Keep Her Lit:Awe na Mná with Karan Casey, Inni-K, BRÍDÍN and Clare Sands

Keep Her Lit are delighted to present an evening of folk and traditional music from some of Ireland's best folk and traditional musicians. An evening of powerful music and song that celebrates the Irish women in folk and traditional music hosted by Karan Casey. Karan Casey “A singer by trade, I have navigated life through song and the balm of a beautiful melody and feel very proud to be a carrier particularly of traditional song.” Irish singer-songwriter Karan Casey has been blazing a trail for more than 30 years. A lover of ballads, love songs and searing versions of social justice songs, fond of a good yarn, she has toured the world making deep connections with her audience via Ireland’s past while crucially repositioning women and songs in a universal and a modern setting. Karan has been striking out lately to explore new areas of performance on the piano and with spoken word and theatre. She has released twelve albums as well as contributing to numerous other artists’ projects – appearing on more than 80 albums so far - and has toured extensively throughout North America, Europe and Japan, performing with her own band as well as collaborating with such diverse musicians as Maura O’Connell, James Taylor, Bela Fleck, Boston Pops Orchestra, Kate Ellis, Niall Vallely, Pauline Scanlon, The Chieftains, The Dubliners, Peggy Seeger, Karen Matheson, Mick Flannery, Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin, Tim O’Brien and Solas. In 2018 Karan helped found FairPlé which is an organization aimed at achieving fairness and gender balance for female performers in Irish traditional and folk musics. 2019 saw Karan achieving a PhD in music at the University of Limerick while her song “Down in the Glen” was nominated for Best Original Folk Song at the RTE Folk Awards. Karan’s first theatre show I Walked into My Head was premiered at the Kilkenny Arts Festival 2021. In 2022 Karan collaborated with composer Harry Escott on a version of the Irish ballad "Grace" for the film “Ali & Ava”. Karan’s latest album “Nine Apples of Gold” was released to great critical acclaim in February 2023. It topped the Irish and US radio charts and was one of the most played albums on folk radio in 2023. Karan’s stage show about women in the Irish revolutionary period The Women We Will Rise directed by acclaimed Tom Creed, was premiered at the Everyman Theatre in Cork in September 2023 and subsequently performed at Dublin’s Tradfest and Glasgow’s Celtic Connections in 2025. Karan is currently working on a new album that will celebrate her thirty years in music to be released in 2027. "Karan Casey’s latest album is revelatory. She’s always been a singer of songs that tell a story and show their muscle…This is a strikingly three-dimensional work that stands the test of intensive and repeated listening with ease. A vivid and dazzling snapshot of Casey invincible, at the height of her powers.” **** SIOBHÁN LONG, IRISH TIMES Clare Sands will be joining this special in the round ahead of her full band Kilkenny album launch concert in December - how lucky are we! Clare is a sixth generation fiddle player and bilingual singer from Cork, Ireland. Drawing deeply from the music of her ancestors, she weaves Traditional Irish roots with Contemporary sounds and influences. Her songs are deeply connected to place and where folklore, language, and activism rise in song. Known for her raw and infectious energy, she embodies a fearless warrior-like spirit that inspires and unites audiences around the world. Her eponymous album secured a place among the Irish Times’ Top 5 Folk Albums of 2022, and earned Sands a Best Folk Singer nomination at the Irish Folk Awards. Other notable projects include the ‘hypnotic and tribal’ (BBC Radio 2) Tírdhreacha agus Fuaimdhreacha (Landscapes & Soundscapes) EP, written and recorded across the four seasons in the four provinces of Ireland and Gormacha, a musical odyssey that treads a path between ancient Ireland and our natural world. Sands' passion for collaboration has led her to perform with some of Ireland’s finest folk and traditional musicians, including Hothouse Flowers, Paul Brady, Susan O’Neill, and Sharon Shannon. Her innovative musical creations are matched by electrifying live performances - Clare brings her audiences on an exhilarating journey full of hope, celebration and heart. Recent festival appearances include Glastonbury, Cambridge Folk Festival (UK), Fête De la Musique (FR), Festival Cervantino (MEX) and Port Fairy Folk Festival (AUS). With a new album being released in Autumn 2026, Clare is showing no signs of slowing down. She stands as a testament to the enduring power of music to unite and inspire - a troubadour for the modern age, whose melodies resonate across generations and cultures alike. Clare's new album - ‘They Tried To Bury Us’ is a collection of songs that gives voice to the silenced: the endangered curlew; Lí Ban of Lough Neagh; lost words of our native tongue; the Rostrevor oak; those seeking refuge on our shores and the Palestinian poets whose words embody defiance and inspire generations. All songs have a deep North of Ireland connection - the album was written across Ulster with an incredible array of musicians based in the Northern counties, alongside producer Seán Óg Graham (Beoga, Karen Casey). It is an album that rises from the earth against oppression and insists that love and hope will never be buried. Inni-K (Eithne Ní Chatháin) is a singer, multi-instrumentalist, composer, and songwriter whose music draws from her extensive background in sean-nós and traditional Irish music, even as she ventures into new musical territories. Known for her powerful live performances and singular creative vision, Inni-K continues to evolve with each release. Her fourth studio album ‘Still A Day’ - a fully original collection and her most creatively expansive work to date was released September 2025. “Inni-K’s deeply meditative, often Cagean, record is dreamier and more wide-ranging than 2022’s sean-nós-inspired Iníon.“Still a Day is folk, certainly, but also ambient, jazz, art-song – a tactile, deeply sensitive album at the threshold of meaning and sound. Out of rupture, she's made something luminous; it is an album to unsettle, console, and finally, affirm” - The Line of Best Fit. “One of Ireland’s most exciting artists” The Irish Times “One of the most acclaimed voices in the extraordinary revival of traditional andfolk music we have witnessed in recent years.” RTÉ Radio 1, Arena Her acclaimed 2022 album Iníon — a contemporary sean-nós album— was lauded by Folk Radio UK as “an album of tremendous understatement, power and beauty,” and described by The Irish Times as “a sparkling collection of songs that shimmer in the heat of Inni-K’s warm, unforced voice.” It was named a Top of the World release by Songlines Magazine and received two RTÉ Radio 1 Folk Award nominations: Best Folk Album and Best Traditional Folk Track for “Éamonn an Chnoic.” Her earlier albums, The Hare & the Line (2019) and The King Has Two Horse’s Ears (2015), established her as one of the most distinctive voices in Irish songwriting — blending evocative lyrics, ethereal vocals, deft musicianship, and a unique approach to composition. Inni-K has brought her spellbinding performances to audiences around the world, performing at venues such as Irish Arts Center (New York), Centre Culturel Irlandais (Paris), Symphony Hall (Birmingham), Cork Opera House, and the National Concert Hall (Dublin). She has also toured globally with Sadler’s Wells and Michael Keegan-Dolan’s acclaimed dance-theatre show Rian, and shared the stage with artists as varied as Toumani Diabaté, Efterklang, Lisa O’Neill, Hothouse Flowers, Sam Amidon, Martin Hayes, and Jeff Ballard. In 2025, Inni-K served as Traditional Artist in Residence at University College Cork (UCC), reflecting her deep connection to Ireland’s living musical traditions.