Every Daughter of Danu (Ode to the Olden)
Songwriters: Hayley Reardon & Heather Maloney
Artistic coordinator: Susan Mckeown
Management / contact: Patty Romanoff patty@bulletproofartists.com
SHORT-FORM CREATIVE VISION
“I’ve been living in the stream / the pixelated dream / where everybody’s shouting underwater” -Boanne (Widdershins)
In an age where the lines between art and “content” feel increasingly and rapidly blurred, Every Daughter of Danu endeavors to slow down and turn our focus backwards towards something older and bigger than we are. In writing a collection of 9+ songs that profile 9+ ancient, powerful Irish feminine archetypes, Hayley Reardon and Heather Maloney found creative nourishment and insight in legends too old and too big to be reduced to some kind of personal branding or content to be consumed. As American songwriters of Irish descent, the grand intention of bridging modern issues with ancient mythology deepened into a very personal and tender process of building a relationship with their shared ancestral heritage. ”Every Daughter” draws from the deep and meaningful well that Irish mythology provides in its attempt to understand the ever-changing worlds both around us and within us.
“I was just like the rest / Projecting my mess / On the walls, in the house of your myth” - Morrigan (More Again)
LONG-FORM CREATIVE VISION
This project was born from longing to anchor down into something fertile and solid during this time of rapid change and groundlessness. As two American singer/songwriters both of Irish descent, the creative nourishment we were in search of came in the form of Celtic mythology and its rich archetypes and imagery.
”Every Daughter” is our attempt to bridge both a connection with our shared ancestral heritage (which neither of us had explored deeply prior to this project), as well as to remember and connect with the universal truths stored inside this world of mythology. Through this collection of songs, we aim to reinterpret and re-ignite the ancient through the lens of the modern feminine. We lean upon these characters and their stories to support and sustain us through unprecedented times.
“Every time we got together to write, we found ourselves falling back into the same conversation again and again. It always seemed to unfold and circle back to the same shared question: how do we foster and protect our connection to the sacred in this exploitative, internet dominated, brand-driven time? We hope the songs themselves can live as little instruction manuals for how to engage with and let these archetypes grow with us and with the changes and needs of the world as we connect more deeply with our shared heritage.” - HM & HR
Morrigan (More Again)
Boanne (Widdershins)
Celia (Almost)
Brigid (The Other One)
Banshee (The Banned She)
Sheleigh, Sheila, Sheela (None of the Above)
Danu (Mother of Us All)
Deirdre of the Sorrows (Dear, Dry Your Eyes)
Ode to the Olden (Let Me Know Them)
PROJECT GOALS:
Personal:
To learn about, honor, celebrate & amplify Irish mythology & folklore and identify the ways in which it apples to our modern lives in this internet age, specifically through the lens of the powerful feminine archetypes
To trace our roots, ancestrally and culturally, to find meaning, community and artistic inspiration
To find our own personal narratives that fill gaps in a mythology that was largely lost to historical suppression of pagan Ireland’s culture and folklore—and also find alternative narratives to the parts of the oral mythology that were so heavily edited, Christianized or or left out entirely when transcribed to written word by Christian monks.
Artistic:
To spend a week+ recording all songs in a recording studio in the place that inspired them—Ireland!
To hire and collaborate with Irish accompanists, guest vocalists and instrumentalists, both traditional and non-traditional
To film the “making of” the album, as well as interviews and conversations (conducted by Susan McKoewn) about each of the archetypes, how we relate to their stories as women, our personal stories of tracing our Irish roots, and the specific ways we’ve found modern wisdom in the ancient mythology
To release the album worldwide, rolling it out with visual art, music videos, live performance videos and other media content
To embark on a tour in the US and Ireland, ideally with a band of collaborators, guests, and a visual element to the production
*ROUGH* (iphone!) DEMO CLIPS & WORKING LYRICS
***These are very rough clips intended only to illustrate the ways we are using song to explore our themes, and provide a little music context with out modern folk approach to storytelling. When we’ve achieved out ultimate goal of recording them with Irish collaborators, they’ll sound much more produced!
