Cork's Rosie McCarthy: ‘You don’t see many Traveller girls doing what I’m doing’

Rosie McCarthy may be just 18-years-old, but she already has a significant number of career accomplishments under her belt.

The Macroom-based singer has performed at the Triskel Arts Centre, the Misleor festival in Galway, the Drimoleague Singing Festival, the National Concert Hall, the Traveller Pride Awards in Dublin, and for President Catherine Connolly at Áras an Uachtarán this summer. Next on her busy schedule is a performance at the Kinsale Literary Festival, Words by Water, in October.

A proud Traveller woman, Rosie sings unaccompanied in the traditional style in both English and Irish. Her haunting voice can be heard on the soundtrack to Oein DeBhardúin’s play, Why the Moon Travels.

Singing has been part of her life for as long as Rosie can remember. “I’ve been singing since I was small really,” she says. “I always remember singing growing up, at family occasions and things there’d always be a sing-song”.

Rosie acts too, and has featured in films and television programmes. Her acting debut came about in 2018 when she was cast as an extra in Cork filmmaker Carmel Winters’ movie Float Like a Butterfly. Further opportunities arose from this performance.

“Carmel’s wife Toma [McCullim– artist and activist] made a documentary with nine Traveller girls, all from West Cork, and I was in it. It was called The Wheel of Dreams and it was filmed during covid, all on mobile phones”.

It was The Wheel of Dreams that really set Rosie’s career in motion. “When we were making The Wheel of Dreams, I got a mentorship with [renowned folk singer] Clare Sands after she saw me singing. Then lots of the Traveller visibility groups got onto me, and I’d sing at open days and things.”

Rosie then met Thomas McCarthy, a fellow traditional Traveller singer. Thomas was journeying throughout Ireland, meeting Traveller performers and documenting the classic Traveller songs. Rosie featured in the RTÉ One documentary that resulted from this project, Songlines.

Songlines highlighted the oral and aural traditions of Traveller songs and singing. In times gone by, members of the Travelling community would move from town to town, sharing tunes and songs which may have been old to them, but were often new to the communities they passed through.

Like her ancestors before her, Rosie mostly learns songs by ear. “I learned my songs by hearing them,” she explains. “Growing up, everyone would have their own song, and you just kind of get your own.”

Rosie loves country music and cites Randy Travis and Dolly Parton among her musical influences. Traditional Irish music, however, is unsurprisingly one of her great passions. “Tom Doran,” she says of one inspiration, “I listened to him a lot when I was younger, and I still listen to him now.”

As a Traveller, Rosie’s heritage is important to her and is reflected in her singing. She acknowledges that she is in a unique position in her field. “You don’t see many Traveller girls doing what I’m doing,” she reflects. “There are a few, but not as young as me, I suppose. And I’m getting all the old songs that are kind of being lost. That’s what Thomas is collecting, all the songs. And Mary Delaney as well – I sing a few of her songs. All the songs that are dying out – we’re trying to keep them alive.”

Keeping old traditions alive is an important theme of Rosie’s upcoming event at the Kinsale Literary Festival. Rosie will be joining poet and storyteller, Paddy Doyle, who is on his own mission to preserve the ancient Irish tradition of oral storytelling. Their event, ‘Bonfires of Remembrance’, promises a night of story, poetry and song, with audience members invited to share their own tales of loved ones who have passed.

“Paddy will tell a story, and he’ll kind of set the scene,” says Rosie of the event. “And I’ll sing a song that will go with the story. Paddy’s got a very unique style about him. He lights candles and makes it kind of spiritual.”

The event will uphold the old practice of “cuardíocht”, something that is important to Paddy Doyle and familiar to Traveller people. Cuardíocht is the custom of visiting one’s neighbours, sharing stories and music and songs. For Rosie, it is reminiscent of the “scríocht” nights - showcases of music, storytelling and song – at which she likes to perform. “Cuardíocht is similar to the scríochts that I’d be going to here in Ballinagree. It’s all about keeping those traditions alive.”

Rosie sat her Leaving Cert in June. She works part-time at a dressmaker’s in Macroom, but is taking a gap year from studying to focus on her career. Along with the Kinsale Literary Festival, she has numerous other performances coming up, including appearances at the Samhain Festival in Clonakilty, the Collective Social Futures Festival of Social Science in University College Cork, the Dublin Trad Festival and Celtic Connections. She will also be acting and singing in a new film that starts shooting this autumn. Rosie is busy, but she’s passionate about her work.

“I love to meet new people, and to get to go to new places – places I wouldn’t go if I wasn’t doing this – with all these different things, and how one thing leads from another. Lots of things come from one thing”.

‘Bonfires of Remembrance’ with Rosie McCarthy and Paddy Doyle will take place at the OHK in Kinsale on Friday, October 2 from 7pm to 8.30pm. For tickets or more information, visit https://www.wordsbywater.ie/event/bonfires-of-remembrance-with-paddy-doyle-rosie-mccarthy/

The ‘Words by Water’ Kinsale Literary Festival will run from October 1 to 4. 

The full brochure of events is available at https://www.wordsbywater.ie/