Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin
Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin is an Irish singer, songwriter, academic writer from Ireland.

Background
Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin was born into an Irish-speaking household in County Louth to Pádraig Ó hUallacháin and Eithne Devlin, from Cullyhanna, County Armagh. Her father, a teacher, writer and song collector collected older songs from the Oriel area and in Rannafast, and encouraged her and her siblings to sing. Her family childhood was in Ballina County Mayo, in Ramelton & Carrigart County Donegal and in Dundalk County Louth. She has seven siblings.

She attended St Louis Secondary boarding school, Monaghan, County Monaghan before beginning a degree course at University College Dublin and University of Ulster.. She received her doctorate in 2009 from the University of Ulster. She lived in Mullaghbawn, County Armagh in the historic Belmont Barracks house 1983-2023 and has returned to live in County Louth.

Career

In 1977, Pádraigín was the first woman to read the news headlines in Irish at RTÉ, Ireland's national broadcaster. She also researched and presented numerous radio programmes in English and in Irish for RTÉ Radio.

She left RTÉ in 1980 to study for a Master's degree in the University of Ulster and in 1984 was appointed as a teacher in Dundalk, County Louth.
She left teaching in 1999 and since then is a full-time professional musician.

Recordings

In 1994, Pádraigín recorded her first full-length album with producer/musician Garry Ó Briain. A Stór is a Stóirín on the Gael Linn label and featured 36 songs for all ages.

Britain's Channel 4 commissioned music videos of a number of songs on the album for a series Rí Rá. The videos later became regular features on TG4 between 1996 and 1998.

In 1995, Pádraigín she recorded her second album An Dara Craiceann: Beneath the Surface (produced by Garry Ó Briain). It featured unaccompanied sean-nós songs and traditional songs set to her new compositions, including a work by Irish poet Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill.

Pádraigín's third album, When I Was Young - an album for children, a collaboration between her, Garry Ó Briain and traditional singer Len Graham, which was released on the Gael Linn label in 1999 and later on Shanachie label US. Two years later, Pádraigín released a fourth album, An Irish Lullaby: Suantraí, on the Shanachie label in the United States. The recording featured Garry Ó Briain, Máire Breatnach,harpist Helen Davies, fiddler Nollaig Casey and Uilleann piper Ronan Browne.

From 1997 to 2012 Ní Uallacháin was a regular performer with the Danish composer musician Palle Mikkleborg and harpist Helen Davies. She is the vocalist on his soundtrack for the Goethe film Light, Darkness and Colour (1998) and is also the vocalist on the title track of his album Song Tread Lightly (CD 2002). One of her own song compositions Don't give me the whole truth' (Ná tar le hIomlán na Fírinne) is featured on Helen Davies 'Open the Door Softly (CD 2000); her composition An Leannán (The Beloved) is played by Mikkleborg and Davies and Mikkel Nordsoe on Masters of the Irish Harp (CD 2011) and also on her Áilleacht CD.

Other musicians with whom she has collaborative recordings include Steve Vai, Liam O'Flynn, Steve Cooney, Máire Breatnach, Dónal O'Connor,  Macdara Ó hUallacháin-Graham. She has also collaborated on new compositions with poets Ciaran Carson, Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Biddy Jenkinson and Seamus Heaney.

A Hidden Ulster- people, songs and traditions of Oriel

2003- 2005 may have been Ní Uallacháin's most prolific period with the results of her intensive research, recorded on an album of restored Oriel songs, An Dealg Óir CD (produced by Steve Cooney, Gael Linn 2003) and her magnus opus, A Hidden Ulster: People, songs and traditions of Oriel published 2004, Four Courts Press. Following that award winning publication, her pioneering work continued as the first woman to record an album of new compositions in Irish with Áilleacht CD (Beauty, produced by Steve Cooney, Gael Linn 2005).

A Hidden Ulster featuring 540 pages of rare songs, their histories, biographies of authors, collectors and scribes and documentation of folk traditions in Oriel from the 17th century onwards. Television and radio programmes and series were produced, Songs from A Hidden Ulster' and featuring Ní Uallacháin on RTÉ Radio 1, TG4, RTÉ1 and on BBC radio.Songs from a Hidden Ulster  A Hidden Ulster was met with critical acclaim and featured in the Times Literary Supplement as a Book of the Year 2004, and Irish Times Books of the Year 2004 list. After the book's publication in 2003, Pádraigín was awarded Gradam Shean-Nós Cois Life in 2003 for her contribution to the Irish song tradition, and became the first traditional artist to be awarded a Major Arts Award from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.

In 2005, A Hidden Ulster was shortlisted for the 2005 Michaelis-Jena Ratcliff Prize in Folklore and Folklife.Oriel Song Restoration and ORIEL ARTS PROJECT'''An Dealg Óir: The Golden Thorn - a CD collection of restored song from A Hidden Ulster publication, features Irish musicians Steve Cooney, Liam O'Flynn, Liam Ó Maonlaí Ódhrán Ó Casaide, Helen Davies, Máire Breatnach & Laoise Kelly, with one track Éalaigh Liom (Elope With Me) reaching an international audience on The Highland Sessions on BBC Two.

She released a double album of songs, Ceoltaí Oirialla: Songs of Oriel in 2017 to coincide with the launch of the Oriel Arts an online research and multimedia award winning project which she, as author and editor, directed and is funded by the Arts Council of Ireland. This is a work of reclamation and restoration of a song and music tradition which had almost died out in her locality, where most of the song lyrics had lost their respective musics. Her research, skilful remarrying of lyrics and music and editing of texts, and then recording the songs as singer, has resulted in a widespread renewal of interest and practice in the Gaelic song tradition of Oriel. It has inspired a new generation of young singers to reclaim their own local tradition of song and lore.The restorative songs on her CD recordings and on www.orielarts.com are now sung by many local and national singers, which have brought accolades and awards to the Oriel region. The book A Hidden Ulster gives contextual information, lyrics, musics & translation to this body of restored & recorded song. This magisterial work was acknowledged by the national TG4 Gradam 2018 award for 'outstanding contribution to traditional music'.

