irish traveller singer

Proud Irish Traveller Sharyn Ward sung her way into Ireland's heart and made them think

Ireland's got talent contestant becomes and ambassadress for irish travellers and makes a nation reconsider the prejudice against the ancient irish people and their way of life.

Ireland's Got Talent contestant becomes an ambassadress for Irish Travellers and makes a nation reconsider the prejudice against the ancient Irish people and their way of life

The reality TV program ‘Ireland's Got Talent’ 2019, revealed many talents, including the winners ‘BSD’ a terrific dance troupe. However, the talent that took my and many other’s breaths away was 34-year-old, Sharyn Ward, “a very proud Irish Traveller”.

Sharyn was discovered by TV presenter Lucy Kennedy while she was visiting a Traveller’s campsite for another TV reality show. While relaxing after dinner, around the campfire, a beautiful young Traveller started to sing and Lucy’s shivers and goosebumps confirmed she had inadvertently found a contestant, and in her mind, a winner, for ‘ Ireland's Got Talent ’, another show produced by her boss.

Sharyn had to be convinced to join the competition and step into the spotlight as she knew her origins could provoke prejudice. At the first round, she sang Ben E. Rings song ‘Stand by me’ and the judges were wooed by her strong, crystal clear voice.

However, after she spoke about herself, judge Louis Walsh asked if she ever sang Irish traditional songs. She subsequently gave a non-accompanied rendition of Finbar Furey’s ‘Sweet Sixteen’ that blew him and the three other judges (Michelle Visage, Jason Byrne, and Denise Van Outen) away. Louis Walsh’s instinct had been correct; Sharyn’s voice was absolutely perfect for Irish Trad.

Vicious online attacks

Although the judges and many of the public were absolutely enchanted, as Sharyn had anticipated, her performance as well as inciting accolades also provoked vicious and vile comments on social media. Some of the comments poked fun of her ultra-glamorous look; others went farther, referring to members of the Travelling community as “beasts” that needed to be “exterminated”.

Read more:  German photographer spends four years photographing Irish Travellers

As someone who intensely dislikes conflict, Sharyn deliberately avoided replying to the insults to prevent a social media controversy. She kept the hurtful remarks to herself for days as she wrestled alone with the difficult decision of whether to drop out or continue. Intensely religious, she let herself be guided by her faith, which seemed to be telling her to forge ahead. She felt the situation wasn’t only hurtful for her, but for all Travellers, and she needed to go on, if not for herself, for her fellow Travellers and posterity.

Her dignified handling of the situation led me, and I’m sure many others, to reflect on the Travellers.

Irish Travellers and crime

I wondered why they had gone from being a respected, albeit separate, ethnic group to a people who solicited racism and hatred. An Irish Traveller crime gang who had committed not only petty but heinous crimes, over the past few decades seem to have blackened all Travellers’ names .

Over the same period, organized crime gangs, with no Traveller links, escalated in Dublin and other areas of Ireland. Discriminating against a whole ethnic group, or area, because of the actions of a minority doesn’t make sense. No one would blacklist the entire population of Crumlin, in South East Dublin, because Liam Byrne and other members of his organized crime gang, which has links with the notorious, international ‘Kinahan Cartel’, live there.

In the 2016 census, it was estimated that there were approximately 30,987 Travellers in the Republic and 3,905 in Northern Ireland. (The US is home to 10,000–40,000 Irish Travellers, many of whose ancestors left Ireland during the Great Famine, with a community of approximately 1,500 residing in ‘Murphy Village’, South Carolina). Because Travellers are a minority group within Ireland and the United Kingdom, they have often faced discrimination on the basis of their ethnicity.

In the UK Irish Travellers are a very small ethnic group. There is a far greater likelihood of them being given custodial sentences due to the lack of a permanent home address and the expectation that they might abscond. In Feltham prison for young male offenders outside London (Feltham “A” building houses young boys between the ages of 15 and 18, and Feltham “B” houses young men aged 18 to 21) the number of Irish Travellers incarcerated at times has reached ‘a staggering 38%’[1] of the prison’s ‘white population’.

Often first-time Traveller offenders are in for petty-crime, the same crimes for which a person with a fixed abode would be released on bail. A volunteer worker from Feltham prison told me it broke his heart to see the young Irish Travellers, who often suffered the racism, of not only other inmates but of some prison officers.

Their inability to exist in a cell, due to their love of the open space and life on the road, along with being separated from their families, and problems linked with illiteracy, often led to them being more negatively affected by their ‘time’ than other inmates. Feltham is not a tender place, 13 prison guards were hospitalized after a teenage inmates’ riot at the beginning of April. There have also been recent cases of inmates being murdered by their cellmates because of race or sexual orientation.

A brighter future?

After ruminating on many questions, Sharyn decided to return to IHT’s stage, with her head held high for the sake of younger Travellers and her own children, to show them that if she could do what she wanted in life, they should have the confidence to follow suit.

In the semi-finals, her rendition of ‘Black is the Color’ was spectacular and confirmed her place as a finalist.

