OMÓS DO SINÉAD O’Connor by Rev. Nóirín Ní Riain

Sinéad contacted me for the first time in 1995 asking me if I would teach her some Gregorian Chant. I was living in Glenstal Abbey at the time and she came to my home to spend a few days with me.

I was working on a doctorate then on the Sound of God and we had great conversations in between moments of teaching and at meal times. She was an extraordinary student. Sing her a phrase and she had it immediately; sing to her an entire chant, no notes taken, but she could sing it straight back to you. She loved Gregorian chant and in the afternoons, we would steal into the church and try out the morning’s learnings. One evening in particular I shall never forget. We went up to Compline – Night Prayer at 8.35pm. Afterwards, one of the community, Br. Ciarán, came down to us and Sinéad asked him if she could sing the hymn which the community had just sung once the monks had left. She did and indeed it became her favourite encore at many concerts she gave at that time.

‘As shadows fall and daylight dies,
Renew your gift of peace.
Be with us as we close our eyes,
Let all our troubles cease.’
-Glenstal Abbey compline

A year later, I was publishing a book on Gregorian Chant and Sinéad was the obvious choice to do the Foreword. It can be seen on Nóirín’s Facebook page linked below.

Then, with Owen, Mícheál and the monastic community of Glenstal, in the Autumn of 2003, we invited her to join us on a recording Biscanotrat. Yes, she would sing but wanted to be called Marie-Bernadette O Connor although there was no way that her unique timbre could pass for anyone else except Sinéad Ó Connor. During rehearsals in the church, she used every minute to learn more chants from me. One evening one of the monks made this impromptu recording of us both singing Regina Caeli.

There were so many magic moment s during those halcyon days of singing our hearts out. She challenged the monks on many levels. In the event of us doing a concert together, “could me an Nóirín wear yer gear”? “If not, why don’t ye wear ours”?

A great devotee of the Mary, mother of God, it was so colourful to visit her home and see a life size statue and icons to the “BVM” as she called her.

On another occasion, when she was pregnant, she invited me to open a concert for her in the Royal Albert Hall in London. A very humbling experience, because out I came and all the eager audience wanted was to hear their idol, Sinéad, so I had to exit fairly lively! Over the next three hours, she had everyone mesmerised, not a note astray or a word forgotten. At the end of the evening in my dressing room, she hugged me and her focail scor – parting words were “ you know, Nóirín, you and I, we’re two crazy bitches”.

Although I had little or no contact with her since 2004, when I visited her in her home in Dublin, my brush with her affected me and my spiritual life in a very profound way. I admired her authentic spirituality greatly; she was a true seeker and searcher of the Divine. When I was ordained an Inter faith minister in London in 2017, I wrote to her thanking her for the inspiration she had been to me in it all and telling her that she was the best student I ever had, which was no lie.

I know that in my own small way, she admired me too. She once gave an interview where she described me as her greatest heroine in music and that I as a contemporary Irish Courtney Love. I had to ask my two sons who this C.L. was!

Dearest Sinéad, a chroi, as we say in Irish “tá do choineall múchta roimh bhreacadh an lae” – your candle has been extinguished before the dawning of day (Resurrection).

The world will miss you and so will I, but you are now at rest and you will be rewarded for all the goodness you spread through your voice and presence among us.

For BBC Interview click here. The piece on Sinead begins at about 24 minutes.

Rev. Nóirín Ní Riain’s website

Facebook page

BIO: Rev. Nóirín Ní Riain Irish Interfaith minister and Spiritual singer. A wedding officiant, author and spiritual counsellor