16 year old finger picking guitar player & singer from County Donegal signed to Tompkins Square aged 13 releases her debut December 2023
“Muireann Bradley is a new Celtic soul sister, swinging the blues back from the margins. More vitally, she could inspire a fresh generation to investigate the genre.” Folk Radio
Muireann Bradley is a 16 year old finger picking guitarist & singer who grew up in the hills overlooking the Finn Valley outside the town of Ballybofey in County Donegal, Ireland. Muireann performs primarily Country, Ragtime & Piedmont style blues from the 1920s & 1930s.
Her influences include Rev Gary Davis, Blind Blake, Mississippi John Hurt, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Robert Johnson, Elizabeth Cotten, and Memphis Minnie to name just a few. She delights in interpreting & performing the music of these early blues masters, always putting her own unique stamp on the tunes.
Muireann grew up surrounded by guitars & old blues & began playing at the age of nine when she convinced her father to buy her first guitar and teach her. She worked hard and learned to finger pick in various old blues styles. However as she got older she began to invest more time in the sports of boxing and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu which she trained and competed in successfully from a young age. This led to the guitar and music beginning to take something of a back seat. Then in March 2020 when the first COVID lock downs happened all contact sports were shut down. Muireann felt lost for a while but she soon rediscovered her love for the guitar and the old Blues that she had grown up with. She was now listening and practicing with a new intensity and focus. She decided to start posting videos on You Tube, the first of which was her rendition of Blind Blake’s “Police Dog Blues”. It received a lot of attention, and has now had 80,000+ views. She was then contacted by Josh Rosenthal of Tompkins Square Records in San Francisco who suggested she record an album. Muireann was very keen to hear herself on record but as it turned out the recording of the album would be delayed and interrupted numerous times by the ongoing pandemic, allergies, orthodontics and just generally growing up! The songs and instrumentals were all recorded live in the studio in one or two takes in an attempt to make the process as similar as possible to that of the original classic country blues artists of the 1920s and 30s. These recordings would become the album âI kept these old bluesâ which is due for release in early December on vinyl, CD and cassette as well as being available on all the digital platforms.
Muireann recently went down a storm performing on the Marquee stage at the 46th Ballyshannon folk & traditional festival as the 2023 solo showcase winner.
The great Arlen Roth has described her as âa natural!â, Jorma Kaukonen said that kid is really good and I donât mean really good for a kid, I mean REALLY GOOD, while Stefan Grossman said â A wonderful player, I can now retire, the torch has been passedâ.