New Song Composition & Music
2005 saw the release of her album of new compositions ÁILLEACHT beauty (Gael Linn). It is a collection of newly written and composed songs in Irish. Áilleacht garnered enthusiastic reviews and praise from both press and academics, with poet Louis de Paor writing:

Her new compositions feature on the soundtrack of BRANWEN (S4C 1995), The Black Guelph (2023),and HOME (Martello Media 2021).

In November 2011, Pádraigín released her first album on the Ceoltaí Éireann label, Songs of the Scribe with early Irish lyrics and translations set to her new compositions and accompanied by harpist, Helen Davies. As Traditional Singer in Residence at the Seamus Heaney Centre she collaborated with poets Ciaran Carson and Seamus Heaney by setting to music song-poems from ancient Irish manuscripts, written by Irish scribes and scribe-poets. To record the album, Pádraigín travelled to St. Gallen, Switzerland to read the Irish manuscripts. Songs of the Scribe CD was recorded in Copenhagen. Songs of the Scribe remained on the Celtic Note album charts for seven months between March and September 2012.

Settings of poems include poems by Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Biddy Jenkinson, Ciaran Carson, Seamus Heaney and W.B Yeats and many early Irish & Bardic poems.

Her new ew song compositions have been recorded by Dolores Keane, Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh & Danu, The Black Family, Eithne Ní Uallacháin, Len Graham, Skylark, Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh & Altan,BRIGID - an EP of 4 newly composed songs, honouring the Goddess/Saint Brigid, released August 2022 as a digital download.

She is featured as a contemporary Irish language song writer on https://portraidi.ie/en/padraigin-ni-uallachain/

Her 2nd CD album of new compositions in Irish is expected to be released in 2023.

Awards
Since becoming a professional musician in 1999, she has been the recipient of numerous Arts Council of Ireland awards and national accolades. In 2003, Pádraigín was awarded Gradam Shean-nós Cois Life. Ní Uallacháin is the first traditional musician to receive a Major Arts Award from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Cultural Relations Commission. in 2004. In 2018, she was awarded the Outstanding Contribution to Traditional Music Award at Gradam Ceoil TG4. Her book, A Hidden Ulster: people, songs and traditions of Oriel was a Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year  and an Irish Times Book of the Year. The book was shortlisted for the 2005 Michaelis-Jena Ratcliff Prize.

Ní Uallacháin received her doctorate from University of Ulster in 2009

As well as receiving TG4's Gradam Ceoil in 2018, that year also saw Pádraigín receiving a further four accolades including ‘Mná an Mhisnigh‘ (Women of Courage) Award, Bliain na Gaeilge 2018 from Craobh an Iúir de Chonradh na Gaeilge; a Cultural Achievement Award 2018 from GAA An Mullach Bán; a Civic Award 2018, from Newry, Mourne and Down District Council, for her contribution to local culture and the Creative Arts Award 2018 at Fiddler’s Green Festival in Rostrevor, County Down.

She was a Foras na Gaeilge & QUB funded Traditional Musician in Residence in the Seamus Heaney Centre of Poetry in Queen’s University Belfast (under the directorship of Ciaran Carson), with residencies in DkIT County Louth (under the directorship of Dr Eilish Farrell) and The Glens Arts Centre in Manorhamilton, County Leitrim. She is also the first recipient of an Irish language fellowship from the Royal Literary Fund based at St. Mary’s University College Belfast and Queen’s University Belfast.

She has contributed widely to BBC, RTE and TG4 documentaries on the song tradition.

Her work and life was the subject of the documentaries, Spiorad Saor RTE 1 2007 (Léargas series) &'Sé Mo Laoch TG4, 2020.

Personal life
Pádraigín Ní Uallacháin has two sons, Eoghan and Macdara Ó hUallacháin Graham. She is a sister of singer Eithne Ní Uallacháin and aunt to Dónal O'Connor (musician and producer), Feilimí O'Connor (film and TV director) and musician Finnian Ó Connor.

Discography
1994 – A Stór Is A Stóirín - CD x2  album (producer Garry Ó Briain)
1995 – An Dara Craiceann (CD Beneath the Surface - producer Garry Ó Briain)
1997 – When I Was Young (CD producer Garry Ó Briain)
1999 – An Irish Lullaby (CD Suantraí - producer Máire Breatnach)
2002 – An Dealg Óir (CD The Golden Thorn - producer Steve Cooney))
2005 – Áilleacht (CD Beauty - producer Steve Cooney)
2011 – Songs of the Scribe - (CD producer P.Ní Uallacháin & Helen Davies)
2012 – LET THE FAIRIES IN (CD producer Dónal O'Connor)
2017 – Ceoltaí Oirialla (CD x2 Oriel Songs) - double album
2022 – BRIGID (EP producer Dónal O'Connor)

Bibliography
2003 – Ní Uallacháin, Pádraigín, A Hidden Ulster: People, songs and traditions of Oriel'', Four Courts Press

Footnotes

External links
Official website
Editor/Author Oriel music project 2018

20th-century Irish women singers
21st-century Irish women singers
Irish folk singers
Irish-language singers
Irish-language writers
Irish schoolteachers
Living people
Musicians from County Armagh
People from County Louth
Year of birth missing (living people)