{"id":485614,"date":"2026-05-15T07:17:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T07:17:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/485614\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T07:17:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T07:17:12","slug":"imelda-may-i-was-told-you-will-amount-to-nothing-aim-for-not-getting-pregnant-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/485614\/","title":{"rendered":"Imelda May: I was told, \u2018You will amount to nothing. Aim for not getting pregnant\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

At a certain point in our discussion about music, I show Imelda May<\/a> footage of people singing at a party I recently attended. They\u2019re accompanying an older man who is singing about the Napoleonic Wars. She\u2019s moved by it, so much so that she grabs my forearm as she listens. \u201cBeautiful,\u201d she says softly.<\/p>\n

The singer, poet and actor has been telling me about the musical culture she grew up with in the Liberties<\/a>, in Dublin<\/a>. She is clad all in black, with a leather biker jacket. We\u2019re sitting outside on a sunny day at a hotel in Montenotte, overlooking Cork city<\/a>. She has, she says, been trying to conjure up the spirit of Irish singing sessions in her gigs. <\/p>\n

\u201cI never remember music not being a huge part of my life. Singsongs were natural in our household. My mam was a dressmaker, a seamstress. She had me later in life. I was the surprise baby.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo my mam was the same age as my friends\u2019 grandmothers, and I got an insight into something from before. She worked in the factories. They weren\u2019t allowed to speak, so they sang all day.\u201d <\/p>\n

When one finished singing another would start, and they\u2019d all join in. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy mam knew all the songs, and it was a lot of Hollywood stuff, and Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby. Mona Lisa and Somewhere over the Rainbow. Jerome Kern songs.\u201d<\/p>\n

And she brought it home to family parties, May says. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019d always be a point where my mom or somebody would say, \u2018Right, who\u2019s going to start?\u2019 And then somebody would break into song and we\u2019d be there all night.\u201d <\/p>\n

She still does it. \u201cEvery party. Every birthday. It\u2019s just part of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

What does she like about singsongs? \u201cYou get to see people in a different light,\u201d she says. \u201cA family member who might maybe be a bit more serious or shy would just break into song and throw their head back and you\u2019d see a new side of them. <\/p>\n

\u201cI love seeing them as them rather than who they were to me. You could see a version of them in what songs they chose. And I was lucky to see that.\u201d<\/p>\n

What did she sing at those family parties as a child? <\/p>\n

\u201cAll kinds of things my mam taught me. I\u2019m Always Chasing Rainbows … A Mother\u2019s Love\u2019s a Blessing. She used to make me sing that for her, and she\u2019d roar crying.\u201d<\/p>\n

May bursts out laughing. She has a healthily raspy laugh. \u201cIt\u2019s just a miserable song.\u201d<\/p>\n

She sings a bit: \u201c\u2018A mother\u2019s love\u2019s a blessing, no matter where you roam. Keep her while she\u2019s living, for you\u2019ll miss her when she\u2019s gone. Love her as a child, although feeble, old and grey, you\u2019ll never miss your mother\u2019s love, till she\u2019s buried beneath the clay.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ImeldaImelda May: ‘I never remember music not being a huge part of my life.’ Photograph: Justin Farrelly <\/p>\n

She laughs again. \u201cAnd I\u2019d stand there as she cried.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her mother, Madge, died in 2021. \u201cWe sang that in the funeral. We were laughing and crying and we remembered all that. And [the song] was right!\u201d<\/p>\n

May is in Cork in the run-up to the city\u2019s Midsummer Festival<\/a>, where she\u2019ll be performing Raised on Songs & Stories; the event is partly an attempt to re-create those nights. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hugely improvised. I have the bones of an evening and then it changes depending on what people shout out or what pops into my head and whatever the audience gives to me. They get the vibe and they totally go along with it. People are coming to it again and again … <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very much a collective of energies. It\u2019s not a \u2018show\u2019. I got the set done up like my sittingroom, because I wanted to bring everyone to my sittingroom … I ask people up on stage to sing if they want to sing … Another time I was asked to sing a song and I forgot the words, and the women who asked for it sang it. It was lovely.\u201d<\/p>\n

