Music At Maddens Podcast

Music At Maddens Podcast #015 - Strings and Sisters with The Walls Sisters

• Maddens Bar • Season 1 • Episode 15

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Welcome to a new episode of Music At Maddens Podcast with me, Lynette Fay.


This week we welcome the Walls Sisters to the podcast.


This week in the snug, Lynette is joined by sisters Molly, Jane, and Cara Walls, whose shared journey through Irish traditional music stretches from Moneyglass sessions to stages at home and in Nashville.


They chat about growing up in a family where music was part of everyday life, the teachers who shaped them, and the moments that turned practice into passion. 


Cara talks about falling for the harp, Jane shares her unique path to the uilleann pipes (starting with an airbed pump hack!), and Molly reflects on teaching, fiddle playing, and finding her own sound.


Together, they explore the highs of competition, the closeness and chaos of playing as siblings, and how music has held both grief and joy in equal measure


From Crosskeys to Madden’s, country jives to late-night sessions, this is a heartwarming story of family, friendship, and the music that ties it all together.


Enjoy!


New episodes every Monday.


Maddens Bar

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maddensbarbelfast_home_of_trad/


Hatch Belfast

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/belfasthatch/?hl=en


Avalon Guitars

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/avalonguitarsofficial/

Website: https://www.avalonguitars.com/


Smithwicks Irish Ale

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/smithwicks_ireland/

Website: https://www.smithwicksexperience.com/

SPEAKER_00:

Well hello Arish Watch is Jack Pock creating the Shoutinishaw Agranella de Music at Maddens. Um you can tell already the crack has started here in the Snug this week. This is a weekly podcast uh from the Snug upstairs in Madden's Bar, the home of traditional music here in Belfast City. I'm Lynette Faye, and every week I get to have the chats with members of the traditional music family, and no shortage of stories, no shortage of crack. Um, and we want to thank everybody for listening so far because if you're discovering the podcast for the first time, there are a back there is a bad back catalogue of episodes, so please go and have a listen and rate the podcast and subscribe as well. And we also need your help to keep this going. Uh so you can subscribe to our new uh Patreon and you'll find the details on our Instagram page, music at Madden's, and for the price of a coffee less than a pint, you can access exclusive performances from some of our guests and uh some special offers as well. So do sign up for that now. Thank you very much. In the snug this week, the bubbles already are pouring here, they're flowing. We have three sisters, uh the three fantastic musicians from Money Glass County Antrim, who I have had the pleasure of seeing grow up, uh, and that's a bit scary in itself, to be honest. Um, now establishing themselves as shining lights in the traditional music world. So hello to the wall sisters, Molly and Jane and Cara. How are you doing? Good. Very good, Lina. And just before we well, we were recording, we might use it as a clip, but you've just blown my mind here because I was saying, and what age are you now, Cara? And what age are you now, Jane? And then Jane pipes up and says, We're twins. And I said, No, you're not. And I'm still not sure whether or not you're taking a hand on my thought. That's kept secret about. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Oh my gosh, I did not know I thought Jane was the baby. Yep, no. I'm actually older than Cara, so two minutes, she doesn't have any free.

SPEAKER_01:

You know what I mean? Two minutes, you were just too you were too comfy in there. I was just chillin', she just she wanted out first, so I let her.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, so she's but and you know what? That's true to form to your personality too. Jane's had to go get her, and you're still just chilling.

SPEAKER_01:

I'm just a very chilled out person. I never get too stressed out about anything.

SPEAKER_04:

Like a boat without an engine, you know. She just feels. Alright, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

It's not a bad way to be, is it?

SPEAKER_01:

Like Oh here, I just get by.

SPEAKER_00:

I love it. And Molly says you're you're the eldest then trying to keep these two in check. Yeah, all the best. And you've Patty the Wee Brother as well.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Yeah. Patty's all into the music now.

SPEAKER_01:

He's 17 now, you got the test of the day, he's buzzing. So the driving test on it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, it was anything else, you know. Mind the roads, mind money last. Yeah. Stay wide. I I was trying to think, you know, how where the first time was that I met you, uh, whenever I was preparing for this podcast today. And I was trying to think, and I was going, when was it? And I think it was you. I met first. I think it was.

SPEAKER_02:

Was it Nathan Carter? No.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes.

SPEAKER_02:

In Dunganan. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00:

Yes. Your dad came over. Dunganan Park. Yes, your dad came over to me and says, This young lassie wants a photograph of you. And I went, Why would she want to photograph me? And we got the photograph taken. Honest to God, but it was so funny because I remember that came up in my memories. Yes. That it was, I think, maybe 2015. Yeah. Dunganum Park or something. Yep, it was a big, big thing. Fanamina Bagley was there as well, and there was a a a big do. And it just brought me straight into the whole crossover between traditional music and country music. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

I think our patty was probably to blame for that concert because he always wanted to play the piano accordion like Nathan Carter.

SPEAKER_01:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

And we said, Patty, now like we'll settle for the button accordion. So then he started the button accordion and then it just never really kicked off. And we were taking him to the lessons and everything, and he sat it down and he was like, Mummy, you can just sell that. And then the next day he had told somebody at a session that he wanted to play the banjo. So they landed into the session like the following month with the banjo for him. And we're like, Where has this come from? And then now he's playing the banjo.

SPEAKER_04:

So and he used to have like the you know, the way tweed blazer on the brown shoes and all he was the red cap was decked out.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Like Nathan Carter. His idol.