In recent years a study of Irish Travellers ancestry predates the time of their social divergence to far before the Great Famine, back to the early 1600s when during Cromwellian times people were displaced during the plantations. However, looking at this fabulous woman sing, we might remember other stories of how the Travellers were descendants of the Fir Blog and Tuatha Dé Danann, the tribe of the Gods of pre-Christian Gaelic Ireland.

As Sharyn’s voice soared her accent was distinctive. Many Travellers still speak their own dialect ‘Shelta’ also known as ‘the Cant’. Celtic language expert Kuno Meyer maintains that ‘Shelta’ existed as far back as the 13th century. It was the language of the ancient Bards of Ireland.

At the finals on 7 April, Sharyn brought tears to the driest eyes when she sang ‘One Starry night’ a love song which Liam Weldon, folk singer and songwriter borrowed from the Traveller community in the early 1960s.

The lyrics for ‘One Starry night’ are as follows:

One starry night as I lay sleepin' One starry night as I lay in bed Dreamed I heard wagon wheels a'creakin' When I awoke, love, found you had fled

I'll search the highways likewise the byways I'll search the boreens, the camping places too I will inquire of all our people Have they tide or tidings or sight of you

For it's many's the mile, love, with you I've traveled Many's the hour, love, with you I've spent Dreamed you were my love forever But now I find, love, you were only lent

I'll go across the seas to England To London or to Birmingham And in some public house, I'll find you Lamenting your lost love back home

I'm drunk today, I'm seldom sober A handsome rover from town to town When I am dead, my story ended Molly Bán a stoirín, come lay me down

One starry night as I lay sleepin' One starry night as I lay in bed Dreamed I heard wagon wheels a'creakin' Now that you're gone, love, I might as well be dead

Although she was the ‘judges’ choice’, Sharyn didn’t win the finals. She came fifth out of eight finalists. However, she did win many hearts and led many people to reflect on the Travellers and perhaps to remember back to when they were welcome callers at peoples’ homes.

I remember lady Travellers coming to our house to sell clothes’ pegs, lace, and other handicrafts along with the enamel white and blue mugs their men folk made and which we’d always bring on picnics. I also remembered the secret and sound advice a Traveller lady gave me as she looked into my very soul.

I remembered their place in many of our poets and playwrights’ works; J. M. Synge, Thomas MacDonagh and J. B. Keane to name a few.

Nowadays the gulf between settlers and Travellers seems more pronounced. In Rathkeale, Co Limerick, where approximately 1,500 Travellers live (two-thirds of the town’s population) the settled and the Traveller population are challenged by the logistics of cohabiting.

Sharyn has made us remember it wasn’t always this way, as she bravely reached out. TheJournal.ie reported how she called on parents to teach their children to be open and accepting of the Traveller community saying:

“The main thing people need to do is just teach your children. If you teach the next generation to stop listening to the ones before. Don’t listen to what you’ve grown up to hear… ‘to stay away from Travellers, Travellers are bad’. Don’t listen to it. Start fresh with your own children. Tell them if you don’t know a Traveller, personally – meet one. They’re not bad people.”

Prof Gianpiero Cavalleri of the Royal College of Surgeons reminds us that “the Irish Traveller population has Irish ancestry , (unlike the Roma gypsies) and that although Irish Travellers show clear features of a genetic isolate; they are genetically very close to settled people in Ireland. Whether because they are descendants of the Tuatha Dé Danann, the Fir Blog, the Irish Bards, or were Irish settled people displaced by Cromwell, the majority of Travellers are riddled with culture, Irish traditions and customs, kindness and spirituality and are “freeborn men (and women) of a Travelling people.

Many revolutionary ideas start with women and Sharyn herself broke many of the Travellers’ codes by going to college and working. She is an ambassadress for her people and may revolutionize how they are perceived. It’s good to think about all our people, whether we’re settled, Travellers, or from the diaspora scattered to the four corners of the world. Whatever way you look at it, the truth is we’re all Irish and proud!

[1] Katharine Quarmby, ‘No Place to Call Home: Inside the Real Lives of Gypsies and Travellers’, p. 172

This article was submitted to the IrishCentral contributors network by a member of the global Irish community. To become an IrishCentral contributor click here .

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Steo Wall: ‘Maybe there is something in the fact that music can often transcend our differences.’

With all the socio-political discussions surrounding Irish Travellers in the media, we can be forgiven for forgetting that there are positive things happening in the background, including a fresh new approach to expression through the medium of music and song. Ireland has a long history of advocating for our artists and creatives, and we are known for the high quality of music we produce, from trad sessions to contemporary pop and rock. But we rarely hear about music from the margins, and specifically, music from the Traveller community. I took some time to talk to five new and emerging singers and musicians from that community.

Steo Wall: ‘At the end of the day, we all enjoy music in the same way’

Steo Wall is from Dún Laoghaire but now lives in Ennistymon, Co Clare. His genre of music is normally contemporary urban folk. “I write all my own songs,” he tells me. “I learned to play the guitar when I was 12, it was an uncle that taught me how to play. I grew up with my grandmother, I was exposed to her favourite music. Since my grandmother’s uncles were Felix and Johnny Doran, we would listen to a lot of Irish trad music, and this influenced me greatly.”

