through the Moreau College Initiative, bringing traditional Irish music into prison education programs.

She is currently working on her MA in Ethnochoreology at the University of Limerick.

Gabriel Fitzmaurice

Gabriel Fitzmaurice is a poet, broadcaster, writer, translator, singer, and storyteller deeply rooted in the literary tradition of North Kerry. Born in Moyvane, Co. Kerry in 1952, he continues to live there today.

For more than thirty years he taught and later served as principal in his local national school before retiring. His poetry has been praised for its lyricism and insight, and he has been described as “poetry’s answer to John B. Keane.”

Fitzmaurice has written more than forty books, including poetry collections in both English and Irish, children’s verse, translations, essays, songs, and ballads. He has twice represented Ireland at the European Festival of Poetry in Louvain, Belgium and won the Gerard Manley Hopkins Centenary Poetry Competition.

A musician and singer as well as a writer, he has performed on several traditional music albums, including Humours of Glin with Donal Sullivan and Martin Mulvihill. He frequently broadcasts on Irish radio and television on subjects relating to education and the arts.

Pa Foley

Pa Foley, from Glin, is one of Ireland’s finest accordion players. He won the senior All Ireland honours in the button accordion and for many years taught music around West Limerick. Pa has toured with various groups touring America, Canada, Australia, Singapore and Dubai with his music. Pa is sought after for teaching and playing at sessions and festivals throughout the country and recently appeared in a Geantrai recording from O Shaughnessy’s Glin for TG4. 

Con Herbert

Con Herbert is a noted master traditional musician and teacher. Con was born in Cloncon, Killeedy, Co. Limerick. He learned his first tunes from Tadhg Collins, Ballykenny on a Hohner Accordion given to him by his brother Seán. Other early influences were accordion players Séamas Danagher, Willie Lacey and fiddle teacher Martin Ward from Tournafulla. As a young musician house parties and Hunting the ‘Wren’ provided opportunities to meet and play with other musicians. From late 70s Con frequented Dan O’Connell’s, Knocknagree and Scully’s Newmarket. While teaching in Mallow he was introduced to teaching music in the local Comhaltas Branch by Pat Goulding, a piper who was a native of Cullen. As a teacher in Freemount, Con introduced traditional music as part of the school curriculum which was the foundation of the success of Craobh Chrónáin CCE which was founded in 1983. He has spent many years teaching music in Freemount and his native Killeedy successfully participated in Fleadhanna Cheoil over the past 40 years. He also plays and teaches concertina.

Laoise Kelly

Laoise is from Westport, Co. Mayo, now living on Achill Island, is regarded as the most significant harper of her generation – Nuala O’Connor. She has pioneered a new style of driving instrumental harping showcased in her three critically acclaimed solo albums Just Harp, Ceis and Fáilte Uí Cheallaigh. She was director of the Achill International Harp Festival, encompassing her role as musical director of music Suites Sraith Oileán Acla, Mayo-Breton & Ireland Galicia collaborations.

Laoise was a founding member of traditional group Bumblebees with whom she recorded two albums and toured extensively. She is a founding member of Fiddletree a group from America, Cape Breton and Scotland who play 8 instruments made from the same tree-they have two albums to date. Her latest album release is Ar Lorg na Laochra with Monaghan Uilleann piper Tiarnán Ó Duinnchinn.

Throughout her solo career she has recorded on over 70 albums with many of Ireland’s foremost artists including Seamus Heaney, The Chieftains, Christy Moore, Sharon Shannon, Dónal Lunny, Tommy Makem, Matt Molloy, Tommy Peoples, Mary Black, Maighread & Tríona Ní Dhomhnaill, as well as Kate Bush and American country/bluegrass icon Tim O’Brien.

Laoise tours regularly with different collaborators: piper Tiarnán Ó Duinnchinn; fiddler Tola Custy; Music Network pals Josephine Marsh, Tara Breen & Nell Ní Chróinín; singer and accordion player Breanndán Begley; award winning Scottish Gaelic singer Kathleen MacInnes; & Achill fiddler Diarmuid Gielty.

Laoise composed new music in 2018 for Theatre Gu Leòr’s Scotties, a co-commission of the National Theatre of Scotland and The Abbey, Dublin. She was Musical Director on Brendan Beehan’s The Hostage and Seán O’Casey’s Purple Dust with Glasgow theatre company Arches at the Edinburgh Festival. She toured with NY based Mabou Mines award winning production of Peter & Wendy to the Edinburgh Festival and the Old Vic, off Broadway.

She has toured and performed worldwide, at festivals including Womad, Celtic Connections, Celtic Colours, Tonder, Dranouter, Lorient, Milwaukee, Armagh Piping Festival, and at harp festivals throughout Europe and South America. She has performed for Irish Presidents Michael D. Higgins, Mary Robinson, Mary McAleese and for the twenty-five EU Heads of State and Presidents in Dublin. She has represented Ireland with the Irish Embassy in Nigeria, Ghana, Russia, Argentina, and is honoured to have represented Ireland at the World Harp Festival in Paraguay.

