'Now That's A Compilation' - Part 1

Last week I had the pleasure of joining Dundalk FM100's Paraic Duffy on his show 'Now That's A Compilation'. I jumped at the opportunity to do the show when he asked me to pick 10 songs that really meant something to me. My only concern was narrowing down all the music that has had such a huge impact on me from the early days until now so needless to say it took great effort and I'm guessing that my mood over the few days of reminiscing affected my choices. If I was to do it again, I could quite easily pick 10 completely different songs. Anyways, on this occasion, I chose the following 10 songs that really have a place of importance in my life so far...

1. Up first was 'When You Were Sweet Sixteen' by The Fureys. I mentioned The Fureys in my last post, such was the impact of them and other Irish bands like The Dubliners as a young child. Whilst it wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea, for me it brings back very fond memories of being a child and accidental exposure to music that really got stuck in my soul.
The Fureys 'When You Were Sweet Sixteen'

2. Number 2 on my list was the incredible 'Beat It' by Michael Jackson. I had serious difficulty choosing my favourite Michael Jackson track but I recently performed a cover of this and my lead guitar player 'Robbie Fitzgerald' kicked ass with the solo so it has great memories both as a listener and a performer. Michael Jackson to me is the undisputed king of the riffs and it is a massive part of my songwriting to create riffs that make the song instantly recognisable.

Michael Jackson 'Beat It'

3. At number 3 was my teenage agony aunt 'Alanis Morissette' with 'Hand In My Pocket'. 'Jagged Little Pill' was like a bible to me such was the strength of the emotion in her songs. Lyrically, Alanis is a genius to me and really taught me a lot about construction, phrasing, etc.. I chose this song as it sums up my life for the whole of 2011!!

Alanis Morissette 'Hand In My Pocket'

4. Going from one extreme to another, at number 4 is Eurovision winner 'Rock and Roll Kids' by Paul Harrington and Charlie McGettigan. As a Eurovision anorak (pen and paper in hand, scoring all the acts!), this song brings me most joy of all the winners. It was 1994, I was 14 and I just loved everything about the song. The soft combination of the piano and guitar, the catchy melody and the pure simplicity of it.

Paul Harrington and Charlie McGettigan 'Rock and Roll Kids'

5. Staying with Irish artists, at number 5 is the fast-fingered button accordian maestro Sharon Shannon performing a selection of tunes titled 'The Bungee Jumpers'. Again, I could have picked so many of Sharon Shannon's performances but this just tickles me all over. The only way I can describe it is to use the very common 'Dundalk phrase' ' It's pure class'... Everytime I listen to this, I just feel like I can take on the world!!!

Sharon Shannon 'Bungee Jumpers'

Hope you enjoy this small selection of music....I'll post the next 5 tomorrow x



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In The Rare Old Times...

I recently joined a ceili band. A good friend and brilliant musician Melissa Hayes rounded up a group of people to form a band to enter this year's Fleadh Cheoil. It has been the best thing I have done in a long time. It has brought me right back to the beginnings of my musical life and many of the conversations during our rehearsals remind of the people, places and events that were a big part of musical life back in the day! I thought it would be nice to share some of those times and the people who made it all so much fun!

Irish traditional music was around me all the time. It did so many great things to me, it's difficult to explain but you know it when you feel it! LMFM's Green Scene was an institute in our house and I remember going to mass every Sunday with the radio on in the car singing along to a Fureys or a Dubliners classic. One of my favourites was 'Sweet Sixteen' by The Fureys. There is something so incredibly beautiful when the banjo plays the intro to the song. The other great thing about Sunday mass journeys was the ice-cream on the way home from mass, listening to the music and letting it just go right through to the soul. Sweet in many ways... (see what I did there!!)

The Fureys - Sweet Sixteen

Music was everywhere ALL the time, thats just how I remember it to be. I started Irish dancing at three. In fact, I wasn't due to start that young but Mam took me to the dancing lessons with my sister Fiona and once I saw all the other children dancing, I apparently just had to do it too and Mam recalls me out on the floor in my nappy holding on to the dance teacher's hand trying to do my 'one, two threes'. I continued Irish dancing with the great Scoil Rince Ní Rodaigh until I was about 10 or 11.