For Steo, the highest point of his career was “writing a song for my grandmother, called Sarah Doran. At the RTÉ Radio 1 inaugural Folk Awards, when inducting John Reilly, Christy Moore introduced him on stage to sing Sarah Doran, “which for me was a magical moment in my career”.

On his experience as a Traveller musician, Steo says, “I have found most people to be extremely supportive of me and my music. Maybe there is something in the fact that music can often transcend our differences, because at the end of the day, we all enjoy music in the same way.”

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Steo is working on a project with musician Thomas McCarthy and actor Michael Collins, which has been funded by the Arts Council. They will be exploring the National Folklore Collection in Dublin and old footage and photographs of Travellers stored in the Irish Film Institute. Steo is also performing in Marlay Park for the Féile Nasc on August 27th. "My new album, Street Wisdom for Lost Souls, is out at the end of 2021 and my previous album, Where I'm From, is available on steowall.ie ."

Sharyn Ward: ‘The older I get, the more I am becoming aware of how beautiful our community’s singing, poetry and art is’

Sharyn Ward is originally from Longford but now based in Dublin. Her style of singing would mainly be sean nós.

“My influences were always family members, especially Big Daddy – my grandfather. There was someone always singing in our home. The highest point in my career was getting to perform on Ireland’s Got Talent, because it was a great opportunity to perform to the nation and to show a positive side to Travellers.”

Sharyn also recalls that “the lows, unfortunately, were the hundreds of negative and discriminatory comments that followed it. The comments attacked me, my family, and my community.”

“The older I get, the more I am becoming aware of how beautiful our community’s singing, poetry and art is,” she says. “It is unfortunate that the reality behind it would tell you that 90 per cent of it will never be recognised. I would not have bothered with singing if it were not for Lucy Kennedy and Ireland’s Got Talent encouraging me to take part.”

Making it in the music industry is difficult for everyone, says Sharyn. “But it is even more so when you are a Traveller trying to book a venue. There is a fear amongst venues that a Traveller artist will attract a crowd of Travellers.”

Her advice to next generation musicians? “Stay proud of who you are and never change or stop what you are doing for anyone. You are perfect and beautiful the way you are.”

Sharyn will complete and release her own album this year. She is also performing in a few shows across Ireland. "I have a special concert that highlights mental health, planned for the Axis in Ballymun this year. We are just seeking supports at the moment." When not on stage, Sharyn can always be found singing on live feed sessions on her Facebook page @sharynwardsinger .

William Casey: ‘I’m the type to figure out why I can’t do something and educate myself to the point where I can at least put up a good debate’

“I’m from the rap capital of Ireland, Limerick city,” says William Casey, aka Willzee. “My genre of music would be rap/hip-hop and spoken word. I started a few years back as a source of self-therapy, I guess. I have been influenced by many people, but the ones that stand out are Dyrt Davis, Mynameisj0hn and Mic Righteous. Over the past while, Enda Gallery has been the producer behind my tracks. He inspires me to return the greatness.”

Speaking on the highs and lows of his career, Willzee says: “The lows of the industry would be that it is sometimes lonely... The highs to me have to be winning Virgin Media’s Dublin International Film Festival short film competition in 2019 for a short I wrote called Innocent Boy, while finally releasing my debut album this year will also be a massive high.”

And what does Willzee believe sets him apart from everyone else? “I’m not afraid to speak the truth on a level most say they are but never do, love me or hate me, my honesty can’t be denied.”

What is it like to be a Traveller rap artist? “If I am honest, I haven’t had many setbacks from being a Traveller when it comes to performing, only if some pub owners find out I am a Traveller they become cagey, which in some cases I can’t blame them, but most give you the trust and if you don’t mess about all is good for another one if you need it.”

Asked if he has faced any of the barriers other Traveller performers encounter, he says: “I’d say none, I don’t let anything hold me back, I’m the type to figure out why I can’t do something and educate myself to the point where I can at least put up a good debate.”

Willzee's debut album Kuti Gris, which means "a piece of heart" in Shelta, will be released this year. His most recent song released this month, called A Dream of Peace is, available now on YouTube . Willzee is on Twitter @WillzeeTWOW .

Kathleen Marie Keenan: ‘I also now spend time working on ways to highlight mental health issues and suicide amongst Travellers’

Kathleen Marie Keenan is from Ennis, Co Clare, but now lives in Co Galway. Her music genre is Irish folk and country. Fifteen years ago, Tommy Tiernan and Hector Ó hEochagáin were doing a live show at the Iveagh Gardens. Hector had asked me to do them a favour, they wanted some talented Traveller singers to join them on stage. Until then I had only heard the Keenan sisters and brother Davie, busking on the streets of Galway. When they took to the stage, they were outstanding, even putting Tommy in his place when he brought out one or two of his banked Traveller jokes. Kathleen was, and is, a natural performer and a lovely soul.

“I have been singing since I was about four or five years of age,” she says. “Most people would say that their inspirations are singers they listened to. For me, it was my parents. Sadly, we lost our mother in 2019 after a battle with ovarian cancer and with that one of my main inspirations in life.”