May never really decided to become a musician. It just happened. \u201cI started singing blues and jazz and rootsy music in Bruxelles,\u201d she says, referring to the bar off Grafton Street in Dublin. \u201cI was only 15 or 16 and I was singing in Leeson Street at some nightclubs. A lot of musicians would have a night off on a Monday and have a dance session, and they\u2019d sneak me in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\u2018My granny was Cumman na mBan and my grandad was Fianna \u00c9ireann, so the political discussions were fiery in my house\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0Imelda May<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

She fell in with some bikers, the Devils Disciples, and sang at biker clubs and festivals. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019d have me onstage with the blues band to sing, and they were so supportive. I loved it. I was definitely their pet. I was really minded. I was so young … I remember Ronnie Wood<\/a> getting up on stage when I was 16 at Bruxelles … <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Kylie Minogue on her breast cancer diagnosis: \u2018I was so scared of what was ahead of me\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was about 18, BB King<\/a> came to town and did a free gig. One of his guitarists asked me did I want his autograph. And, cheeky as I was, I said, \u2018No, but would you like mine?\u2019 And he roared laughing. I said, \u2018I\u2019ll be singing with you in a few years.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Where did that confidence come from? <\/p>\n

\u201cI think I got some of that from being in the Liberties,\u201d she says. \u201cIt felt like we were always observed. Because I remember a lot of the tourists used to come around the area on their way to Guinness\u2019s, and they\u2019d be taking photographs of the area. <\/p>\n

\u201cI remember people taking photographs of us sitting on the swings and things like that, being aware of being observed. Like a local animal, a wild creature. I remember being aware of that when I was young. So maybe when BB King came to town it was a very inner-city-Dublin-kid reaction.\u201d<\/p>\n

May never studied music formally, but she studied singers she idolised, such as the blues singer Mary Stokes, and took notes on how they walked the stage, on how they sang and on how they led their bands. She went to art college. \u201cI\u2019d always be late, because I\u2019d be singing in Leeson Street until five or six in the morning.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ImeldaImelda May: ‘Sometimes, weirdly, I feel more comfortable on stage than I do off it.’ Photograph: Justin Farrelly <\/p>\n

She released her first records and ended up touring with Jeff Beck<\/a> and Jools Holland<\/a>. She closely observed other musicians she worked with over the years, such as Wanda Jackson, Robert Plant<\/a> and Lou Reed<\/a>. The blues legend Hubert Sumlin told her a story about how Muddy Waters<\/a> and Howlin\u2019 Wolf came to blows over him, \u201crolling around, fighting on the street. And I said, \u2018What did you say?\u2019 and he said, \u2018I just stood back and watched.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

She laughs. <\/p>\n

\u201cI love being in the space of brilliance. I love watching it and learning from it. I want to smell it. I want to taste it. I want to experience it. And I\u2019ve been lucky enough to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

In recent years May has experienced a lot of change. She co-parents her daughter with her ex-husband and bandmate, Darrel Higham. And she has lost both of her parents. Her father, Tony, died in 2024. Does she process her grief and her emotions through music? <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s my therapy. And sometimes, weirdly, I feel more comfortable on stage than I do off it. I\u2019ve been there since I was 15, and it makes more sense to me than the world sometimes. <\/p>\n

\n

It upset me. I was clever. I was daydreaming, but I was clever<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0Imelda May<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t get the rules that are put on everything. I don\u2019t see the sense in it other than to make people perform, to make people lesser. I\u2019ve always questioned. At school I\u2019d always put my hand up to say, \u2018Why?\u2019 <\/p>\n

\u201cIt didn\u2019t gain me popularity with the teachers. But I suppose being a musician or being an artist, or creative, immediately sets you up as the outside looking in. So maybe the stage is a bit more comfortable to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

What rules does she dislike? She waves her hand around. \u201cAll of it. It\u2019s not working, is it? Nobody feels good. It\u2019s like you can\u2019t breathe. All these apps you\u2019re given to make it easier. They\u2019re supposed to connect us, but it\u2019s isolating us.\u201d She sighs. <\/p>\n

\u201cAt the moment I\u2019m totally disillusioned. I\u2019m disillusioned by people trying to find differences. Imagine if you were an astronaut looking back at this.\u201d<\/p>\n

May sees herself as a storyteller these days as much as a singer. She has published poetry, including a poem called You Don\u2019t Get to Be Racist and Irish, which went viral in 2020, and acted in a film, Fisherman\u2019s Friends. <\/p>\n