SPEAKER_03:

It never worked out. It never worked out for poor Patty, but he's not he's flat out by the music and they're very.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, he's loves the music, he does, he loves us. And driving now as well. As are all of you. I know.

SPEAKER_00:

But back in those days when a very matches, your mummy and daddy, well, your daddy was driving you everywhere. You had like a big bus for the whole family.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I was actually thinking about that in the way up the road. When we we used to have a Jeep and Cara always played the harp, and the harp was always kind of like it wasn't a siege, but we always it was always just like, oh the harp.

SPEAKER_01:

The harp.

SPEAKER_04:

But then um one day daddy just took this wild notion and he pulled in I I remember him coming up our lane and there was this van, it didn't it didn't have no side door on it. I don't know. He had no front door on it. There was like was there three seats in the front? Yeah, three seats in the front. And there was hardly a like a paint on her. And he drove it into the backyard and we all just didn't the house like that.

SPEAKER_02:

We never went out near wicked projects, so we just let him at it.

SPEAKER_01:

Classic John Walls project project.

SPEAKER_04:

So then after a couple of weeks, Cara, you went out. Yeah. Cara actually was like, you know what, sure, why not? Cara went out. I've seen the vision. Okay, yeah, you've seen the vision. Yeah, you you seen something. And Cara went out to any wing. Then this van kind of started coming together. So then he kind of trapped Molly into the idea one day and he drove into Marafelt and he went to this. This is actually like when Daddy takes a notion of something, that's it, right? So he drove into this place in Marafelt, and it's like a graphic car graphics place. And he goes to Molly, oh what chin will he put up beside of her?

SPEAKER_03:

And I was like, No chin.

SPEAKER_02:

And he was like, What's that chin that um Patty always likes? And I was like, You mean Father Kelly's? Patty was about seven. Patty was about seven, but he always loved Father Kelly's right. Like, and Daddy was like, Yep, that's the one. So we got the boy to go onto the session.org and like crop it out, and that's a chin up the side of the floor.

SPEAKER_04:

And we used to be going to flash and stuff, and people be going to us, what's that up the side of it? And Daddy'd be like, You have to work it out. You have to work it out. Can you not think of it? So then he got that up the side of her, and then he put on the back of her, it wasn't a transporter anymore, it was a chin transporter.

SPEAKER_01:

So it was just oh my god. The van's still about and goes so fly, but it's it is luck, goddess round music.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yeah. But between the van and your dad driving you're everywhere is like who you know because you live in Muddy Glass, you're members of Jamore Cultists always have been. Yeah, that in itself is what an hour, two, two and a half hour, more or less a round trip, round trip a track more anytime you go. Yeah, but like look, it's worth it to go to Jamore. We know we know what Jamore gives and we know we know of the the quality of the community there, what music's what what's thought of music in that area and all the rest of it. So whenever you were like doing all that travelling and all for tunes and going to classes, yeah. Did you think about it or was it just what you did about it?

SPEAKER_02:

Well we didn't really think about it. I suppose like mummy was so good as well, and like always having the dinners ready and you know the pack lunches made, toasties in the box, you know. We we wouldn't have been able to do it without them both back, and yeah, I suppose they like they just worked really well together as a team.

SPEAKER_01:

I think Daddy just accepted that he was one that was willing to drive, and mummy was like, right, I'll just I'll just try and help hold it for try and help them as well.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, where where did this drive for traditional music and wanting you to have the best and be the best you just could possibly be? Because it's almost like um you have to dedicate yourself to it. As you just described, there both your mummy and daddy are making a decision here. Yeah, this is what we're doing for the kids, and it's not easy. As anybody listening will know, if you're lifting them and laying them, cheapers whenever the the whole after school stuff starts, you know, we PC inside days because I said you're you're you're never out of the car and the ta the taxi is begins. Like, but why traditional music?

SPEAKER_01:

So well like when I'm explaining it to people, people always be a wee bit surprised that mummy and daddy actually don't play music at all. Mummy once mummy played back in the day and all that thought.

SPEAKER_04:

Mummy used to try to play in was it was it Clino flip band or Derry Tresk flip band or something? Pipe band. Pipe but she has a fan.

SPEAKER_00:

No, there's two there's two pipe bands. She has a flip band. I think there's Dairy Tresk and Clineau. I don't I don't know.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so they would have kind of So she I don't know. So Mummy was a midwife and a nurse, but she did all her training in London. So she obviously moved away for that and argument, but Daddy kind of followed her there. So they lived in London for a while. And when whenever I was sh asking them about it a few years later, I was like, how did we even get to the stage where we're so into music? And like you know, people keep asking me, like, why do Iens not play? And like how how did how did Yens get so into it? Mummy was like, see, when you move away from home, you realise how much that culture and that music means to you as a person and like your identity, and they were always like to themselves, like if we ever have children or we ever go on to get married, like we want them to play, like we want them to be able to just to go into a bar anywhere and just lift an instrument and be able to play a tune. So I think that's how we kind of you know, they they really loved music then, and then whenever we were obviously so they recognised what they didn't have and wanted to make sure that you had a few.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and then we were so lucky in school as well because my primary three teacher and primary four teacher, um Aileen Logan, she played the fiddle. And um she was what started me off on the fiddle, and then we Jenna Carr would have started after me with her, and we would have gone to her house for lessons on Saturday mornings. And yeah, that just kind of took off. I don't know how much we pay me and Jane didn't have fiddle.