“Some of the high points in my life were performing in Dublin with Paddy Keenan and with the Hothouse Flowers, and in 2015 I performed with Daniel O’Donnell. I also appeared on the Saturday Night Show with Brendan O’Connor. Unfortunately, the lows in my career came from not getting opportunities beyond that or being able to book venues to perform shows, which has been down to who I am, and not what I sing.”

“I am using this time to write my songs, but I also now spend time working on ways to highlight mental health issues and suicide amongst Travellers. Since we lost our brother to it recently, it has been something I feel strongly about. I hope to raise awareness of this issue through my music because suicide is such a big issue for Travellers, and something we don’t speak about enough.”

Kathleen's music can be found on her Facebook page, @illerstate for more on Twitter.

Shelley Ward: ‘The highs of my career will always be the appreciation for my music I get from live audiences, while the lows would have to be the recent pandemic, which stole that away from all performers’

Shelley Ward, born to a Traveller mother and a Jamaican father, grew up in Moss side, Manchester, and his genre of music is hip-hop.

“My main influence would be Tupac, listening to his lyrics and the quality of his music inspired me to just go for it, to at least try. I started about 13 years ago with some rapping, but both my parents would have played a lot of music around me. I grew up listening to old Irish ballads and reggae.

“What is interesting about the music myself and my band (Illerstate) make is that it is a blend of hip-hop with rock, as in, you can hear the guitar in it, it is an authentic sound, there’s no one that sounds like us.”

On discrimination he has faced: “There was one time I booked a venue for a show and when they found out I was a Traveller, they came up with some excuse about overbooking the room. There is a lot of anti-Traveller stuff like that happening in the UK. We even have politicians trying to stop our way of life. It’s a crazy time. As a black man, I know what it is like to get  hated because of who you are, but it is my surname and the fact I often speak proudly about my Traveller heritage that prevents me from gigging. I am a proud black Jamaican and Irish Traveller; no amount of racism or hatred will change that. In fact, it will only make me more determined to succeed. I want both Travellers and Black people to realise we fight the same fight, just in different colour skin.”

Shelley has a few solo tracks coming out soon, and he and his band are planning another music video in the coming weeks. "We are cooking a storm," he says. "And  I cannot wait for everyone to enjoy it, Illerstate need to make a trip to Ireland, someone book us," he says with a hopeful laugh. Follow @illerstate for more on Twitter.

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Irish traveller mum melts talent show judges with When You Were Sweet 16

The travelling community often get a bad press but a mother-of-two went some way to redressing the balance when she appeared on Ireland’s Got Talent.

Sharon Ward began by singing Stand by Me by Ben E. King. She dedicated her performance to her two children and said she hoped to make her travelling people proud.

“There’s loads of good Travellers out there so the more positive things that are being done, the better. Hopefully this is one of them positive things and that my people are so proud.

“I’d like the children to think that nothing can hold them back in life.”

One of the judges, Louis Walsh, suspected that although Sharon did a good job on Stand By Me, she probably chose it because she thought it would be right for the show even though it wasn’t ‘really her’.

Sharon explained: “I thought I was doing a good thing by picking something that everybody knew and that it’d be familiar and they’d like it.”

Walsh asked her what song she would have sung if she was trying to represent her true self. She replied: I would probably have sung something by Finbarr Furey.”

“Could you sing a little bit of it now,” asked Walsh. “I could,” she said.

“Off you go then,” said Walsh. “This is YOU.”

Sharon then sang one verse of the song unaccompanied and brought the house down.

Louis Walsh told her: “This is you, I know it.”

After a thunderous reception from the audience, Sharon got a thumbs up from all the judges and is through to the next round.

Take a look at the video below.

More about When You Were Sweet 16

By Andrew Moore

Andrew Moore is a writer for Irish Music Daily and Ireland Calling. His favourite Irish music bands are the Dropkick Murphys and the Pogues.

Celtic Junction Arts Center

Best cultural center in north america, – irishcentral, a 501(c)(3) organization, 836 prior avenue,, st. paul, mn, 55104, celtic junction arts review, irish travellers work to define the road ahead in contemporary times.

Jane Kennedy

Over the past half century, many ethnic groups have experienced social advances that improved their quality of life. Irish Travellers are no exception to this in some ways. Modernization since the 1960s has brought a sea change to the Irish ethnic group that has existed for centuries. But, to borrow a line from past U.S. presidential campaigns, are Travellers better off today than they were say 50 years ago (or longer)?

The history of Irish Travellers goes back centuries. Their itinerant nature came about when the demand for their skills waned, and they were unable to make a living in their typically small towns. This led them to an itinerant existence; eventually, they developed an ethnic identity as Travellers.

“There is a lot of ignorance about Travellers as an ethnic group,” notes Fergal O’Brien of Armagh, No. Ireland, a licensed social worker who has researched Irish Travellers and today performs musically with them. “You have to be born a Traveller,” he recalls telling singer Sinead O’Connor who once inquired if she could become a Traveller simply by pulling up her trailer alongside a Traveller community.

