Siobhán O’Donnell grew up in South Sligo playing music with her father Colm, a reputed trad musician she went on to perform with around Ireland and overseas. But she picked up the bodhrán she found in her grandmother’s house one summer because she’d seen her auntie play it. Then she couldn’t put it down.
“There’s something different and special about the bodhrán,” she told me this month from Sligo, where she’s recently returned to live. “It really speaks to some people, and just completely grabs them. Once you’re hooked on it, you’re hooked.”
(Photo courtesy of Siobhán O’Donnell)
You can follow Siobhán on Facebook and order her solo album Beautiful Affair on Bandcamp. Stay tuned for an online bodhrán course she’s developing for release in mid-year! More of our interview is below, and if you know someone who’d enjoy reading it, please share.
This is the second issue of Fanny Power, a newsletter about brilliant women who play the bodhrán. If you’re seeing it for the first time, find the introduction here, and check out the January interview with the amazing Amy Richter. Thank you so much to everyone who got in touch to let me know that you enjoyed it!
Madeline
P.S. Don’t forget to subscribe! I’ll be back next month with another interview.
Siobhán’s 2017 teacher's recital at Craiceann with Dónal Lunny on Irish bouzouki and Brona Graham on banjo (via Hinnerk Rümenapf)
Siobhán O’Donnell
(Photo courtesy of Siobhán O’Donnell)
On style
I come from a music background and a singing background. When I play, it’s the music that’s the most important thing to me, not how many fancy things I can get in. It’s more atmospheric, building up the dynamics the same way a musician would. If I was to describe it myself, I would call my style very musical, very traditional.
I’ve played the fiddle in a session with Cathy Jordan before, the singer and bodhrán player with Dervish. She brings so much to a session, the atmosphere and the rhythm. That’s the kind of bodhrán playing that I enjoy. I love playing with Helen Flaherty because she’s full of music. A young guy who’s seven years old can do stuff I can’t do, but I would choose Helen every minute of the day. It has to be used in the right way for the tradition, and technique and musicality are very different.
On starting out
My auntie played the bodhrán, and I remember seeing her play in sessions. It was a huge bodhrán with a Celtic design on it. She emigrated to Boston and left it behind in my grandmother’s house. I was playing the fiddle and the whistle at this stage. I was maybe 10 or 11, and I’d often stay with my granny during the summer. One day I found this bodhrán upstairs and was messing around with it.
I just absolutely fell in love with it—I would be up there for hours and hours. I can’t remember getting tuition on how to hold the stick, I must have seen my auntie playing it. There was no internet back then. I figured out that I could push my hand in and out to make different sounds.
I had one CD that my grandmother had because it was my dad’s. My dad had two old friends that played the bodhrán hand style, and I used to play that track over and over. As time went on, I was like, “I’m well able to keep up here.” When I was getting good, I could feel that myself and that spurred me on.
One summer, I was at a session with my dad and I had the bodhrán with me. He didn’t even know I had started playing. I’ll never forget him going, “You’re quite good, Siobhán. Where did you learn that?”
He bought me a bodhrán of Seamus O’Kane’s and I was able to do far more on it. I don’t know if you can ever top that type of bodhrán, but the tuning system that Christian [Hedwitschak] has works for my style so I can tune it as I play. I play one of his 16 inch drums now, I’ve probably had it about 15 years.
I started going to Junior [Davey] at the South Sligo Summer School. I was also taught by Johnny "Ringo" [McDonagh]. He’s so sympathetic to the music, he knew all those tunes inside and out. There was music pouring out of him.
On competition
I had been competing in the Fleadh, I did win the All-Ireland senior championship in 2005. That’s something that you want to have under your belt in terms of being taken seriously as a player. A lot of it has to do with who’s adjudicating on the day—in this day and age, I might never get placed. But it definitely raised my profile. I was asked to take part in a lot of different workshops and festivals after that.
I competed for years singing and playing the fiddle, so it’s something I was used to, but it’s not something I enjoy, a lot of times I was dragged to compete. I didn’t have the sense of, “Oh, I want to be the best,” and I still don’t, that’s not the type of personality I have. I never went back into it afterwards, but that time, my dad played the whistle and it was definitely a highlight. I really enjoyed taking part that year.
On teaching
I was in a band with my dad called the Border Collies, and we played one of the evening concerts at Craiceann when I was 18. I was asked to teach for a couple of days, they must have had a lot of extra students and I had been teaching at festivals here and there.
Now I have my own bodhrán classes down in Sligo and a lot of people coming to me looking for lessons, but I don’t have any time because I have a full-time job, so I’m about to record an online bodhrán tutorial. A friend of mine, Caitlín Nic Gabhann, teaches the concertina that way.
The plan is to put my own spin on it. Some people like my style, some people don’t, it won’t be everybody’s cup of tea. But at the end of the day, people pick up the bodhrán to be part of the music and the culture. If I can help people appreciate that and see music the way I do, that’s what it’s about. I can perform, and I can make money from it, but the reason I play is because I love it to bits.
I enjoy [teaching], meeting people from all over the world and having a good time. I try to make the experience fun, obviously worthwhile, but also just getting across how amazing it is, and how we appreciate people taking an interest in the bodhrán.
I love when I get to the point of it clicking with others. I see it all the time, and you’re like, “Yeah, that one now is hooked.” It’s a lovely thing, because once someone is hooked like that they’re going to be hooked forever. You don’t just lose that. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that with the fiddle or any other instrument.
On playing while female
If anything, it might be a bit of an advantage, being a woman. Obviously, female anatomy is different, but there’s always a way you can mould the bodhrán to your body. I would say that women tend to listen in a different way to men. They don’t focus on the technical side as much, they focus on the feel. They’re definitely more aware of the bodhrán in terms of the vibrations and how to get different tones.
I would be quite modest and shy about putting myself out there. There are females that are well able to put themselves out there, so it’s a personal thing. But males tend to be more confidant in their abilities, and at a certain age, a lot of female musicians take time out to start a family—it may be easier for a male to leave their family and pursue it in a professional way. Percussion and drums would be perceived as being of a more male instrument anyway.
I can’t say I was ever treated differently because I was a female – I’ve been lucky. If anything, it might have been an advantage in some ways because there weren’t too many.
I think females are very much capable of taking bodhrán to a professional level and making money from it. There’s an awful lot of front players in bands who are singing and playing the bodhrán so it’s getting bigger and more popular among women. I do see a bit of a change in that respect, it’s getting easier and I see more women taking part. I think there is a place out there for female bodhrán players to do very well.