Maeve Donnelly is one of the top Irish traditional

fiddle A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin or a bass. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Althou ...

players known for her unique style within the

traditional Irish music Irish traditional music (also known as Irish trad, Irish folk music, and other variants) is a Music genre, genre of folk music that developed in Ireland. In ''A History of Irish Music'' (1905), W. H. Grattan Flood wrote that, in Gaelic Irela ...

genre.

Life and education

Donnelly was born near

Kylemore Abbey Kylemore Abbey () is a Benedictines, Benedictine Monastery founded in 1920 on the grounds of Kylemore Castle, in Connemara, County Galway, Ireland. The Abbey was founded for Benedictine nuns who fled Belgium in World War 1. Today, Kylemore Abbe ...

Loughrea Loughrea ( ; ), is a town in County Galway, Ireland. It lies to the north of a range of wooded hills, the Slieve Aughty Mountains and Lough Rea, the lake from which it takes its name. The town's cathedral, St Brendan's, dominates the urban sk ...

in East Galway, Ireland. She now lives in

Quin, County Clare Quin () is a village in southeast County Clare, Ireland. The name also refers to a civil parish in the barony of Bunratty Upper, and to an ecclesiastical parish of the same name. The main attraction in the vicinity is Quin Abbey, the ruins of ...

. She has been playing music since she was a child and won her first All-Ireland Fiddle Competition when she was nine despite her parents not being musicians. However her family has developed a musical tradition with her three brothers playing the accordion, banjo, and fiddle. Donnelly toured the US for the 1976 Bicentennial celebration, and again in 1978 and 1983. She went on to win two more All-Ireland fiddle titles in the 1970s and the National Slogadh Competition for Solo Fiddle and The Stone Fiddle Competition in

County Fermanagh County Fermanagh ( ; ) is one of the thirty-two counties of Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of six counties of Northern Ireland. The county covers an area of and had a population of 63,585 as of 2021. Enniskillen is the ...

in 1981. Donnelly went to college in

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

and when she graduated she moved to live in Clare. She works touring, recording and tutoring when she isn't working as a teacher.

Discography

* ''Sailing Into Walpole's Marsh'' - Mairéad Ní Domhnaill, Sean Corcoran, Eddie Clarke, Maeve Donnelly - 1977 * ''Moving Cloud'' - Paul Brock,

Manus McGuire Manus McGuire is an Irish fiddle player. Early life He was born in Tullamore, and grew up in County Sligo County Sligo ( , ) is a Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Northern and Western Region and i ...

, Kevin Crawford, Carl Hession, Maeve Donnelly - 1995 * ''Foxglove'' - Moving Cloud - 1998 * ''Her Infinite Variety'' - Celtic Women (compilation album) - 1998 * ''Éigse Dhiarmuidín'' - Live recordings in concert (compilation album) - 2001 * ''Maeve Donnelly'' - Maeve Donnelly - 2002 * ''The Thing Itself'' - Maeve Donnelly, Peadar O'Loughlin - 2004 * ''Flame On The Banks'' - Maeve Donnelly with Tony McManus - 2008 *
Musical analysis of album contents at irishtune.info

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Donnelly, Maeve Year of birth missing (living people) Living people Musicians from County Galway Irish women fiddlers 20th-century Irish fiddlers 20th-century Irish women musicians 21st-century Irish fiddlers 21st-century Irish women musicians Claddagh Records artists People from Loughrea