Travellers have their own shared culture that includes a separate language, matched marriages, the trades they practice, and more. In 1997, the No. Ireland Race Relations Order recognized Irish Travellers as a racial group within the meaning of the law. This was a momentous acknowledgment considering how long Travellers existed in Ireland. It took yet another 20 years before the Republic of Ireland gave such recognition to Travellers.

Making a living

Aside from the term Travellers, research refers to this community as “tinkers” “Gypsies” or “itinerants.” They prefer to be called Travellers and find the phrase “tinkers” to be pejorative. Gypsies refer to Roma people who are an Indo-Aryan group.

The name “tinkers” originated from their trade as tinsmiths. The sound of a hammer hitting metal was called tinkering and therefore the name became synonymous with Travellers because not only was tin smithing a popular trade among the men, but it was also one of the more highly regarded types of work. Using new sheets of tin or empty biscuit containers, tinsmiths made cups, kettles, milk pails, lanterns, buckets, and more.

Travellers also were knowledgeable horsemen and adept at horse and donkey trading. This skill earned them a good income when they would ply their trade at country fairs. Travellers were known to drive horses from the west coast of Ireland and bring them to Dublin and surrounding areas where the animals were sold at a good price.

Travellers also took on work as chimney sweeps, peddlers, and fortune tellers. It was typically the women Travellers who would peddle the merchandise created by their husbands, going into the Irish settled communities and earning money. Many describe the rural farm families and Travellers as having a symbiotic relationship – the farmers needed the wares the Travellers sold, and the Travellers needed an income.

Typically, Traveller families would go from one rural community to the next in groups of three families. Once they had called on the residents of one area, they would pull up stakes and move to the next. Travellers did not wander aimlessly; instead, they planned their routes and moved from one location to another in an ordered manner.

Wagons: a place to call home

Almost a century earlier, Travellers roamed throughout Ireland in colorful covered wagons. They resided in tents in the early years but that changed after World War I when Gypsies in England were threatened with conscription, and they fled to Ireland. Irish Travellers were intrigued by this type of transportation/ home on wheels; after purchasing some covered wagons, it didn’t take long for Travellers to begin constructing their own. By the mid-1930s, about half of the Irish Traveller population owned covered wagons. As recent as 1960, some 61% of the then 6.5 thousand Travellers still lived in wagons. 1

The covered wagons were but one symbol of the Traveller culture. Irish Travellers were also considered gifted musicians and storytellers, two aspects that, unlike covered wagons, allow their culture to be preserved and sustained.

Volunteers with the Irish Folklore Commission in the 1930s ventured into the countryside to capture local storytellers using a heavy and bulky recording device, the Edison Ediphone. One individual, Páidraig Mac Gréine, is estimated to have transcribed 10,000 pages of folklore material in the course of his work .2  After the folktales were recorded, Mac Greine and other field workers transcribed the recordings in the exact words of the recorder.

Many of the folk tales of that era were published in Bealoideas , a journal of folklore that began in 1927. Today, folktales recorded by Irish Travellers in the 1930s are available in Bealoideas accessible through JSTOR, a digital library that includes journals in the social sciences and humanities.

In describing Bealoideas in the early- to mid-1930s, author Bairbre Ni Fhloinn writes, “Certainly, no other body was then engaging with Travellers in an attempt to document their history, their life experience and their wealth of oral tradition.” 3

Music continues to be an important aspect of Traveller culture. After a long day of working at their craft and services, and selling their wares, Travellers would gather around campfires in the evening and engage in storytelling and music. The songs also served to preserve the history of this itinerant community.

Today there are a number of musicians influenced by Irish Travellers of the past. Some well-known contemporary Irish Traveller musicians include Paddy Keenan who was born in Co. Meath. He hails from a line of musicians who are steeped in traditional music. Keenan has even performed several times at the Celtic Junction, the last time being June 18 of 2022.

Sharyn Ward is another successful Traveller singer and songwriter. Born in Longford and the mother of two children, she made it to the “Ireland’s Got Talent” final with her rendition of “One Starry Night.” She notes that “the song makes me proud to be a Traveller.” 4

Keenan and Ward are but two of successful singers/musicians. Others include Michael O’Connell, Co. Clare; Pat Broderick, East Galway; and Martin Nolan, Dublin, (pipes).

Contemporary Irish Traveller music tends to focus on the hardships experienced in the past and the discrimination and isolation felt by Travellers today. In the stirring song, “Move Along,” written by Finbar Magee, singer William Dundon laments,

While this song speaks to how Travellers have been treated both in the past and presently, singer Dundon displays a positive outlook for his family. “I’m settled now,” says Dundon. “My kids are settled. They’re going to school to have a good education to have all the means to survive and have a happy life.”

A personal ambition for Dundon, who works in security, is to own his security company. But he says if that doesn’t work out, “I’m going to go into music.” According to Dundon, when it comes to music, being a Traveller doesn’t really matter. He notes, “When you’re a musician, everyone wants you.”

One of his greatest accomplishments was a trip to China a few years ago when his musical group was invited by Simon Coveney, the deputy leader of Fine Gael since 2017, to perform in Beijing. Dundon said it was incredible enough to play in China, but then he was given the opportunity to play music on the Great Wall of China – something less than 100 musicians have ever been allowed to do. It’s opportunities like these that give Dundon hope for a brighter future for Travellers as they make their way into the 21 st century.

