Winifred Horan is an American violinist/
fiddler
A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Although in many ...
of Irish descent. After classical training, she played with the all-female Celtic music ensemble Cherish the Ladies before becoming an original member
[
][
]
of the
Irish traditional music
Irish traditional music (also known as Irish trad, Irish folk music, and other variants) is a genre of folk music that developed in Ireland.
In ''A History of Irish Music'' (1905), W. H. Grattan Flood wrote that, in Gaelic Ireland, there w ...
group
Solas.
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]
Biography
Horan was born in New York City
[
]
to Irish parents
[
]
and studied piano (taught by her father, a carpenter and musician)
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]
and
Irish fiddle playing
The Celtic fiddle is one of the most important instruments in the traditional repertoire of Folk music of Ireland, Celtic music. The fiddle itself is identical to the violin, however it is played differently in widely varying regional styles. In t ...
at a young age.
[
]
She attended and graduated from the
New England Conservatory
The New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) is a private music school in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the oldest independent music conservatory in the United States and among the most prestigious in the world. The conservatory is located on Hu ...
[
]
in
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
, Massachusetts, where she studied classical violin,
[
]
and the
Aspen Music Festival and School
The Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS) is a classical music festival held annually in Aspen, Colorado.
It is noted both for its concert programming and the musical training it offers to mostly young-adult music students. Founded in 1949, the ...
in
Aspen, Colorado
Aspen is a home rule municipality that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of Pitkin County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 7,004 at the 2020 United States Census. Aspen is in a remote area of the Rocky Mounta ...
.
She played with multiple orchestras, including the
Boston Pops Orchestra
The Boston Pops Orchestra is an American orchestra based in Boston, Massachusetts, specializing in light classical and popular music. The orchestra's current music director is Keith Lockhart.
Founded in 1885 as an offshoot of the Boston Symp ...
, and
string quartet
The term string quartet can refer to either a type of musical composition or a group of four people who play them. Many composers from the mid-18th century onwards wrote string quartets. The associated musical ensemble consists of two violinists ...
s, before joining the all-female
Celtic music
Celtic music is a broad grouping of music genres that evolved out of the folk music traditions of the Celtic people of Northwestern Europe. It refers to both orally-transmitted traditional music and recorded music and the styles vary considerab ...
ensemble
Cherish the Ladies
Cherish the Ladies is an American female supergroup (music), super group that plays Celtic music. The band began as a concert series in New York in January 1985. It was the brainchild of Mick Moloney who wanted to showcase the brightest female ...
in 1990.
She co-founded
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][
]
Solas in 1994,
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]
and is on fiddle and backing vocals.
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]
On her participation in Solas and, in particular,
touring with the group, Horan expressed in a 2008 interview: "Traveling the world with Solas has been one of the best things about being in the band."
Outside of her work with Solas, Horan was a member of and toured with The
Sharon Shannon
Sharon Shannon (born 8 June 1968) is an Irish musician, best known for her work with the button accordion and for her fiddle technique. She also plays the tin whistle and melodeon. Her 1991 debut album, ''Sharon Shannon,'' was the best-selling ...
Band,
and also performed with Irish singer-songwriter
Pierce Turner
Pierce Turner (born June 1949) is an Irish singer-songwriter. After forming a duo with Larry Kirwan he went solo in the mid-1980s and has since released several albums.
Biography
Turner grew up in the port town of Wexford, where his mother ...
.
She was "featured fiddler" on ''When Juniper Sleeps'', a 1996 solo album by
Séamus Egan
Séamus Egan is an Irish-American musician.
Early days
Séamus Egan was born in Hatboro, Pennsylvania to Irish immigrants Mike and Ann Egan. At the age of three his parents moved the family back home to County Mayo, Ireland.
He learned accor ...
, and co-writer of certain tracks for the 1995 film ''
The Brothers McMullen
''The Brothers McMullen'' is a 1995 American comedy-drama film written, directed, produced by, and starring Edward Burns. It deals with the lives of the three Irish Catholic McMullen brothers from Long Island, New York, over three months, as they ...
''.
She is also a nine-time champion
Irish stepdance
Irish stepdance is a style of performance dance with its roots in traditional Irish dance. It is generally characterized by a stiff upper body and fast and precise movements of the feet. It can be performed solo or in groups. Aside from public ...
r and an
All-Ireland
All-Ireland (sometimes All-Island) refers to all of Ireland, as opposed to the separate jurisdictions of the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. "All-Ireland" is most frequently used to refer to sporting teams or events for the entire islan ...
fiddle champion,
[
][
]
having won an All-Ireland Junior Championship at age eleven.
In a December 2001 interview, Horan identified
Liz Carroll
Liz Carroll (born September 19, 1956) is an American fiddler and composer. She is a recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts' National Heritage Fellowship Award. Carroll and collaborator Irish guitarist John Doyle were nominated for a Gr ...