Laoise has won three All-Ireland Harp competitions and the Waterford Crystal harp at the Belfast Bicentennial Harp Festival 1992. She has featured on numerous TV and radio programs both in Ireland and internationally including RTÉ’s A River of Sound, The Late Late Show, Sult, Eurovision; BBC’s Folkworks UK Harp tour Documentary, Colmcille sessions, and many of TG4’s music programmes Hup!, Fleadh TV, Féilte, Gradam Ceoil, Mná an Ceoil … She recently presented an RTÉ Radio 1 programme of highlights from Viljandi Folk Festival in Estonia where she also performed.

In 2020 Laoise was awarded Musician of the year, TG4’s Gradam Ceoil Ceoltóir na bliana.

Willie Kelly

Willie Kelly is one of the best-known traditional fiddlers in the New York area. He learned from the celebrated West Limerick fiddler Martin Mulvihill and developed strong connections with Clare and East Galway traditions.

Born in the Bronx and raised in New Jersey, Kelly came from a musical family with Roscommon roots. At fifteen he began studying seriously with Mulvihill, focusing on tune collecting and traditional style.

He has recorded with Mike and Mary Rafferty, Dymphna O’Sullivan, and David Power, and his album The New Broom with Mike Rafferty and Donal Clancy received wide acclaim.

He has performed at major cultural festivals and continues to be active in the Irish traditional music scene in the United States.

Donna Long

Donna Long grew up in Los Angeles and was introduced to music by her father Byron Long, a jazz and classical pianist. After moving to Baltimore in the early 1980s, she met fiddler Brendan Mulvihill, whose playing inspired her to accompany Irish music on piano.

The pair performed together for ten years and recorded the albums The Steeplechase and The Morning Dew. In 1995 she joined Cherish the Ladies, touring internationally and recording six albums with the group.

Her solo piano album Handprints (2003) received critical praise and featured collaborations with musicians including Billy McComiskey and Liz Knowles. She continues performing in the Baltimore/Washington area and has toured extensively with artists such as James Kelly, Jerry Holland, Seamus Connolly, and Kevin Doyle.

Catherine McEvoy

Catherine McEvoy was born in Birmingham in May 1956, both her parents having emigrated there from Co. Roscommon in the 1940s. Her father, Paddy, comes from an area six miles from Strokestown called Kilmore. His father, Mark McEvoy, was an accomplished flute player in his time, playing at local house dances and fairs for many years. Mark came from a large family, many of whom were also very fine musicians. Sarah, Catherine’s mother, also comes from Strokestown, and in her younger days was a very good traditional ballad singer.

Both her parents remember many musicians around the Strokestown area, including Jimmy Tighe (flute), Pat Caslin (fiddle), and Mutty Flanagan, the local postman who also played flute.

This rich musical environment in Roscommon was strongly reflected in Birmingham’s Irish music scene, especially the Birmingham Céilí Band, one of the most popular bands of the 60s and 70s.

Catherine’s older brother John, a well-known fiddle player in Ireland and England, strongly influenced her early musical development. He introduced her to recordings of Denis Murphy, Julia Clifford, Máirtín Byrnes, Jimmy Power, and Michael Coleman.

At age 13 she began accordion lessons with Kathleen Lawrie. She later joined the Birmingham Céilí Band, initially on piano, before switching to flute in the early 1970s. She quickly developed a strong repertoire despite no formal flute training.

She played alongside Frank Carty and performed with her brother John, later collaborating with Brendan Mulvihill in Birmingham.

She was influenced by recordings of Séan Ryan, the Killina Céilí Band, Seamus Tansey, Roger Sherlock, and All Ireland Champions featuring Paddy Canny, P.J. Hayes, and Peadar O’Loughlin. She also received a recording of The Tribute to Coleman featuring Joe Burke, Andy McGann, and Felix Dolan, whom she later met and worked with.

She was deeply influenced by Josie McDermott and Peg McGrath, and spent time playing in Roscommon and Leitrim sessions including Dominic Cosgrove’s pub in Boyle.

She moved to Ireland in 1977 and received a Rudall & Rose flute from Kathleen Lawrie.

She married flute player Tom McGorman in 1975 and played widely with musicians including Packie Duignan, Tom and Nellie Mulligan, John Kelly Sr., Paddy O’Brien, James Kelly, Daithí Sproule, and John Kelly Jr.

She was a member of the all-female group Macalla (1984–1988) and later became a senior flute tutor at the Willie Clancy Summer School.

Margie Mulvihill & John Reynolds

Manhattan native, John Reynolds is most often heard playing the fiddle with his wife; Bronx born flute and whistle player Margie Mulvihill – in the “Pride of Moyvane Ceili Band”. For many years, they both had successful musical careers, but recently they have been performing for festivals and are a very popular ceili band in the New York Tri-state area known for their lively and rhythmic percussive style, perfect for dancing.

