Sina Theil, Caitriona O’Sullivan, Chantelle Padden and Laura Colgan told David Hennessy about their new all female Irish musical collective, Women of Éire.
Women of Éire is a new collective project bringing together the voices and artistry of 12 female artists who hail from all four provinces of Ireland.
Made up of Sina Theil, The O’Neill Sisters, Tara Howley, Caitríona O’Sullivan, Caitríona Sherlock, Chantelle Padden, Elle Marie O’Dwyer, Ciara Fox, Laura Colgan, and Irish dancer Róisín Lyons, the new outfit have just announced themselves with debut single Ireland’s Call which dropped aptly on St Brigid’s Day.
This release marks the first officially recorded version by a female group drawn from all four provinces.
The collective has also confirmed that this release marks the beginning of a wider body of work, with more music set to follow.
The Irish World chatted to Sina Theil, Caitriona O’Sullivan, Chantelle Padden and Laura Colgan.
Sina, originally from Germany, came to Ireland to pursue the music that she loves.
Caitriona O’Sullivan from Kerry has long been known as a singer and judge on TG4’s Glór Tíre.
Chantelle Padden as been featured in The Irish World around the time of her appearance on The Voice.
Laura Colgan is a singer based in Co. Meath.
Where did the idea Women of Éire come from?
Sina: “I think in a way we have to credit Opry le Daniel because that’s when Caitriona and I met for the first time.
“We just really hit it off and we decided, ‘Let’s do a song together’.
“We did the first female duet of The Fields of Athenry which did, and still does, incredibly well.
“That really set the foundation for doing more.
“We really thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool to do something and expand a bit more?’
“And then I started doing more duets with Meadhbh Walsh, then last year with Chantelle The Green and Red of Mayo.
“And in the midst of all that, November 2024 was when I kind of thought, ‘Okay, it’s going to be an album’.
“And everything just started rolling.”
Caitriona: “You get a great lift in energy from the excitement of other people’s talents and other people’s gifts and what you can pool into it together.”
Laura: “To be in a room with 11 other women, all different personalities and all great craic, it’s just amazing.
“I’ve personally learned so much off these girls.
“It’s like a big pot of homemade Irish Stew.
“We’re all unique in our own little ways but a good stew doesn’t work without good, wholesome ingredients.
“I’m definitely the carrot in the stew.”
Chantelle: “When I first heard about the project, I was only three weeks after having my twins so the fact Sina got me into a studio and to record a music video was crazy.
“I wouldn’t do it for just anyone.
“I was so not ready.
“But working with Sina, she convinced me and I’m so glad she did because it was then that she told me about this project that she had in the pipeline that she was so passionate about.
“The fact that she asked me to be involved was very, very special to be honest.
“It’s been an amazing journey so far and I’m looking forward to what the future holds.”
Caitriona: “Myself and Chantelle had met years earlier.
“Chantelle was on Glór Tíre.
“I’ve been judging that 20 years and when I heard Chantelle singing, I was just blown away, ‘That is one of the best voices I’ve ever heard’.
“I was in awe.
“We’re all inspired by each other.
“We all bring different gifts and talents to the table.”
Has there long been that mutual admiration between you all?
Catriona: “Yeah, 100%.
“That admiration has been there.
“And a lot of it is personality too.
“It’s how you click with people and then there’s other girls as part of our group, the likes of Tara Howley who plays about 20 instruments as well as being a great singer.
“All the girls on the project are amazing vocalists and have had great success in their own background both individually and as part of various groups over the years.
“The talent is second to none.
“It’s just outstanding.
“You’re talking about some of the finest singers and instrumentalists in the country.
“We’ve definitely been admiring each other for a long time.
“It’s like asking a fella out on a date which is something I’ve never done in my life.
“I think seeing Sina being German took the initiative to pull us all together.
“Whenever you get talking to people and real, honest conversations of what goes on behind the scenes in people’s lives, you discover that there’s a lot of commonalities in your experiences and where you’re trying to go.
“It was lovely to share all that.”
Sina: “It was like asking someone out on a musical date.
“Because you’re asking people that you admire so much, that are all very busy and very successful in their own right, to join what was, at that point, a dream, a wild idea: Let’s come together. Let’s coordinate everyone’s schedules. Let’s just make it happen.
“It felt a tiny bit daunting but every time that call was over, I would just feel like a million dollars because I was like, ‘Wow, these girls believe in it as much as I do’.
“I think Ireland’s Call being the first single was just perfect because that’s an iconic anthem which talks about coming together, rising together in unity, everybody’s voices becoming as one and you could feel it the day we recorded it together.
“You’d hear the laughs and the stories and people cheering each other on and it was just wonderful.
“That’s what I love most about this project.
“It’s just the sense of unity and community and sisterhood and joint admiration and love.”
Tell us about the recording process involving all of you..
Caitriona: “Oh, it was amazing.”
Chantelle: “I remember watching Róisín Lyons dancing for the first time, she put the shivers up my spine.
“And then hearing Tara Howley live and in person, I was crying. I was an emotional wreck.
“And it’s very rare that you feel that passion.
“And it was a burning passion I was feeling because I could see right in front of me, ‘Wow, the potential this has to fly’.
“A lot of us had very similar backgrounds and some of us had different backgrounds but everyone really glued and got on.
“I think that’s amazing because there was no egos.
“There was no trying to outshine anyone.
“Everyone wanted this to marry up as well as it could, to get the best out of the song.
“I hope that everyone that has listened to Ireland’s Call can hear that.