SPEAKER_04:

Well I was saying there, we didn't start long after her, but we didn't finish long after that either. You know what I mean? It was a short but sweet.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. And then how did you get onto the heart?

SPEAKER_00:

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SPEAKER_01:

Um I actually star so I went from the I had a bit of a round trip on the whole thing. I went from the fiddle, little violin and then fiddle. So I started classical and then I went to the fiddle. And then I actually started on the piano with Grona Myers, and one day, thank God Mummy was late a few minutes, and Grania plays the harp as well. So the harp was just sitting there and she's a classical harp too, and I was like, oh my god, that's class. I think I was like nine. I was like, that's class. I was like, can I play a chin on it? And lo and behold, I actually did play a chin on it. And then I came out to the car. I had about ten minutes footing around and I was being able to get a chin out of it, and I came out to the car and I was like, Mummy, I just need to play the harp. Like I just I just feel like that is like I just I've never felt anything probably like my life where I've just been like, that's for me, and that's it. Do you know that there can I um you instantly connected with it? I started that Saturday morning at lessons and I got a harp. So that was like the Thursday night, and Saturday I started in the harp, and then that's been me ever since.

SPEAKER_00:

Well they fairly believed you because to get to buy you the harp without uh giving you a wee while uh to get used to it or to see whether or not this was a win that's a big that's a big risk to take as well as a parent. Same thing when you're because you know you went for in for the really um expensive ones there.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, you always harp and the very expensive taste, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, there we go, twins with expensive taste. That's it, let them add it. Yeah, so how did you choose or did the Ellen Pice choose you?

SPEAKER_04:

Not well Daddy kind of had the notion of it, and um whatever Daddy says is what we do. No, it's not. So basically, uh he came home one day and Daddy sells machinery, so one of his friends, uh Patrick McLean, his sister um Marie played the pipes, and Daddy was like, God, that's class. Came home one day dr and he drove to Ennis. He'd seen someone had up on eBay or Dum Dealer, one of them sites, um, that someone was selling pipes. Daddy was like, Right, I'll buy them, give that a go. Came home and I don't know, it was like an ornament. I was like, get that up in the attic there, we'll take it down again at Christmas, you know what I mean? I just we just didn't know what we were doing. But it's such an intimidating thing if you have no idea how to play it.

SPEAKER_00:

You just look at it going okay, what what what do we do?

SPEAKER_01:

What where do you start? I remember that day coming home from school off the bus and we knew that Daddy had these pipes at home and Jane was like, Oh I can't wait to see them. And Jane opened the box and I remember the look at her on her face and she was just like, like I didn't know.

SPEAKER_04:

It was like something you put in a bonfire, you know? It just it wasn't it wasn't purple. So anyway, then we went to where did we go? We went up to the Marie and she kind of said, Look, like they're not really they're not something you could play. Um and Daddy kind of just kept the notion. Daddy always was very dedicated, like deca dedicated because if something if one thing got on his road, like he kept going. Um and then he got another set of pipes and then another set of pipes and another and it this just kept going on until you know then we met um we were up at the winter school in Guidor, we used to always go up there, we still do, um, from we were young and then we met Gay McHyong and then started going to Dublin for lessons with gay and daddy just used to get out early every week from school. I don't know how I ever decided to become a school teacher because I wasn't really there much of the time. You know what I mean? You were too specific. I was away piping. Um But yeah, that's kinda it all just kind of fell me.

SPEAKER_00:

So hang on, so when your daddy met Chip Kay McKeon up at the winter school in Gidore, you started going to Dublin for classes.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, so my teacher was having um children and uh I went to the classes for the week with gay and I think Bioga was playing in the curt that night. So Mummy and Daddy were like, Oh, we'll go. So they went anyway and they met this man and he was like, Yeah, I'd love to teach her, I'd love to teach her. And then Daddy was chatting to one of the Bradies from Belfast and was like, Yeah, Gay McKeon said like he would teach her or whatever, like is that like a good thing, or like should we go with that? And he was like, Gay McKeon, like, whoa. So then that daddy kind of heard that and was like, right, so lifted me early from school one day, it was in January, then just back from Christmas, and I was thinking, uh I don't know if I'm going to the dentist here or where I'm going, but I'm leaving school now. So Daddy lifted me and we headed down the road, and Daddy, we kind of spoke about it going down the road that we would just go every two weeks or every month or so. It wouldn't be a weekly thing because driving to Dublin every week, like that's crazy. Um but then went for the first lesson and we learnt the first part of Garp Barry's jig, and then at the end of the class, gay goes, Right, that's all good, we'll learn the second part next week. And my daddy just looked at me like what? So then we were back the next week and the next week and the next week for about eight years. Yeah. So Daddy used to drive me to Dublin every week. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00:

But Game McCo must have seen something in you that he said did she take you on as a as a student?

SPEAKER_04:

I don't know. I used to never speak in the classes. Never. We used to laugh about it. Like we just laugh about it now. Like I used to come in, you wouldn't get a hello. You would get a thanks at the end, but not it was just he showed me and then I just like I was kinda like robotic back then. I was actually quite a quiet child. She was making up for it now, then I don't I don't know how where it all went wrong, but yeah, it was a very quiet child. And kind of just I just loved the pipes and used to practice every day and it was just I don't know, it was weird. And then you had the pipes with the Oh yeah. You went to the phone. So like that's a good one.

SPEAKER_00:

That's a good one. Sometimes it's a benchmark.

