ABOUT
Laoise Kelly 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.