— BOANNE (Widdershins)—
(VERSE) Well, well, well, it’s a well that’s been on my mind / A well, well, well, with the whole wide world inside / It’s been hell, hell, hell, living under his high-noon eye / There’s a spell on the well for to quell my desire and I’ll
(PRE-CHORUS) Leave when the sun closes his eyes / Leave when he’s slipped all the way behind / Down under the quilted horizon line
(CHORUS) Boanne, Boanne, no ones showin’ you the way / But oh, when the knowing is callin’ you in / You just can’t stay, you just can’t stay / You’re made to be the river / And the bridge
(VERSE) A round, round, round, she is circling the well of the world / A round, round, round, widdershins as it swells and swirls / Down, down, down, seeds of the hazel like rain, they pour / And pound, pound, pounding, her heart as it’s bursting forth
(PRE-CHORUS) Leaving the walls that kept all underground / Leaping and sweeping her up to be drowned / Bursting the line between sky and ground
(1/2 CHORUS) Boanne, Boanne, the knowing is callin’ you in / You just can’t stay, you just can’t stay
(BRIDGE) I’ve been living in the stream, the pixelated dream where everybody’s shouting underwater / But you found a way to be both the swimmer and the sea / Floating in between one world and the other / Show me please, how to be, how to see, how to breath underwater, how to
(PRE-CHORUS) Leave when the sun closes his eyes / Leave when he’s slipped all the way behind / Down under the quilted horizon line
(CHORUS) Boanne, Boanne, flowin’, showin’ all the ways / ‘Cause oh when the knowing is callin’ you in / You just can’t stay, you just can’t stay / You’re made to be the river / And the bridge
— MORRIGAN (More Again) —
(VERSE) Your name on all their tongues / in a game of telephone / You can be anyone they want
(VERSE) Angel of prophecy / Raven of tragedy / Give all the glory in exchange for the blame
(CHORUS) Morrigan, Morrigan, how’d you end up on the floor again? / Morrigan, Morrigan, you give them all you’ve got, just for them to want more again, more again
(VERSE) Your face in all their eyes / you change it all the time / You can be their crone or their desire / You must be tired
(CHORUS) Morrigan, Morrigan, how’d you end up on the floor again? / Morrigan, Morrigan, you give them all you’ve got, just for them to want more again, more again
(BRIDGE-OUT) When I shift all my shapes, when I twist all my fates / Just to make, just to make all the content they crave / When I’m emptied all out, looking up from the ground / You’re nowhere to be found, you’ve already broken out / And I was just like the rest, projecting my mess / On the walls, in the house of your myth
— CELIA (Almost) —
(VERSE) Bewildered by the chill, were Celia’s tender limbs / Unfamiliar, was the kilter of the shore / Mysterious, to feel the mist come rolling in / She wakes beneath the looming cliffs of Moher
(VERSE) Entangled in the mangled strands golden hair / Amazed to trace the threads back to her skull / Surprised to find four hands entwined, and someone there / He carries her away into his world
(PRE-CHORUS) She comes to know it as her own / She calls it home, calls it home / She comes to think it’s all she knows / She should be whole, should be whole
(CHORUS) And it’s almost right / This almost her life / The stars are almost bright/ But it’s only ever almost and she can’t remember why
(VERSE) Hidden, was the skin of who she’d been before / But oblivious was she, to what she’d lost / So long, was it concealed behind a cellar door / Celia tried the latch but it was locked
(PRE CHORUS) She comes to know these empty bones / She calls them home, calls them home / She comes to think it’s all she knows / She should be whole, should be whole
(CHORUS) And it’s almost right / This almost life / The stars are almost bright/ But it’s only ever almost and she can’t remember why