Such was my love for Irish trad that Dad and Mam thought I should learn the fiddle. I really don't think I was any good at it despite the brilliant training I had from the late Rose O'Connor. She was an absolute lady and so talented. She started by teaching me the classics like 'Roddy McCorley' and 'The Boys of Bluehill'...pieces I remember nearly note for note to this day. She had the patience of a saint because I was never on time for my lessons (sorry Mam) and to be honest, I don't actually think I played the fiddle, more like 'screeched' it. I was a terrible chatterbox too and tried my best to divert her attention from my playing to talking about things but she knew better. Rose wrote the music out by hand with a lovely blue pen and rarely ever made a mistake. I remember her hands very clearly and I loved when she played for me. She encouraged me to enter the féis's for the solo fiddle events and I did enter some of them but I was fairly shocking to be honest and didn't ever make it past the first round. I did however play a duet with my friend Breda who played the piano accordian. Now I don't actually know how we did it, but one year in particular we got through the first round and made it to the 'Leinsters'. Myself and Breda laughed so much at everything that I'm not quite sure how we kept our faces straight enough to get through a set of reels and jigs and actually qualify but to be fair to us both, we had something good there when we were on form.

Whilst I didn't enjoy playing the fiddle in solo competitions or events, I absolutely loved being in the ceili bands. The man responsible for so many incredible ceili band achievements in the Dundalk area is the late Rory Kennedy. The man was a genius. He knew every tune in the book, by ear, note for note. He was a brilliant piano accordian player and teacher and he liked to smoke...a lot. He scared you into learning your tunes without shouting at you or anything mean, you just respected him to know not to come unprepared. That way, he got the very best out of us and whatever he did, worked.

Playing traditional Irish music is a gift and a blessing. It tickles my insides...it's just class. From finding yourself playing the fiddle on a bale of hay on the back of a lorry at the St.Patrick's Day parade in town to winning an All Ireland ceili band medal (must work out what year that was), there are no stories or words that will sum up all the adventure that it brings. Here's to an exciting few months being part of a ceili band again and competing in the Louth fleadh in May!!

A Personal Favourite...Mícheál O'Súilleabháin

The day I gate-crashed Louis Walsh's and Kian Egan's girlband auditions....

Imagine the scene...it's a lovely Saturday morning, mid July 2008 and I am literally squeezing my five foot long Roland piano, weighing 19.5kg into the back of my Megane Coupe. It just about fits in with very little room in the car for more than me and my handbag. Heading up the M1, I wonder if I really have gone insane and consider turning back numerous times along the way!

It's the first day of auditions for what is set to be Ireland's next big thing, an all-female pop group, managed by top pop manager Louis Walsh and Westlife's Kian Egan. Most girls on their way to the same auditions are concerned about their make-up, their hair and their vocals and all I can think of is finding a parking space as close to the Pod Venue as possible so that I don't have to walk too far with a piano!!!

I arrived at Adelaide Road and with a stroke of luck managed to find a parking space just a short walk from the entrance where the queue of girls had started to form. I took my bag and left the piano and joined the queue. I made small talk with the girls around me, most of whom had friends or relatives with them. We queued for probably an hour before we actually got inside the entrance where we were held like cattle for another hour or so. Eventually we got through to the main 'holding' area where it was filled with chatter and excitement and vocal warm-ups. I was totally out of my comfort zone and considered leaving at least once nearly every hour but I was there now and sure what was there to lose. The event organisers brought people in, in small groups and those that were successful were asked to return the next day.

After many, many hours of waiting around and watching the excitement and the disappointment of all the girls coming out of the audition room, it eventually got down to the last group of people of which I was expected to line up in. I quickly explained to the organisers that I wasn't there to audition but I had in fact 'gate-crashed' the auditions to introduce myself to Louis and Kian and perform a selection of 'pop' songs that I had written in the hope that there may even be one song in there, that may be considered as a track for the new girl group they were about to unleash on Ireland. In fairness to the organisers, they agreed although reluctantly to let me play a few tunes for Louis and Kian and whilst the last group of girls auditioned, I nervously returned to my car to get my piano. There were wheels on the case so taking it from the car to the entrance was no problem....the problem was inside when I was faced with 50 odd steps to clamber up with approx 19kg of weight in tow, to the floor the auditions were being held in!! I managed to get to the last 10 or so steps when a security guy gave me a hand. I hurriedly found a place to plug in and set up and within seconds, along came Louis and Kian. I can only imagine the conversation that must have gone on between the organisers and the two lads as they were coming out front to meet me:) There was a quick hello and I went straight into a set of songs, short versions of at least 3 songs, one leading into the other. All in all, my nervous performance lasted about 3 minutes.

I have never told anyone this story until now. In my innocent understanding of the music industry, I actually thought that getting out there and making a point of meeting the guys who pretty much run the pop music industry in Ireland, would somehow help me along my songwriting career. Knowing what I know now, I can look back and have a little giggle about it but unfortunately at the time, I didn't understand why it wasn't enough to be right there, right in front of these guys with enough music to fill two albums, only to be told that they didn't operate with songwriters directly and that all I could do to have my music considered for their acts was to get a 'publishing' deal. I knew about publishing deals but again in my innocence, I thought that being face to face with these guys could have had some influence on becoming recognised as a potential writer of pop music for Irish pop bands. I said thank you to them both for coming to meet me. I packed up and went home. As you can imagine, going down the stairs was much easier than going up although I must admit, my wee heart was broken.