SPEAKER_04:

Sometimes me and Cara just know what each other's talking about. So we're just so insane. I can't explain it, but we're just on the weird one. Like you know what I'm talking about. Yeah. We just look at each other and then it's like it's twist. It's either a good thing or a bad thing on the same way. Um so when I started the pipes, I was only seven and it was very, very small. And Daddy, like, as he said before, like the when the van came into his head, it's an idea, and the idea has to be complete. There is no job done half a daddy. So anyway, I was like teeny, like as a child as a child, I was only seven. And he was like, How are we gonna get these pipes to to work? Like they were big, like big bellows, big bag. And Daddy then sat and was thinking and thinking and thinking. Next thing he was like, Oh yeah, I ordered something from Curry's or Argos or something. Came home with a pump for an airbag. An airbed.

unknown:

Right.

SPEAKER_04:

Like an electric pump. An electric pump for the phone. So originally I thought he was just gonna do like, you know, bellows on the floor. You know the like if you ever go to like electric picnic or something, you have the bellows on the floor and you just like you know? No. Electric airbed pump. So he set it up. It used to he had the contraption made that the bag wouldn't blow up. You still have it. You know? Um, I'm so sorry you didn't bring the ball in. I know I actually should I should get it out someday. So you have to. You know the way they say hit the music? Like it was hit the pump and then Bling up, right? Bloom up. And I just it was kind of basically like a tin muscle Olympic kind of contraction. Yeah. And like I played that for about three months. And then that's the only way that I learned how to do the bells and the wagon.

SPEAKER_01:

Because genius to get through a barbachin and be like, oh, I'm wrapped. I'm actually wrapped.

SPEAKER_04:

It was like a high box, you know. I've never done the high rox, but from what Molly tells me it's like a high rox, isn't that right, Molly? Oh my god. She loves all that stuff. Sorry, play playing a tune only in a pipe. It's like a high rox. Yeah. Well, when you were seven. No, it's not the bad night. You can get used to it.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh my god, I love it. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00:

Molly, I'm sitting, I'm laughing because you're sitting here looking at Jane going, she's just talking about Jane. It doesn't stop like and she tells me it wasn't always like that. She just found her voice. No, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Jimmy goes very, very quiet.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

And then I don't know.

SPEAKER_04:

Silent but deadly. Isn't that right? SBD.

SPEAKER_00:

And then right, so we've heard about Chiara's harp, G is pipes, we don't think we're ever going to forget that story. What about G the Fiddle?

SPEAKER_02:

Um, yeah, so it was my primary school teacher that started um me off on the fiddle, Aileen Logan, and then yeah, after a while, then Aileen was having children, and um then I went to Bridge Harper. And Breach wasn't really teaching at the time. And yeah, I went up to classes of hers in Donakmore. And yeah, that's where I met Bridge and learnt a lot from her.

SPEAKER_00:

And would she have been then a huge influence on the way you play?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, definitely. And um I suppose whenever we're all talking about different influences on our playing. Like we all have different like Jean learned the pipes in Dublin, Carl learnt the harp in Valley Castle and then Monaghan, and like I was learning the fiddle and throne from a Donegal fiddle player. So like we all had different experiences um of getting different music from everywhere, but then whenever we put it all together, I suppose it gives you something different again. Do you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00:

You just I think then it just becomes your own brand, really. Yeah. Well, you know, with all those different influences, then and then you you're from Money Glass, so cross keys is right beside you. Yeah, did that become the hub to go to then to get to get as it was experience of playing sessions? A couple of fucking oh looked or shaken your shawl air music at Madden's uh some words from our sponsors this week on the podcast, and uh they say there's music in every pint. Smithics has been brewed in Kilkenny since 1710, it carries centuries of craft a ruby red ale with notes of caramel, roasted malt, poured smooth and rich, and it's the taste that's been part of our sessions for generations, where stories are told and music is made. So whether you're at Madden's or listening from home, raise a glass and let the tradition play on.

SPEAKER_02:

Definitely like we would have gone to sessions all over the country, but um I suppose that shapes your music as well. But the cross keys for us um is our local, it's already up the road from us and about two miles. It's a wee bit too handy sometimes, you know. And like we're so lucky to have somewhere so good, like Madden's as well, that you can have somewhere that is just a wee hub for music.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

And like even during the storm on Friday night, we were just sitting in the house and we were all kind of Well, I was working. Car was working, but we were all kind of just sitting there looking at each other, and Late Late Country was on, and we said, we'll go up for one and bring the instruments here and we'll be back down for Late Late Country, but we were there too long, we missed Late Late Country, but we watch we watched it on the way back.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so it's really good having somewhere so local to you that and especially whenever like um the bars like respect your music and there's a real thing now about like preserving the music. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00:

And whenever you were younger uh and your daddy was driving you all around the place to learn the music, you know, you go into Dublin and all the rest of it. I'm sure people were making comments about that thing saying, Are you serious? What are you doing? Yeah. Or you know, in in your in your school, but supposedly if the teacher had music uh it would have been accepted. But what did what were your friends doing?

SPEAKER_04:

Um we always found it tough maybe in primary school because like when you look at it, look back, all our friends were playing camoe, and like one thing that I always remember like growing up was I always used to say, they can go home in the evening and watch Disney. And like we used to go home in the evening and like there was kind of like a need to practice. Like you had to practice, like daddy and mummy were taking us all around the country, and like we couldn't you wouldn't rock up to a lesson and not know what you know.