(BRIDGE) Celia, I see ya in so many that I know / Celia how I feel ya in my own empty aching bones
(PRE-CHORUS) When at last she slips into her skin / The ocean calls her in again / And there she goes upon the wind / She’s getting close—diving in…
(CHORUS) And she’s almost right / This is almost life / The stars are almost bright
(OUTRO) And she’s almost done with almost done with almost done with almost
BRIGID (The Other One)
(VERSE) You came in a flame, sparked in the water / oh, unlikely daughter of the flood / You bloomed in a plume, billowing and wild / oh, the flower child of the mother of us all, mother of us all
(PRE-CHORUS) And you’d bring spring every year at winter’s end / With poems and paintings spilling from your open hands
(CHORUS) Where is the other Brigid? / Come back, come back / Who’s pure and who is wicked? / I’ll go back, go back to the well
(VERSE) Your name barely changed when they came to bury / the whispers of the fairies for the written word of man / You became another saint, a goddess undercover / all that holy water couldn’t douse such a fire, douse such a fire
(PRE-CHORUS) And your embers burned when all of the rest burned out / And the world kept turning with your heat turned down
(CHORUS) Where is the other Brigid? / Come back, come back / Who’s pure and who is wicked? / I’ll go back, go back to the well
(BRIDGE) I feel my roots in the ground / Reaching through, reaching down / Into the fire at the core / And then they reach out even more / Until they break through ancient soil…
— ODE TO THE OLDEN (Let Me Know Them) —
So much that I owe / That I owe, that I owe / An ode to the old / An ode to the Olden
So much I don't know / I don't know, I don't know / Locked away in my bones / In my bones, let me know them
For all I've forsaken / Forsake and forsake / In the home I've mistaken / They stir and awaken
With their names in my mouth / In my mouth, in my mouth / Calling out from within / Calling in from without
SONGS WITHOUT CLIPS (COMING SOON!)
BANSHEE (The Banned She)
(VERSE) In the brightness of the city, In the safety of these walls, We are whole—So we’re told / There’s a bounty for your hunger, There’s a numbing for your ache, There’s a bandage for the wound in you that never goes away / You should feel lucky you’re not out there, In the woods beyond the town, Where it’s cold—So we’re told
(PRE-CHORUS) And the moaning from the forest / The haunting from the deep —We can drown it out and hold our ears and lull ourselves to sleep / And she who we have banned, she is crying from afar / She who holds no rank within the order of the bards
(CHORUS) Ohhhh— There are so many words I don’t know / So many names for sorrow
(VERSE) But the day will always come, The day you lose someone, And you’ll know—In your bones / There’s no bounty for this hunger, No numbing for this ache, No bandage for the wound—you know it never goes away
(PRE-CHORUS) BUT the moment that you listen, with your ear against the wall / The ghoul becomes an angel and her screams become a song
(CHORUS) Ohhhh— Oh won’t you sing the words I don’t know / All the names for sorrow
Sprochtúil … cianaí … gruama …eadochas … brón …thamhain … Scíth …
***There are more words for sorrow in Gaelic than most other languages and they are all so beautiful—We’d like to have an Irish guest vocalist sing them on the outro here!
SHEILA, SHEELA, SHEILEIGH (None of the Above)
(VERSE 1) Were you the princess who fell for the thief? And was your royal heart stolen out on the sea? Was he a criminal, sun burned and bleached? And did this seafarer see a fairer face than Sheela’s?
(PRE CHORUS) Sheela—
(CHORUS) Nobody knows you, How your light flickers and bends / Everyone sees you / through their own piece of the lens
(VERSE) Were you the wife of a saint, his quiet counterpart? And is your unknown holiday on the 18th of March? There in his holy shadow, hungover you like a weight? And did you die in the dark on a long forgotten day?