“We love everything about the song but we love what we have created.”
Why was it Ireland’s Call you did firstly?
Laura: “It’s very true that to what’s in the song: ‘Come the day, come the hour’.
“It was literally that.
“We are literally representing each province, are coming from our own little place and it is such an anthem.
“It’s such a huge, massive anthem and we have literally answered it by coming together and why not put it into song and just give it our all?
“That’s exactly what we did and we’ve come to answer Sina’s call.”
Caitriona: “We were excited too by the fact that there’s never been a girl version of that song.
“We felt that we’d something special to bring to it and share the female perspective on it and show women can be warriors too.
“We’re bringing out the Irish warriors in us.”
Sina: “It all started with that call and maybe I put in the call but everybody answered it and everybody coming together just makes it that strong.
“You can call out but what really matters at the end is who shows up and who is there and everybody just really put their incredibly busy schedules aside and just came from all the corners of Ireland. It was just amazing.
“That is a theme that runs through this project and stay tuned because there is more coming.”
What can you tell us about what is coming next?
Sina: “There’s some original stuff in the pipeline as well which is always exciting.
“We all are songwriters as well and it’s a beauty that we get to showcase so many different aspects.
“We get to showcase songwriting, Irish language as well so stay tuned for some exciting stuff.”
Laura: “Sky’s the limit.”
Caitriona: “We have other tracks recorded and we’ve more tracks we want to record.
“I suppose we’d love to be good ambassadors for Irish culture.
“We want to showcase the Irish language which we’ve done with some of the tracks we’ve already recorded.
“I’m sure we’d love to put together a little touring schedule.
“It’s a matter of trying to talk through everyone’s schedules.
“It is no mean feat when there are 12 people in the band to put it all together but I guess our mission is our shared love of Irish culture and language and portraying that across as strong Irish warrior type women.
“I think we feel like we have our own little special, unique sound and edge as opposed to what’s out there.
“We’ve our own little unique spin on things with some of the recordings we’ve done and not yet released so we’re really excited for that and to see what the future holds.”
Chantelle: “Yeah especially with the original tracks that are in the pipeline with Women of Éire, we definitely want to create our own sound and have a big, magical, powerful show that makes people feel every sort of emotion possible.
“It’s going to be like a roller coaster when you do come to a show to see what we have to offer.”
Laura: “That’s the beauty of this music.
“It will take everybody on a journey and that’s what we want.”
Is it your mission to inspire younger females especially in this climate of gender bias or being difficult for females to break through?
Caitriona: “We all know as individuals what it’s like and a lot of us are also independent artists.
“But we felt like we do have a voice.
“We want to use it.
“We’ve 12 very talented women and women who forged a great friendship over those couple of days that we were recording.
“I suppose we really feel we’ve so much to offer in so many different ways that we want to have our voices heard and get it out there.”
This really doesn’t like a one off or gimmick, seems like something you’re really serious about..
Caitriona: “I think we realised how special what we had was those couple of days.
“Initially we thought it was seen as album and we were doing a couple of days recording but then it just grew legs and the excitement grew.
“We realised how special the thing was, it gave us all the desire to continue with it.
“And we all quickly realised this could be a really, really special project going into the future.
“We want to do more of this.
“We want to do more recordings.
“We want to do tour dates.
“We want the whole lot.
“We realised this could be something really big and we quickly transformed it into that idea going forward of women of Éire.”
Sina: “I’d say Women of Éire definitely is growing into something with a life of its own.
“It just feels so good.
“We’ve come together for this album, for this project and I really do feel Women of Éire is taking on a life of its own.
“It’s growing.
“It’s evolving and who knows what it’s gonna grow and evolve into in the future?”
There is 12 of you at present but you talk about the project growing. Could it grow further? Would you welcome more members?
Caitriona: “We’re totally open to that, David.
“We see Women of Éire as a concept that we’re all invested in.
“We’d very much have our arms wide open to different people coming in with the Women of Éire group.
“If one person is off touring America or Australia, we might have other very talented female friends who could be a great asset to us and we’d be excited to work with.
“I suppose that’s the spirit that brought the whole project together in the first place.”
Sina: “This is a very organic project which is really how it came together as well, organically.
“So organically given the nature of it I think it will flow a lot, which is super exciting.”
Laura: “Where there’s women, there’s magic.
“That’s for sure.”
What can you say about any plans for any live shows?
Sina: “We’re all getting ready for the next chapter which will be hitting the road together which we all would very much love in whatever format that moment in time will permit.
“Is it 12? Is it 10? Is it 14? Who knows?”
Chantelle: “I think, definitely with Ireland’s Call, it was to get word out there that there is these talented vocalists who have come together and who want to create good music and I think definitely when we start releasing, especially the original music, that’s what is going to make the statement for us.
“We’ve showcased what we can do talent-wise but I do think the next part of this project will be what will define us and set us apart from anything that you would have seen before in Ireland.
“When you hear our original stuff coming out- not to take away from the very amazing single that we’re here talking about now but I think that is what got us really excited so we want to make sure that we put our all into it and that everyone realises we, as a unit, will not be afraid to break any boundaries in the sound, the way we present ourselves and the passion that we have going into the next stage of what’s to come.
“I think the shows will come definitely.
“It won’t be too far into the future before we start releasing some more tracks and I think people will see then what makes us different to everything they’ve heard before coming out of Ireland.
“There is a fierce group of women and we take pride in everything we create and I hope that that shows in everything that is to come.”
Laura: “The best is yet to come.”
Ireland’s Call is out now.
For more information, click here.