SPEAKER_01:

Never there was never any what I would say about mummy and daddy and us growing up they would never like be like right you need to practice. Like there was just an understanding between us and they was like unspoken. Daddy drove, like never mummy helped us a lot and we practiced. Like that was just that's what we had. Yeah, it was just like unspoken. I think there was just a level of like respect there that that's what you do. Like there's no there's no like rocking up to lesson, not knowing a chin.

SPEAKER_04:

Like that's just that's so disrespectful to a teacher and like I don't know, I always would have found like we lived in the countryside and then we went to primary school in Tomb, like in Toonbridge, and like a lot of people would have lived in the village and like you know all their friends were close to them, whereas yeah, we had all of us at home, but we wouldn't be able to go in and like knock on someone's door and be like, Oh, you come out to play. Like we just didn't have that, so like we didn't have music and we wouldn't have been like see even now, like people find it weird, like we have one TV in our house and like we don't really ever use it. It goes on at six o'clock and half six for the BBC and U TV news. That's it. And then like TV car or something. Yeah, on a Sunday night, yeah. Or else Friday night, maybe like late late, but we don't want TV. We went up to just TV people.

SPEAKER_01:

We used to just come home and play music with each other. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

And the best thing that we ever got for Christmas one year was we got a like an Apple TV box. It was like a box you put plug into the TV. Like this is going back years and like you were able to get YouTube on it. Oh my god, we used to sit and like just like type in all these musicians and just watch YouTube all day. Yeah. So our YouTube wasn't like, you know, you know the way like maybe young ones now be watching like all these vloggers and influencers, like we were watching like the Mulkay's or like, you know, big time.

SPEAKER_00:

I I'm laughing these young ones now. Seriously trying to be able to do that. Oh no we're only 22, we're about 22. Younger, younger, younger. Oh my god. And then what about competitions then? When the views were going to to COTUS and um was was that much of a a focus for you?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I suppose the competitions was really good as well in getting you to practice for things and well um I know like for Kelly Ban and Grupp of Hill, like we always were really big into them. Yeah, and then solo competitions, and then we did the duet and trio as well. That's right.

SPEAKER_04:

I remember Jim having you in the radio shows and they would have been playing with the duets and trios. The duet and trio was like Jeremy Kyle live. Like I'm telling you now.

SPEAKER_02:

We actually only became friendly after we stopped in the trio.

SPEAKER_01:

That's what I always said. Like someone said to me there at the flat in August, we're like, Well, Jints all do the senior trio, like youans are all like senior now, and you all love playing music and you all still play. I was like, like we actually only started liking each other when we stopped in the trio. Well, it was just like something like you messed up in that variation, like that's your fault.

SPEAKER_04:

And you know, you know now we gotta play music and we gotta play whatever we want. And like if someone like you can sometimes they'd be sitting playing, and you know what the weather's like because we would be just like sometimes Molly would look at me and be like, Jane, what are you doing? Like, but it doesn't matter because we can do what we want now. Whereas like when it was playing for a flaw um in a J or trio, it had to be like exactly the same, every note the same. Yeah, and like I don't know if it didn't really like fit like with us because if one person made one wrong note, you just were like the whole time was done. Like that's it.

SPEAKER_01:

People think it's so nice playing with your siblings, and it like it is, like I can see why people think that, but it's more so like it's intense. Do you know? I would say things to Molly and Jane that I wouldn't like I wouldn't say to my friend. Do you know I would give it to them? You can be a bit more than a little bit. Yeah, you can I'd be like, that was awful. That was actually awful. And like I might not say that to my friend, do you know what I mean? I might be like, okay, that was alright. Do you know you're very honest with your sisters? Yeah, but I guess like the Jet that time in Calvin. Oh I was only a by I was only a bystander that day, but that was somehow it was always it was me and Molly.

SPEAKER_04:

You and me weren't playing as long, and me and Molly were broken to the Jet. And sure didn't we get to the island under 12. Oh my god. Okay, so we're gonna go to the stage. The stakes are high. This is the first time we'd ever like Mlad ever played at that level. I can see Molly looking at Jane and being like, and it was in the do not tell the story. It was in like a way chapel. And it was far from religious, the acts that we were doing, so we were shitting. We were gonna We were gonna We were gonna it's pure cringing here. I know when I do it. Molly doesn't want me to tell the story, but she will just tell it anyway. So we were gonna go on the stage and Molly goes, Gene, you go first because you're in the far side of the stage, and I was like, I'm not going first. Why would I go first?

SPEAKER_02:

Like and the stage was so small that only one person could have gone up. Like we couldn't have switched over at the top.

SPEAKER_04:

Sure, by the time we got to the rein as the tears were flowing down the face, you would have thought it was slow air, like it was awful.

SPEAKER_02:

It was awful.

SPEAKER_03:

But we actually still we still still kept going with it. So you did you didn you didn't win the all-in of that year?

SPEAKER_02:

Not that year.

unknown:

I don't know.

SPEAKER_03:

Not that year. So did you like what what have you won? You keep tabs on them. No, we don't really.

SPEAKER_02:

We don't really keep tabs. Or anything like they're literally like there's medals. Carvan, it's not be open in the caravan.

SPEAKER_04:

Mummy was like complaining last week she came in or whatever from the caravan. Gee and that metal of yours lying out in that carvan. And I was like, sure, like what a difference does it make? Like it's only like a it's more of like a term that you like you've won something or got placed in the.