(PRE CHORUS) Sheileigh—
(CHORUS) Nobody knows you, How your light flickers and bends / Everyone sees you through their own piece of the lens / Nobody holds you, we reach out, again and again / Nobody knows you, But you knew that we’d pretend (and…)
(BRIDGE) Is it all by your design? Did you scatter all the stars of who you are across the sky? Knowing that we’d constellate a thousand myths to know you by? Knowing that we’d never know? Knowing that we’d always try? (but…)
(VERSE) Of all the stories told under your umbrella name, I like the oldest one, where you’re no damsel, you’re no saint / You’re the one dancing, naked, in a city built of shame / You’re the one laughing blooming bleeding glowing breaking open changing
(CHORUS) Nobody knows you, How your light flickers and bends / Everyone sees you through their own piece of the lens / Nobody knows you, But you knew that we’d pretend to
DANU (Every Daughter)
(VERSE, WATER) There’s a mist from the mountains, Rolling down, Kissing with dew every inch of ground / There’s a wave in the ocean, Tossing ‘round, Every last ship is bound lto drown
(VERSE, AIR) There’s the breeze in grasses, Watch them sway, To an ancient breath touching every blade / There’s a gust on the prairie, spiral of grey, Swallowing all that’s in its way
(PRE-CHORUS) And she is always here / Coming in and out of view / She’s the Everywhere / That we’re dissolving back into / Every daughter of Danu
(CHORUS) Hark! The hidden angels singing / A part so quiet and persistent / Let me listen, let me
(VERSE, FIRE) There’s a holy candle, silent flame, Lighting every face the same / There’s a fire raging, Through the town, Ashes ashes, all fall down
(PRE-CHORUS) And she is always here / Coming in and out of view / She’s the Everywhere / That we’re dissolving back into / Every daughter of Danu
(CHORUS) Hark! The hidden angels singing, A part so quiet and persistent / Hark! the buried belles are ringing / A heart so present yet so distant / Let me listen, let me listen, let me listen, let me listen…
CREATIVE TEAM
HEATHER MALONEY
The Massachusetts-based “writer song-singer” Heather Maloney found music in the midst of three years at a meditation center, honing a sound moored in days of silent reflection and reverence for storytellers like Joni, Rilke, Ken Burns, and the anonymous authors of Zen parables. And while she eventually traded the quiet, structured life as a yogi for the kinetic life a touring musician, the core of her songwriting remains centered around same curiosity about our inner world and the desire to articulate it through storytelling. She now has eight studio album releases under her belt, each one marked by inspiring collaborations with musicians, songwriters and producers.
On Heather’s 2019 album, Soil In The Sky, her “ability to channel emotion is radical” (PopMatters) and the tracks are stacked with special guests who help her deliver an immense range of sound and sentiment in 12 songs; there’s a duet with Dawes front-man Taylor Goldsmith on the Walt Whitman-inspired love song “We Were Together”, an appearance by Rachael Price on the album’s opening track “Enigma”, and Jay Ungar lends his legendary folk fiddle to “Oklahoma Lullaby”, a song inspired by Ken Burns’ documentary The Dustbowl. (Ungar composed Ashokan Farewell in Burns’ The Civil War). The all-star band includes drummer Griffin Goldsmith (Dawes), and multiple members of the Amos Lee band.
The Bluegrass Situation called her 2015 release, Making Me Break (produced by Band of Horses’ Bill Reynolds) “an intoxicating blend that captures the sonic texture of indie rock, the humanity of folk and the spirituality of a Rumi poem.”
In 2014 she released “Woodstock”, her collaborative effort with Boston quartet Darlingside, which drew praise from the New York Times and Graham Nash.
Heather’s songs have played on NPR stations across the country and her live appearances have aired on syndicated programming like eTown and AudioTree. Her song “Nightstand Drawer” was used in the season finale of the CBS TV series "Elementary", and her songs have also been featured on a number of editorial Spotify playlists & Starbucks’ in-store nationwide playlists.
Heather has toured throughout the US & Canada as a headliner and also in support of acts including Lake Street Dive, Shakey Graves, Gary Clark Jr., Rodrigo y Gabriela, Colin Hay (Men at Work), Mary Chapin Carpenter, Shawn Colvin, Dar Williams and many more.
HAYLEY REARDON
Hayley Reardon is a critically acclaimed folk pop artist and a storyteller in the truest sense of the word. Her songs serve as postcards from an artist brave enough to take the road less traveled. The songstress made the decision to begin living life boldly when she left Nashville to tour the world playing her music. In addition to having recently been based in Dachau, Germany for a six month artist residency program awarded by the city, she has spent the past 5 years carrying her songs and guitar all over the globe -- gathering experiences, inspirations, and soulful connections along the way. The artist masterfully channels her colorful stories through music, capturing even the most subtle nuances of the human experience with a striking clarity.