But yet there are many hurdles to deal with in contemporary times. Irish Travellers have undergone a major shift in their lifestyle within the past half century. While “modernization” is generally a positive concept that brings with it a more prosperous and enlightened society, for Travellers, the change hasn’t necessarily been positive.

A recent article in the Irish Times 5 points to a report published in February 2023 that shows how suicide is impacting Travellers in South County Dublin and Ballyfermot:

• Travellers have a suicide rate six times that of the general population 
• Over two-thirds of Travellers have lost a loved one to suicide
• Almost 90 percent of Travellers are worried about suicide in their community

These shocking statistics go hand in hand with the reality that a large percentage of Irish Travellers cannot find employment and are then forced to live in government-funded housing. To add to this, their children tend to leave school early for a variety of complex reasons.

Some countries struggle with itinerants who come from ‘outside.’ But in Ireland, “the itinerants are their own people with Irish names,” notes Aimee L’Amie, editor of The Irish Travelling People: A Resource Collection.

Discrimination, the feeling of not fitting in with the “settled” Irish population, and poverty may seem like insurmountable problems facing today’s Irish Travellers. But one needs only look at their many contributions over centuries to recognize how vital this ethnic community is to the Republic of Ireland and No. Ireland. People like musician Dundon can see a brighter life ahead. While it’s true the itinerant lifestyle may be coming to an end for many Irish Travellers, their past will always remain a vital piece of Irish history.

1 George Gmelch. Shorten the Road, (Dublin: The O’Brien Press, 19xx) p. 18 2 The Irish Times, “Folklore Collector Who Specialised in Traditions of Travelling Community,” March 3, 2007.  3 “On the Edge: Portrayals of Travellers and Others in Irish Popular Tradition, Bairbre Ni Fhloinn, Bealoideas , Iml. 83, p. 5. 4 Traveller Collection website, https://travellercollection.ie/items/628370a5be5aff4ed2883074 5 “The Irish Times View on Suicide in the Traveller Community,” Editorial, The Irish Times , Feb. 23, 2023 6 “ The Irish Traveling People: A Resource Collection,” Aileen L’Amie, Volume 2: The Republic of Ireland 1951-81. Part F: Galway 1967-70 . 1984. JSTOR , https://jstor.org/stable/community.

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Thomas McCarthy

Irish traveller, singer, storyteller.

•         - My Family
•         - Travellers
•         - Reviews
•         - Lyrics

Welcome! I am an Irish Traveller, Singer and Storyteller

My name is Thomas McCarthy and I come from Birr in County Offaly in Ireland. My family are the McCarthys who settled there generations ago. I come from a long line of old traditional singers and musicians who kept the tradition of singing strong. I've been named the Traditional Singer of the Year in the Gradam Ceoil Awards 2019.

Buy my Albums

Showing people the richness of my heritage is important to me. My latest album is 'Jauling the Green Tober' that I made with traditional Cornish singer Viv Legg. Other albums include 'Round Top Wagon' and 'Herself and Myself'.

Gigs and Talks

I love to share the old songs at concerts and folk clubs. I am also passionate about advocating for the Travelling people's rights at conferences and demos. I also enjoy working in schools too.

My Family and Background

Find out about my mother Mary McCarthy, my grandfather Johnny McCarthy and the rest of my relatives who taught me songs and stories. Learn more about the hidden world of traveller culture.

Eileen Mullervy, Lead Teacher, Lancashire Ethnic Minority/Gypsy, Roma & Traveller Achievement Service

Mark radcliffe, the folk show, bbc radio 2 – http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/, ron kavana, respected irish singer/songwriter, john belshire, headteacher, preesall fleetwood’s charity school, robin gillan, musician, singer and organiser of the black fen folk club, peta webb, singer and organiser of the musical traditions club, london, english dance & song magazine, edfss, joe power, na conneries singing club, waterford.

Paddy Keenan

Irish Travellers Songs & Music

Field recordings made by photographer and author Alen MacWeeny between 1965 and 1971 to accompany his book Irish Travellers, Tinkers No More . This compilation includes rare recordings of Paddy and Johnny Keenan, The Fureys, Nellie Weldon, and more. NPR article

1. The Blackbird - Syke Ward

2. The High-Level Hornpipe - John Keenan

3. Long Time A-Growing - Bridget Furey

4. Dick Daglan The Cobbler - Johnny Cassidy

5. The High-Level Hornpipe - Johnny Connors

6. Dunphy's Hornpipe - Paddy Keenan

7. Lovely Willy - Kitty Cassidy

8. The Munster Cloak - Paddy Keenan

9. Na Connerys - The Furey family

10. Sligo Maid & Down The Broom - The Furey family

11. William Scanlan - Paddy Purcell

12. An Chuilfhionn - Paddy Keenan

13. The Patriot Game - Mary Hutchenson & Dominic Behan

14. Sliabh Na Mban - Mick Moriarty

15. Carrickfergus - Nellie Weldon

16. My Rifle, My Pony, and Me - Andy Cassidy

17. The Blue Tar Road - Liam Weldon

18. Sliabh Na Mban - Paddy Keenan

Last  |  Albums  |  Next

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Gypsy and Traveller Voices in Archives

The English Folk Dance and Song Society’s Vaughan Williams Memorial Library’s archives contain many songs sung by Gypsies and Travellers. A new project will make these songs more accessible to the communities from which they came.