SPEAKER_00:

So this would be the medal that you won during the summer there for the senior Ellen pipes and you won the I didn't even open the envelope. Like do you get to keep that or does it does it?

SPEAKER_03:

Keep it for a year. Oh my gosh, whereas does it has it got a room of its own?

SPEAKER_04:

It just sits on the window, like uh, me and Daddy were away the day of the floh, and they were They weren't even there for the big no it was it was uh like it was a tough, tough weekend for everybody in Drumore Caucus. Um unfortunately we lost a wee friend of ours, Patty Rennie. Yeah, um so Patty died on the Tuesday night. Yeah. So it was a Tuesday, the week of the fly, and Patty was a very special friend to all of us, and he was just a charmer. Oh god. Like a wee light in his eye, and then he he passed away um from a short battle with cancer, and then the Sunday off the floor was his funeral. So I said, I said to Mummy and Daddy on the Saturday night, I said, Look, like go yeah's on. I was like, I'm fine, like sure, I've done the fly loads.

SPEAKER_02:

And Daddy would be the only person that would go in and listen to Gene. Jane doesn't let anyone else say. I don't think you'd have ever had a few. But then we did go in and listen to Gene, and then she won anyway, and then next thing she had text into our family. Group chat and she was like, Q Smith is lying up in our caravan, he's full. And Mummy was like, Who is Q Smith? Because like you wouldn't know around the campsites and all, you wouldn't know who be around you around. And then this went on.

SPEAKER_01:

Never mind, they're coming back from later.

SPEAKER_02:

He's so drunk lying up in the caravan and all this thing. He's full. And Mummy rang me. And Mummy was like, Molly, who is Q Smith that's lying in our caravan drunk? And turns out it was Jane's trophy. She had it full of Bruceko.

SPEAKER_01:

No, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

The trophy was big, but there was a hole in the bottom of it, so it was drink fast or Paul the Plumber, you know what I mean? There was a lake to be sorted.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh in that moment, I know you're laughing and saying, okay, threw the medal behind me and all the rest of it. But when you won that, I saw it coming through on social media. I was so proud of you. I was so happy for you and so happy for your whole family.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, honestly. Like it was like a move. Like me and Jane were only the only people there for the results. When we weren't even in the room, we were outside the chapel door. I just remember Jane being like, I feel sick, like I actually feel sick. Like, this is me done now. Like, if I if I don't get it this year, I'm done. So I had my ear to the door, and all I heard was like first Jane and I mean this like the squeals of me, right? The door opens, everybody sitting in the room, turns around and looks at us. Me and Jane jumping on top of each other. Then being like, Are they actually okay? It was like someone that won the Euro 9th. Like the volunteers at the flat come round, come round the corner to me and are like, Are you okay? Like, the still wear competitions next door, and like, do you know you're actually disrupted in the competition? But anyway, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

But I mean, like, I ran in, lifted the medal, shook your ma the two fellas' hand, ran back out. I was on the phone to Mummy and Daddy because they were on the way to the funeral, and geez, like that just set them off for the day. So just like it was like it was like a it was a hard weekend, but there was a lot of good that came with it. And Dre Moore had won the under a team Grippy Hole on the Friday, and Patty's two siblings, Joe and Annie, were in it, so it was very, very special. It was lovely.

SPEAKER_00:

So he he had said to them to go on ahead, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

He told them that he wanted them to do that. You could just question him. That was just Patty like, yeah. Do you know, like it was like, why would you fuss over my do you know that they're gonna music?

SPEAKER_00:

Like, it was and that that sense of you know, it it's in moments like that where you realise the the family that you have that you're a part of. Yeah, um because I remember that news came through, I didn't know Patty at all, but I knew people who knew him, yeah, I knew people who had taught him, people who played music with him, and you can understand the impact that something like that's gonna have on on on his family, of course, but then on the extended family, the music family, and that's what's so good about music as well, is it like in times of you know that you need help or like in times like that, everyone just pulls together, you know, and everybody's really important as well.

SPEAKER_04:

Like we would find we never really played Gaelic growing up, um, because God forbid you broke an arm or broke a leg. But that's what we used to make dumpers. So our choice, well, we never actually had a choice because none of us were that uh athletically talented, but um we didn't have the choice, but we wouldn't have we wouldn't have chosen GM.

SPEAKER_00:

Damore coaches is gay in his money glasses lost. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

God knows what they could have been with us, you know. But um, yeah, so erm we like mu our Dramore family and like the music family, like it is all one big family, and like at times you nearly think they're blood to you, you know. It's weird. But like everybody just rallies together. If you ever need help for anything, like it's always just like it's mad.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, but that's exactly what your mummy and daddy wanted to give you. So they wanted to give you that kind of like passport into that life. And do you find that now like Molly, I see on your social media I sound like a stalker now. No. I maybe living my life through you now, the youngsters. Oh but I can see you going to festivals all over the country, all over the world, you know, England as well. There's there's tons of great music festivals we use go to. Yeah. You walk in, you have your instrument, you sit down, you you're just part of it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I know it's mad. You can just play anywhere with anyone, and it's great, you know. What is it giving you? Do you think so much?