She also performed as Kathleen Behan<\/a>, mother of the writers Brendan, Brian and Dominic, in the one-woman show Mother of All the Behans<\/a>, which Peter Sheridan adapted from Brian Behan\u2019s book, and was originally performed by Rosaleen Linehan.<\/p>\n

\u201cKathleen took over me,\u201d she says. \u201cI was almost possessed by her.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"RaisedRaised on Songs & Stories: Imelda May on stage. Photograph: Ewelina Stachurska <\/p>\n

The play reconnected her, she says, with a rich working-class intellectual and cultural tradition that is often written out of history. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy granny was Cumman na mBan and my grandad was Fianna \u00c9ireann, so the political discussions were fiery in my house. And they were well informed. There was a lot of reading going on, a lot of research.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a big part of my growing up, was political and social awareness. I think a lot of working-class kids are underestimated. I was often told very, very clearly [at school], \u2018You will amount to nothing. Aim for not getting pregnant. Aim for a job with the local council. Aim for the Guinness factory if you\u2019re lucky.\u2019 <\/p>\n

\u201cI remember thinking, \u2018F**k you. You\u2019re underestimating me.\u2019 It upset me. I was clever. I was daydreaming, but I was clever.\u201d <\/p>\n

May believes that a lot of the Behans\u2019 cultural power came from being \u201cworking-class people gathering together and singing songs … If you cut people off from the grandparents, you immediately cut them off from songs about what happened in that area or at that time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the oral traditions are massively important for passing things along … I hope to God that working-class kids are breaking through. Talent and creativity will always be in working-class areas …<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Musician and composer Mary Halvorson: \u2018I\u2019m not trying to be weird. It\u2019s just how I see things\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cBut that working-class kid won\u2019t have the luxury of time or money to fall back on, or even a garage to practise in. If you\u2019re in two rooms with the rest of your family, how do you learn to play the drums? That\u2019s where government needs to step in.\u201d<\/p>\n

May\u2019s passion about her art and the world around her is visceral and sincere. In 2019, possibly in a throwback to her art college roots, she was involved in an installation at the Latitude festival where she simply sat writing poetry inside a big glass box while people around her were encouraged to do likewise. She loved it. <\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted it to be an escape from the noise of the festival,\u201d she says. \u201cPeople came in and I thought they\u2019d come and leave, but they stayed and they\u2019d write as I was writing. It sounds bonkers, but it was really lovely.\u201d<\/p>\n

She thinks for a moment. \u201cI love the beauty of, not the show, but the creation\u201a\u201d she says. \u201cTurning up somewhere like we are now, and nothing exists, and within a certain amount of time something exists that didn\u2019t. And it\u2019s not perfect. <\/p>\n

\u201cI hate writing songs sometimes. It upsets me. Because it\u2019s uncomfortable trying to fit things together … But it\u2019s kind of like making love. The end result isn\u2019t the be-all and end-all; the getting to it is. It\u2019s the intimacy and it\u2019s the moment and it\u2019s the beauty and the imperfections. That\u2019s actually what makes us human.\u201d <\/p>\n

Imelda May: Raised on Songs & Stories is at Vicar Street<\/a>, in Dublin, on Tuesday, June 9th, and Wednesday, June 10th, and at Live at the Marquee on Friday, June 12th, as part of Cork Midsummer Festival<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At a certain point in our discussion about music, I show Imelda May footage of people singing at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":485615,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[103630,9,10,142191,18,13,14,2215,6,19,129993,17,101227,212167,212170,11,12,212168,15,16,212169,5,17311,37849,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-485614","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-bb-king","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-cork-midsummer-festival","12":"tag-eire","13":"tag-featured-news","14":"tag-featurednews","15":"tag-for-you","16":"tag-headlines","17":"tag-ie","18":"tag-imelda-may","19":"tag-ireland","20":"tag-jeff-beck","21":"tag-jools-holland","22":"tag-kathleen-behan","23":"tag-latest-news","24":"tag-latestnews","25":"tag-lou-reed","26":"tag-main-news","27":"tag-mainnews","28":"tag-muddy-waters","29":"tag-news","30":"tag-robert-plant","31":"tag-ronnie-wood","32":"tag-top-stories","33":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116577373701194236","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=485614"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/485614\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/485615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=485614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=485614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=485614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}