Romani Gypsy academic and poet Dr Jo Clement  of Northumbria University is working to create resources that make the Gypsy and Traveller collections more accessible, particularly for Gypsy and Traveller people seeking engagement with their cultural heritage.

The project Gypsy and Traveller Voices in UK Music Archives  is led by Dr Hazel Marsh (University of East Anglia) together with Dr Esbjorn Wettermark (University of Sheffield) and Tiffany Hore , Director of Library and Archives at the English Folk Dance and Song Society. It  has been funded by  the University of East Anglia’s AHRC Impact Acceleration Account.

Through collaboration we will highlight the richness and importance of Gypsy and Traveller music collections – for communities themselves,  supporting the cultural wellbeing of some of the UK’s most marginalised communities, and also for the wider English folk scene.

The resource  will be further shaped by focus groups  from Gypsy and Traveller communities . The resource will be launched at the Library in late June, before a presentation at the Strumpshaw Tree Fair in Norfolk in July.

What do we mean by ‘Gypsy and Traveller’?

Various ethnic groups feature under the umbrella term Gypsy and Traveller. The histories, terminologies, interconnections that relate to these groups are not straightforward. Individuals as well as groups prefer different terms and may subscribe to different discourses about their origins and history. However, current research suggests that Romani Gypsy people migrated from India into Europe in the middle ages, reaching Britain and Ireland in the early 16th century. Irish and some Scottish Travellers, on the other hand, represent indigenous nomadic ethnic groups, with continuous presence in Britain and Ireland. Neither of these groups should be confused with the Roma, mostly East European Romani people, who have arrived on Britain and Ireland in more recent times.

About the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library’s collections of Gypsy and Traveller music

The Gypsy and Traveller collections held by the library consist primarily of private collections that have been deposited in the library archive. The majority of the collections relate to Romani Gypsies, but there is also material relating to Irish and Scottish Travellers. A sizable number of recordings have been digitised and published on the library’s online portal. Most of these recordings are also available in other archive collections (such as the British Library) or published on LPs and CDs from a variety of record companies.

In addition to the digitised material available online, the library collections also include written and audio publications with Gypsy and Traveller songs and music which can be seen in the library. Where relevant the library catalogue also includes notes on collections in other places, such as the British Library Sound Archives. There is currently no single register of Gypsy and Traveller material in the collections and some inside knowledge is required to find the right entries.

Photo: Priscilla Cooper, photographed by Cecil Sharp.

Sound examples

Irish Traveller singer Mary Delaney sings “My brother built for me a bancy bower” vwml.org/record/RoudFS/S245547

Gypsy singer Priscilla Cooper singing “Basket of Eggs” recorded on wax cylinder in 1908 by Cecil Sharp vwml.org/record/CYL/47

Gypsy singer Carolyne Hughes singing a song in Anglo-Romani “Oh 'tis mandi went to poov the grais” vwml.org/record/RoudFS/S370323

Gypsy singer Jasper Smith sings Hartlake Bridge vwml.org/record/VWMLSongIndex/SN29700

Gypsy fiddler Harry Lee plays a step dance tune, The Rakes of Kildare” vwml.org/record/VWMLDanceTuneIndex/DT6614

Scottish Traveller singer Belle Stewart sings “In London's fair city there lived a lady” vwml.org/record/VWMLSongIndex/SN29861

Gypsy singer Phoebe Smith sings “High Germany” vwml.org/record/VWMLSongIndex/SN29765

English Folk Dance and Song Society, Cecil Sharp House, 2 Regent’s Park Road, London NW1 7AY, UK. Tel: 020 7485 2206 | Email: [email protected] | Registered charity number 305999 Cookies: The English Folk Dance and Song Society’s websites use cookies: please read our cookie policy for more information.

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How I learned to love the slow route home to Ireland

Journeys are about so much more than getting from A to B, as our writer found when he ditched flying for the train and ferry between Dublin and London

T here’s always a moment in the journey from Dublin to London – which I make every month or two, taking the land-and-sea route via Holyhead instead of flying – when I stop what I’m doing – reading or writing or chatting to the person next to me – and think: you don’t get to enjoy this from 40,000ft.

Sometimes it’s at the Britannia Bridge in north Wales. As the train crosses the Menai Strait from Anglesey I can see, off to my right, a concrete statue of Lord Nelson keeping a lonely watch from the shore, and further upriver the grounds of Plas Newydd country house sweeping down to the water. To the left, on a tiny island with a curved jetty, stand two handsome whitewashed houses that will one day disappear beneath the rising sea levels but for now are holding out against the elements.

I’ll pause again as the train trundles past Conwy, with its hulking medieval castle and absurdly pretty waterfront, home to the smallest house in Britain, and later still as we move along the coast beyond Colwyn Bay, and legions of offshore wind turbines can be glimpsed through the haze.