SPEAKER_01:

Like a well, a social a really good social life. Like I think when I was younger, like Jane, I was I was so quiet, and I honestly see like even work now we're all in like pretty sociable jobs where you actually have to be able to sit down and have a conversation with someone and really get to know someone and get to know who you're teaching or get to know who you're with. And like it's given me that I can actually just go and chat to anybody. Whereas before I don't know if I could have you know, because you just rock up your instrument and you you just you do just chat to anybody. But I think before that I just would have been a wee bit more standoffish, you know, and there kind of I you're a midwife.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So you've you've you've found your your nation like that. You've followed your mommy's footsteps. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Followed her mommy's footsteps. Um not really sure if she initially wanted me to, but now I'm I'm so happy I did it and she's happy I did it too. She's very proud of you.

SPEAKER_00:

And then she has you then are teachers training. Training? So Molly Not there yet. Molly's actually out and on the field teaching. So then do you find because you're a primary school teacher as well? Yeah. Is there part of you down to give back and make sure that the kids because the focus is you know with the way the education system's funded at the moment? Music is an extra, it's almost like um it's something special if you if you have it in the school. Yeah, if the teacher has it, you're you're you're kind of quids in.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, a lot of people don't see the value of music as well within primary schools as well, and like it's so important that even when if you're grown up, primary one, primary two, like everyone in school normally remembers all of their nursery rhymes and everything. And it's so important, like people don't understand the value of having music within a primary school setting as well. Um so it's so good now being able to give back, and yeah, I suppose teaching is the career for any musician. Yeah, I suppose it gives you a good social life as well, summers off and yes, you know you've got that all going on there.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's great. So you can plan so that the the year is planned around festivals still, is it? Balance.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's what we like to call it balance. Yeah. Someone at work said to me, If you're not if you're not at work, you're in a field somewhere listening to music or like you know, you just you just get over.

SPEAKER_04:

It gives you something to look forward to. Like, especially when Molly's teaching or like we'd all like work a lot during the week and like it gives us something to kind of work for and like push on through the week because we're like, oh here, sure only like three more weeks to Castle Island, and then two more weeks to NS, and then you know, and they're acting, and like it's just like your year is built around looking forward to festivals and with Trad, like you know, it's not just in the summer, it's all year.

SPEAKER_01:

Which is just it used to be when we were younger, like everything wrapped up at the island, and like the Sunday night was the most depressing thing ever because that was a done. Whereas like now it's like no actually, autumn, winter, the whole thing, yeah, it's just festivals all year.

SPEAKER_00:

So it just keeps going, and then you have it as well in uh college here in St. Mary's, yeah. And you're now is it president or chair of the Tradsaft?

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, president President President she and Walls, Tradsaft president, yeah. So like I I took took over from uh Rosie and Care last year, and last year we had gone to we got to go to Nashville for St Patrick's Day, which was on rail. We got like a week off placement and we were out in Nashville playing music. Like sure you couldn't be bad at that. Tell me about that, right?

SPEAKER_00:

Because you part of that is you keep playing at the Opry, don't you, or outside it?

SPEAKER_04:

Um Molly, the year Molly went, so every year they go, it's like kind of like a different um timetable. You got to play at the Oprah.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, we were at the Opry um for St. Patrick's Day and then they took the a few years off, did they? And then they came back after COVID. Because Nashville and Belfast are our sister sister. Cities, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Which is class because like we love controversy. Molly loves Nashville so much she was back in this summer. Um What was it like going out there to play music?

SPEAKER_02:

Unbelievable. Like just you know, here, like you're so lucky at home with music, but like it's like one big strip and music coming out from eleven o'clock, you know, bands. There could be like pubs with three or four different levels, bands on every floor, different types of music. It's unrighteous.

SPEAKER_04:

It's like Molly, isn't it? Kind of like walking down the main strip, but Willie Clansy, but on stairways. Yeah, like only that you can go into like every bar and like there's levels, yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, like oh it's unreal, it's so good. And then do you know back to the where we started the conversation today about that crossover, you know, and you were joking about Nathan Carter and your brother wanting to be meeting Nathan Carter and all, but the the the crossover is real, yeah, and then it's the cross fertilization, it's massive.

SPEAKER_01:

Like we've kind of got a bit more into the country because yeah, well, then on a Sunday, like when we were going up to our anonymies house, we would have listened to your show. So like I feel like that all came from that. But the country for us is really uh probably in the last year is really. Yeah, it's just like I'm not gonna be but like, are we gonna tell the story? But I really don't know. Like, look at one.

SPEAKER_04:

So we always like the cross keys is like a really like it's a really special place to us. Like it's like, oh my goodness, like it's more than a public Vincent and Melanie and Kieran Anna, like they we would see them like family. Like literally like family. We do Christmas there. Christmas Day we go to the cross oh there's a wee butterfly. Um or a moth. I don't know which one.

SPEAKER_00:

It's saying hello and Molly's not Molly Molly's having none of it, get the window opened. At least it's not a spider, she'd be jumping out the window. Out.

SPEAKER_04:

There we go. Hop you go. Um Yeah, so like we would see them as like a second family. We go up there on Christmas Day and Christmas morning, like Christmas morning last year. Oh my goodness, it was just now Cara was working, but it was just epic. Like, it was all of us. Molly, wasn't it? It was all of us just not. And then the next thing you had um the Grahams came in, so like Shan Og and Emer, and then Neve Dunn, and Neve was singing, and oh it was just you know, Prosecco, Jaeger Bombs, whisk John Walls and the Bushmills. It was just great crack. So we then that's where it gets to the country music. We always go to the cross keys. And then the last wee while we said always said, Oh god, it wouldn't be class if I knew how to jive. That Christmas day last year came downstairs and Danny had this like leaflet sitting and it was like jiving lessons with Jared Butler. Like, do you know Jar? Yes, I know Jar. Do you know Jar? We all of us nobody knows this too.