, Egan, and
Sharon Shannon
Sharon Shannon (born 8 June 1968) is an Irish musician, best known for her work with the button accordion and for her fiddle technique. She also plays the tin whistle and melodeon. Her 1991 debut album, ''Sharon Shannon,'' was the best-selling ...
as her top musical influences.
Horan released her first
solo album
An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early 20th century as individual 78 rpm records coll ...
, ''Just One Wish'', in October 2002 on
Shanachie Records
Shanachie Records is an American, New Jersey-based record label, founded in 1975 by Richard Nevins and Dan Collins. The label is named for the Gaelic word ''seanchaí'' (anglicised as shanachie), an Irish storyteller.
It was previously distribu ...
.
[
] In 2006, she and fellow Solas member Mick McAuley, an
accordion
Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...
ist, released ''Serenade'' on
Compass Records
Compass Records is an independent record label founded in 1995 by musicians Garry West and Alison Brown that specializes in folk music, folk, bluegrass music, bluegrass, Celtic music, Celtic, jazz, and acoustic music.
In 2006, Compass purchased t ...
,
[
] with
covers of "
After the Gold Rush
''After the Gold Rush'' is the third studio album by the Canadian-American musician Neil Young, released in September 1970 on Reprise Records, catalogue number RS 6383. It is one of four high-profile albums (all charting within the top fifteen) ...
" by
Neil Young
Neil Percival Young (born November 12, 1945) is a Canadian-American singer and songwriter. After embarking on a music career in Winnipeg in the 1960s, Young moved to Los Angeles, joining Buffalo Springfield with Stephen Stills, Richie Furay ...
and "
Make You Feel My Love
"Make You Feel My Love", also known as "To Make You Feel My Love" is a song written by Bob Dylan for his album '' Time Out of Mind'', released in September 1997. It was first released commercially in August 1997 by Billy Joel for his compilation ...
" by
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan, born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Often regarded as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture during a career sp ...
.
[
]
Siobhán Long, writing for ''
The Irish Times
''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is considered a newspaper ...
'', listed ''Serenade'' as fifth on her list of top five
Irish traditional music
Irish traditional music (also known as Irish trad, Irish folk music, and other variants) is a genre of folk music that developed in Ireland.
In ''A History of Irish Music'' (1905), W. H. Grattan Flood wrote that, in Gaelic Ireland, there w ...
albums released in 2006.
Horan composed two of the album's
tracks: "Little Mona Lisa" and "A Daisy in December",
[
] which was featured during the
third season of the American reality television
competitive dance
Competitive dance is a popular, widespread sport in which competitors perform dances in any of several permitted dance styles—such as acro, ballet, contemporary, jazz, hip-hop, lyrical, modern, musical theatre, tap, and improv—before a ...
series ''
So You Think You Can Dance
''So You Think You Can Dance'' is a franchise of reality television shows in which contestants compete in dance. The first series of the franchise, created by '' Idols'' producers Simon Fuller and Nigel Lythgoe, premiered in July 2005 and has ...
''.
[
]
Horan lives in
Dover
Dover () is a town and major ferry port in Kent, South East England. It faces France across the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel at from Cap Gris Nez in France. It lies south-east of Canterbury and east of Maidstone ...
,
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...
and is currently a member of the faculty of
The New England Conservatory
The New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) is a private music school in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the oldest independent music conservatory in the United States and among the most prestigious in the world. The conservatory is located on H ...
.
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Selected discography
with Cherish The Ladies
* 1992 – ''
The Back Door''
* 1993 – ''
Out And About''
* 1998 – ''
One and All: The Best of Cherish the Ladies''
with Solas
* 1996 — ''Solas''
* 1997 — ''Sunny Spells and Scattered Showers''
* 1998 — ''The Words That Remain''
* 2000 — ''The Hour Before Dawn''
* 2002 — ''The Edge of Silence''
* 2003 — ''Another Day''
* 2005 — ''Waiting for an Echo''
* 2006 — ''Reunion: A Decade of Solas'' – CD and DVD
* 2008 — ''For Love and Laughter''
* 2010 — ''The Turning Tide''
* 2013 — ''Shamrock City''
Solo and other selected albums
* 1996 — ''The Irish Isle: Traditional Irish Music'' (
James Keane with Winifred, Seamus Egan, Sue Richards)
* 2002 — ''Just One Wish''
* 2002 — ''Pleasures Of Home'' (
Cracker Barrel
Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Inc., doing business as simply Cracker Barrel, is an American chain of restaurant and gift stores with a Southern country theme. The company was founded by Dan Evins in 1969. Its first store was in Lebanon, T ...
label)
* 2006 — ''Serenade'' (with Mick McAuley)
* 2014 — ''Lost Girl Found''
References
External links
Winifred Horanon
Myspace
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*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Horan, Winifred
American fiddlers
American people of Irish descent
Aspen Music Festival and School alumni
Living people
Musicians from New York City
New England Conservatory alumni
Musicians from Philadelphia
Year of birth missing (living people)
21st-century American violinists
21st-century American women musicians