On the return journey, as the ferry heads into Dublin Bay, I’ll cast an eye at Howth Head as it rises up to greet us, followed by the crimson lighthouse at the end of the Great South Wall and the looming red and white chimneys beyond – the unmistakable sign that we’re about to dock in the Irish capital.

People often ask me why I choose to travel between Dublin and London by ferry and rail instead of flying, which is considerably less time-consuming. I’ll respond by talking about the price, or the breezy check-in process with minimal luggage restrictions, or the direct connection into central London, or the carbon emissions, which by one estimate are about 95% lower than going by plane . But the little details – the things you see, the people you meet and the reveries you enter as the journey’s lulling rhythms take hold – matter to me almost more.

When I moved to London in 2002, the idea of taking the slow route home to Dublin didn’t occur to me. Going by air was quick: you can fly city to city in under 90 minutes, though of course you have to factor in the time it takes to get to the airport, clear security, wander through duty-free, wait to board, wait to take off, and go through the associated rigmarole on the other side. And it’s cheap.

Then, about 15 years ago, a friend tipped me off about SailRail, a package that bundled train and Irish Sea ferry tickets into a single fare – connecting not only to London but to any town across Britain with a station. I was dubious about the duration but the price was keen – these days it’s £102.20 return, but back then it was about half that – so I decided to give it a try.

I’ll be honest: I didn’t love SailRailing straight away. Train travel is one of life’s great pleasures but in Britain it can curdle to frustration in the face of delays, cancellations and broken-up routes. It took me a while to work out how to time my journey so I didn’t have to change trains in Crewe and again, 20 minutes later, in Chester. And Holyhead, for all the surrounding beauty of Anglesey, is not a town that makes the heart leap – not, at least, the stretch between the terminal and the ferry dock, which on even the sunniest afternoon feels oppressively grey.

The ships – Irish Ferries and Stena are the two options on the Holyhead-to-Dublin route – can feel dated and a bit tacky, and if you strike out from Dublin on a match day, you have the choice of watching football supporters getting stuck into cooked breakfasts and pints at 8am or joining them. The crossing can be rough, though it would take a serious gale to unsettle one of the bigger boats when its stabilisers are out. (In that kind of weather, I’d rather take my chances on a 50,000-tonne ferry than a dinky commuter plane.)

If you travel with Irish Ferries, which I tend to do, this unfolds within a literary theme park of unparalleled incongruity. The flagship Ulysses is riddled with allusions to James Joyce’s masterwork: you can eat reheated pizza slices (but not pork kidneys) at Boylan’s Brasserie, drink tequila slammers at the Leopold Bloom bar or engage in soft play at the Cyclops family entertainment centre. (The faster ferry, often cancelled if the wind picks up, is ingeniously named the Jonathan Swift.)

Despite – or perhaps because of – these idiosyncrasies, I kept returning for more. For years, I’d SailRail to Dublin and fly back; the journey out of London Euston tends to be smoother, especially if you catch the direct train to Holyhead departing about 9am. But since moving back to Dublin in 2020, I’ve ditched the air option and now actively look forward to my day meandering across the Irish Sea and down through Wales and England. The journey takes eight or nine hours, but without internet to distract me I usually get a solid day’s work done, or at least have time to read and think.

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Some distractions are welcome. When the Icelandic volcano eruption grounded European air travel in 2010, I got chatting to two fellow SailRailers on the train out of London. One, delightfully, was the actor who played Gestapo agent Herr Flick in the sitcom ’Allo ’Allo!. The other became a really good friend – and I often thank the ash clouds of Eyjafjallajökull for introducing us.

More recently I’ve fallen into conversation with touring graffiti artists, septuagenarian world travellers and a woman who found God after getting lost in the middle of the Sahara (she prayed for help and a crow appeared to guide her back to safety). Last autumn, when my partner and I took our whippet-saluki over on a morning sailing (pet-friendly cabins are available on Stena) he was lavished with attention by an elderly Traveller couple who told us about similar dogs they’d loved over the years.

The Traveller community uses the ferries a lot, following a route that Irish people with UK connections have taken for centuries. You’ll also encounter plenty of truckers, as well as students, backpackers and people who are averse to flying. What you don’t get a huge number of, among the SailRail contingent, are British tourists. When I mention the package to friends and colleagues in London, few of them have heard of it. And when I tell them the fare, which doesn’t shoot up for last-minute bookings, they’re astonished: £51.10 from London to Holyhead and then on to Dublin by boat? You’re joking, right?

Still, I rarely recommend SailRail without a string of caveats. It isn’t to everyone’s taste. And it could be so much better than it currently is – the rail connections are unreliable and foot passengers on ferries are often treated as afterthoughts. But despite its foibles I’ve come to enjoy the easy pace of the journey and offbeat crowd it throws together. I’ve even developed a fondness for those Joyce allusions.

And I love that long, slow train ride along the north Wales coast, past castles and wind turbines and island houses doomed to vanish beneath the waves. A journey is so much richer and stranger when you travel close to the ground.

SailRail tickets from London Euston to Dublin Ferryport from £ 102.20 return (+ booking fee) via trainline.com

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