Ríoghnach Connolly is a winner of RTE’s and BBC Radio 2’s Folk Singer of the Year, and played GTSF with The Breath in 2021. She's back playing here as a duo and also leading the powerhouse band Honeyfeet.

 

Ríoghnach grew up surrounded by a rich musical familial heritage and through Armagh Pipers’ Club in Armagh City, in the northeast of Ireland. Now based in Manchester, she is a professional vocalist, flautist, lyricist, workshop facilitator and musical activist. She's accompanied by Ellis Davies: they've been playing together for nearly 20 years – as long as long as they have been a couple, and together they've graced stages from Brazil to Singapore. They record under Ríoghnach’s name, and Ellis also appears in Honeyfeet.  As a duo, they explore the traditional music of Ríoghnach’s upbringing, gently underpinned by Ellis’ fingerpicking guitar style.

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"(Connolly is) A remarkable singer and flautist...who can ease from Irish traditional influences to soul."

The Guardian

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"Connolly is a free spirit and strikingly self-assured...seldom has conspicuous greatness been more accessible."

Mike Butler, CityLife / Dyverse Music

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"A voice that echoes back through the ages of jazz and soul, resonant and resplendent in glorious, exploding power and control."

Manchester Music

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"Delightfully undefinable...irrepressible, inimitable"

Folk Radio