SPEAKER_01:

Like I feel like Yeah, it's like this is just our like secret.

SPEAKER_04:

Our secret talent.

SPEAKER_00:

Not anymore.

SPEAKER_01:

No, let's go on.

SPEAKER_04:

We're on the goal.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, not that we're that we're that talented at it.

SPEAKER_04:

No, but we're l we're learning. We're learning. We can hold a bit. We kinda because we used to go to all these comp like I mean, we would go to the opening of a can of beans, right? I like I'm not even joking. I think we'd probably sit in the house and Molly'd be like, ah, send us on Instagram this thing, sure.

SPEAKER_01:

Why not?

SPEAKER_04:

We'll go, sure.

SPEAKER_01:

We just love live music, I think.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, it's not like it's like we would just go to anything. If it's live music, we're happy. So we started the jiving lessons with Jair in Clunmore.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

And Molly's boyfriend went as well. And then we all had like teamed up, and then next thing it was they were bringing Jair to the cross keys. So on a Wednesday night, we used to do jiving classes in the cross keys, and like that's starting up again. So, like, it's just class, like it's not just like a pub toss, it's kind of just like it's community social things.

SPEAKER_01:

It's complete community.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, like we've even started going to like the Ryan deal and all, like, we'd be really big into Saturday night.

SPEAKER_01:

We never thought we'd be like that, but we are now.

SPEAKER_03:

Where'd you go? It's good though. Going to the hallowed ground of the money.

SPEAKER_00:

Very good, very good. We love the moi. We love the moi. Vincent and Marion will look after you well in the middle. Great feed. Oh my gosh. It's just class talking days. Um so Jean, with with Tradsock, uh are there any big plans then?

SPEAKER_04:

We're in the right place right now. So we have a session coming up uh Sunday. I don't know if this will be out before or after, but um Sunday the 19th of October, we have a session in here, up here, and then we also have a collab coming up in we do most of well, nearly all of our sessions here in Madden's because Bamber's so accommodating with sessions, you just text them and yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's just a yes, man. So um we have a session up here and then we're hopefully planning before Christmas to do a session of like the alumni of St. Mary's. So we have Linux of the McKenna's and Molly went and Nal Hannah and Donna Hurston, all them. So we'll we're hopefully bringing them all back. Um yeah. That will be it's in the works, but we have loads of plans. So nice.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_04:

Just like on a and like we always thought like a Sunday night's class, like everyone like either like come up to Belfast on Sunday night and go to the half field or else like just stay in the house. So we were like, you know what? Sure, like a session would be nice way to start off the week. So yeah, that's our plan. So there's a few other big plans, but we just can't. Jane was the party planner.

SPEAKER_00:

Um this is it because it seems like your life is just one big party, girls. It just seems like it. Like, I don't know where you get the energy out of it. As I could say, I do follow you live my life vicariously through you on um Instagram, and I have to say, I really appreciate the prosecco. Just bringing the wee bit of class to the whole thing today, ladies.

SPEAKER_01:

Someone has to do it.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it's just I tell you, they landed up here this morning or this afternoon with the uh prosecco, uh the wee bottles and the glasses, and I thought, yep, you didn't let me down. No, I never never do. I know, but it's changed, but I have to say, yeah, the last time I I remember just br bringing you on to our radio show years ago, there wasn't a peep out of the two of you. No, definitely not. Not a peep. Molly did all the talking. You did not speak at all. And it was so great there, I think, to get the insight into the you know, you playing together at Flas and when when you were paired together. I think it's you've now it's it it feels to me that you have a confidence and a freedom then in your music that you wouldn't have had maybe when you were younger.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. Definitely, like it's kinda grew us into the people that we are today. Like, as in I would love to know what we would have been like if we just were people that went to school and didn't have anything outside of school. Like, music is our life, like our life uh evolves around music, and music always comes first for us. Like, no matter what's on, we're always like, oh like it's it's how we've met so many guys.

SPEAKER_01:

So many people. Like honestly, like people that you would just Even Molly's boyfriend. That's how Molly met our boyfriend.

SPEAKER_04:

So Yeah. So you get a meeting load of people, which is great, but like I know I hear the tumblin' patties are a decent band, do they?

SPEAKER_01:

Word on the street. Word on the street.

SPEAKER_00:

It's the way they are. It's the way they are. Love it. Like Molly's saying nothing.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, she's like, Molly's about to slip off this bench here right down under.

SPEAKER_00:

She's mortified. We will we will say not, but these these three women here could take some tumblin' patties and a thing or two about music, I would say.

SPEAKER_03:

Start the war.

SPEAKER_00:

We'll have to get the tumblin' patties under the podcast too. Yeah, definitely. Because there's the crossover right there between the trad world and the the country world as well. Definitely. How much of this can you crap out?

SPEAKER_04:

We're gonna get in the karma after Molly's just gonna be like I love it.

SPEAKER_00:

We're gonna crap none of it out because it was just all absolute gold. It's been great to talk to you today. Thank you so much for having me. Molly, Jane, and Kiara Walls, and I can't wait for episode two of uh the Walls Girls podcast. Definitely.

SPEAKER_03:

I think you really should. I'm joking.

SPEAKER_04:

Celebrity big brother for us or something, you know.