John was sent for classical violin lessons at the age of five. His mother, Eileen (from near Grange, Co. Sligo) had played the fiddle as a child. Although his father, Paul (a Boornacoola, Co. Leitrim footballer), did not play an instrument, he was very fond of traditional music and was a good whistler. After a few years of classical music, his mother sent him for Irish music lessons to the late Roscommon accordionist John Glynn who was teaching in the neighborhood. Right from the start, John took an interest in the music and spent countless hours growing up listening to Sean McGuire’s recordings and also those of Andy McGann and Paddy Reynolds. After John Glynn’s untimely passing in 1971, John was sent to study with Pete Kelly. There, John was an early member of the Shannonaires, a ceili band that Pete taught and trained which competed in fleadh cheoils and toured in Ireland in the early 1970s. Influenced by Sean McGuire’s recordings and Pete Kelly’s teaching and encouragement, John won third place in the 1972 Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann in Listowal, Co. Kerry. Throughout the 1970s and the early 1980s, John played music for dancing competitions at the feiseana in the northeast, most often playing with Pete Kelly or Paddy Reynolds.

In the early 1980s, John started an almost 20 year association with Dublin-born ballad singer Michael Jesse Owens – a gig that started out by filling in for box-player John Nolan, who had been a fellow John Glynn student. Aside from playing lively trad music with Jesse’s band, John developed his skills for backing up Irish and folk ballads and songs of all types. Those skills have been for many years – and still are – in demand in the ballad and showband scene around New York and John often has been be heard accompanying singers like Guss Hayes, Kitty Kelly, Mike Byrne, Tom Birmingham, and John Morrison.

Margie is a wonderful whistle and flute player. Her parents both hail from County Kerry. Margie started Irish dancing at a young age, training with her uncle, famed Irish dance instructor Jerry Mulvihill. She also took music lessons from the great Martin Mulvihill and played in his All-Ireland champion band, The Glinside Ceili band. Margie’s four adult children are talented musicians: Erin Loughran (a fine fiddler who was the New York Rose of Tralee and music teacher), Blaithin Loughran (accordion player and member of Girsa), Neidin Loughran (whistle, guitar, song) and John Paul Reynolds. The family was featured on the HBO series “The Music in Me”. 

Margie has taught dozens of children to play music in the well-known Irish enclave of Pearl River, New York and continues to coach young musicians.

Margie and John now live in Moyvane.

Donie Nolan

Donie is well-known for his playing for ceilis and sessions. Donie has been playing accordion since he was eleven or twelve, He was influenced by fiddle players such as Connie O’Connell of Cill na Martra in Cork or Denis McMahon in Castleisland and local influences although his style is first and foremost West Limerick. Donie has become synonymous with the Carrigkerry Wren Boys and with the Taylors Cross Ceili Band but he has also built a reputation as a singer.

Daniel O’Brien

Daniel O'Brien is an award-winning chef and All-Ireland champion fiddle player from Tarbert, Co. Kerry. Raised in a household immersed in Irish music, he studied under Ballylongford musician Thomas Moynihan, who gave him a strong grounding in traditional style and technique.

Daniel won the All-Ireland fiddle championship playing the same fiddle gifted to him by Brendan Mulvihill and performing one of Brendan’s own compositions. After his championship success in 1996, he toured extensively through Singapore, Australia, America, and the UK.

Together with his wife Emily, Daniel later operated the well-known Daroka restaurant in Ballybunion. He also returned actively to the traditional music scene there, teaching fiddle classes and mentoring younger musicians. Today he continues teaching music, harvesting honey, and trading in fiddles, while Emily manages Beach Hive in Ballybunion.

Donal O’Sullivan

Donal O Sullivan from Carrigkerry is renowned as one of Ireland’s finest flute players. Taught by Pa Joe Gleeson from Athea and the great Pat Ahern, Donal’s style of playing is rooted in West Limerick. On the 23rd October, 2021 Donal launched duet fiddle and flute gem from the bowels of West Limerick and like any music that has issued from there recently, it is pleasurably listenable, music of such authenticity and quality that makes you feel happy in the knowledge that at least some great things never change in that most musically fecund quarter.

Matthew Reidy

Matthew Reidy, a banjo player from Glin, County Limerick, has been playing with Diarmuid, Donal and Pa Foley for years.

John Paul Reynolds

John Paul Reynolds is a young musician from New York. His parents, Margie Mulvihill and John Reynolds, both respected traditional musicians, inspired him to begin playing music at an early age. He studied fiddle with Rose Flanagan before taking up banjo and guitar.

Now living in Kerry, Reynolds regularly performs throughout Ireland and abroad, playing both melody and accompaniment with a variety of artists.

Jesse Smith

Jesse Smith was born into a musical family in Baltimore, where he was immersed in a thriving Irish music tradition. His mother, Donna Long, has recorded and performed with Brendan Mulvihill and Cherish the Ladies. His dad, John, plays the guitar and sings American music. Jesse started playing the fiddle at an early age, learning from Mulvihill, a renowned fiddle player and teacher.

Jesse has recorded some well-received duet albums and has taught and performed at numerous festivals in Ireland, Europe and America.Willie Kelly

Willie Kelly is a New York–based fiddler from an Irish musical family. He studied with Martin Mulvihill and is deeply connected to Clare and East Galway traditions.

He has recorded with Mike Rafferty, Donal Clancy, and David Power, and appears on documentaries and radio programs. He remains active in the US Irish traditional music scene.