Lisa O'Neill

Irish folk singer-songwriter Lisa O’Neill’s poetic and contemplative songs have earned her a reputation as ‘a modern artist tapped into the ancient’ (The New York Times). Her earthy voice conveys an affinity with nature, expanding into the constellations of outer space.

A raconteur in the truest sense of the word, O’Neill's inimitable voice is raw and loaded with emotion. As The Guardian recently noted, ‘Her voice is transporting live: imagine Edith Piaf coming from the Irish border counties, brilliantly stomping her boots’. Her remarkable adaptation of Bob Dylan’s 'All the Tired Horses’ soundtracked the final scene of epic TV drama Peaky Blinders.

All of This Is Chance, O’Neill’s latest record and first for Rough Trade, borrows its opening lines from The Great Hunger, an epic poem by Patrick Kavanagh. As Kavanagh takes on oppression in religion and rural living in Ireland, O’Neill mediates on cross-generational trauma caused by a dampening of the human spirit. From birds to bees, metaphors of nature abound All of This is Chance, affirming our place in the world.

Presented by Edinburgh International Festival