I left my house that morning full of nerves but also full of hope that there was such a thing as being in the right place at the right time. I do believe that to be true. However, it certainly wasn't the right place or the right time that day and most importantly it was not the right approach. I was embarrassed and for a few months afterwards, I didn't play or write. It was an early insight into the industry I would eventually give everything up for and I am actually grateful for it. It had nothing to do with the music that day. Even if I had had one huge hit among the selection of songs I performed, it would not have made one bit of difference. And once I understood that it wasn't about the music, I realised it was time to grow some hair on my chest, get back on the ball and find a way in...


"...you can't connect the dots looking forwards, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that somehow the dots will connect in the future..." Steve Jobs


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"I, not events have the power to make me happy or unhappy today.." Groucho Marx

I have always been a great believer in having the right attitude. My first single release 'Moody Blues' is inspired by a Groucho Marx quote: "I, not events have the power to make me happy or unhappy today. I can choose which it shall be. Yesterday is dead, tomorrow hasn't arrrived yet. I have just one day, today and I'm going to be happy in it."

Working alone in the music industry is not easy but I love a challenge. The most important thing in getting through each day is attitude. You meet industry people along the way who tell you that you are "nobody" and that the music industry isn't looking for people "like you." That's great, they are fully entitled to their opinion! It would never affect my love or my commitment to what I do. It all comes down to what you believe yourself to be and an essential ingredient to being successful is how you react to all the negatives and the positives that come along when you are starting out. Treat them both the same. Don't over-analyse the negatives, take what is important from them and equally don't brag about the positives but have gratitude for them.

"Woke up this morning, feeling kind of low" (Moody Blues) I regularly wake up and feel unable to face the day ahead knowing that I have to send a dozen cd's with personalised letters, compose 50 odd emails that may or may not get read, organising gigs whilst also trying to be creative. On days like that, I don't give myself a hard time. I just do whatever is possible and trust that tomorrow I will have my enthusiasm back. And that trust never fails me.

It was exactly a year ago this weekend that a number of Irish radio presenters put their trust in me as an artist and gave my music a chance to get heard on the radio. It's not an easy thing for a presenter to put their neck on the line like that and I am very grateful to the guys who did do that for me and have being playing my music ever since! Of course, you won't crack every radio station straight away or even attract the attention of the industry people you believe will make the difference to your career. The important thing is to work for yourself, to commit to the career you want for yourself and to be prepared to go through every emotion under the sun along the way. Don't let the negatives put you off track and don't let the positives lead you astray...stay true, humble and grateful and most importantly stay creative...




A special thanks to all the folks in LMFM, Spirit Radio, Dundalk FM, C103, South East Radio, Northern Sound, KFM for being the first to introduce my music on Irish radio.

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I've decided to name my first blog 'Showtime'... It is the name of a song I wrote in November 2011 and it is very significant to where I am in life right now. The song itself came from a lot of places. The feel of it, the key, the tempo all came from one of Mendelssohn's Song Without Words pieces (Opus 30 No.1) that I learned when I was studying piano at the College of Music in Dublin and I literally fell in love with it. I remember learning it to perform at Feis Ceoil, a significant competition for musicians and singers in Ireland. I loved it as I learned it and never complained about practising it and played it with such ease. Unfortunately being a child that did not know how to handle nerves, I wasn't able to perform it with the ease that I played it at home or in my lessons and participating in the Feis only reduced me to tears and upset. It was important to me that I found a special place for that piece in my life again. A place where I could perform it in public but without the nerves. So I took a section of the piece and used it as the introduction piece that led into 'Showtime'.

'Showtime' is a song about being in place that I had worked hard to get to for the best part of my life. It's about being 'ready' to finally show the world who I am as a musician and writer: "this is my showtime, gona take it gona make it mine"(Chorus). It also addresses the position I found myself in pursuing my dreams: "I found a bubble and I made it my home, And in that bubble, I kept everything that I own" (Verse 2). That 'bubble' is hugely significant for me setting out as an independent. You literally have to find a space that is completely yours to grow and develop whilst protecting yourself from many exterior pressures and influences.

So here I am..at the beginning of my journey as a 'blogger'. Along the way I will share the good and bad experiences of living out a dream. Hope you will enjoy the adventure and become part of it along the way...

Sinead x

"This is my showtime, gona take it, gona make it mine.."



SHOWTIME LYRICS - COPYRIGHT SINEAD MCNALLY 2011
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