Reardon recently made a splash with her single, “Losing From Within,” grabbing the attention of Spotify Editorial Playlists like Fresh Folk, Folk Pop, Morning Coffee, and Today’s Singer/Songwriters. Her latest EP, In The Good Light, was recorded in Barcelona with Catalan collaborators Pau Figueres (one of Spain’s finest guitarists) and Aniol Bestit Collellmir (recording engineer) at The Sound of Wood Studio. The EP embodies Reardon’s essence with a kiss of Spanish flair on certain tracks. The artist discovered a new piece of home in Spain while recording the EP, “It was amazing to travel across the world and work with people who were essentially strangers from an entirely different culture,” she says, “and feel so deeply and effortlessly understood by them.”
Raised in Massachusetts, Reardon dove head first into music at the young age of 15. She has now been honing her craft for a full decade now, sharing the stage with acts like Lori McKenna, Rodney Crowell, and Anaïs Mitchell, among others. Her raw artistry boasts a lyrical and melodic weight far beyond her years, being described as “brilliantly moving folk/pop with a lyrical depth and soul” (Performer Magazine) and “a melancholy little masterpiece” (American Songwriter Magazine). No Depression writes “Reardon is truly a treasure.”
SUSAN MCKEOWN
Grammy award-winning and BBC Award-nominated vocalist and songwriter Susan McKeown is widely acknowledged as one of the most powerful and innovative voices in folk music today. In a distinguished career has performed at Glastonbury, The Edinburgh Festival, Carnegie Hall and the Walt Disney Concert Hall and had her music featured on on PBS, NPR, PRI, BBC and RTE. Susan began her songwriting career at the Lower East Side club Sin-É and released 16 commercial albums as a songwriter and folk artist.
Susan is the founder and director of Cuala Foundation, a Lower East Side-based 501(c)3 nonprofit organization and its sister organisation in Ireland, Cuala Group, that co-creates new systems of community self care centering youth, migrants and indigenous culture. Since 2017 the organizations have produced cultural programs in communities in Ireland and the U.S. to heal trauma and cultivate a culture of belonging.
As the inaugural Music Network Ireland Musician-in-Residence at DLR LexIcon Library in 2018 she researched, wrote and composed songs about the lives of extraordinary Irish women whose stories were little known. She was commissioned by playwright Honor Molloy to write, compose and perform a song cycle for Molloy’s play ‘Round Room’ at Alchemical Theatre in New York in 2020.
The song ‘Everything We Had Was Good’ from Susan’s 2012 album Belong reached #1 on the American Folk Music Chart and the album itself reached #11.
On Singing in the Dark (2010 Hibernian Music), Susan invited collaborators to compose new music for lyrics by Roethke, Mangan, Sexton, Ní Dhomhnaill, and Gwyneth Lewis who were writing through the lens of depression, mania and addiction. The release prompted a symposium at NYU’s Glucksman Ireland House followed by an evening concert and conversation between Susan and Johns Hopkins Head of Psychiatry Kay Jamison, moderated by NYPL Director of Public Programs Paul Holdengräber at New York’s Symphony Space.
Songs from the East Village (2010 EVCS), a world music album for Manhattan’s East Village Community School, was conceived and produced by Susan, featured on NPR’s Weekend Edition, and raised $30,000 for the school’s arts and language programs.
An inventive arranger and producer, McKeown was nominated for a BBC Music Award for her arrangement of an English gypsy song which she recorded with the mariachi group Mariachi Réal de Mexico, and other creative arrangements have paired her emotive vocal delivery with Mali’s Ensemble Tartit and Mamadou Diabate, China’s Wang Guo Wei, Lúnasa, Flook and The Klezmatics, with whom she won a Grammy for Wonder Wheel: Lyrics by Woody Guthrie (2006 JMG).
She has received composer commissions from the Poetry Society of America and United Nations NGO Fourth World, for which she wrote and composed ‘Be Change’, a song inspired by the testimonies of people who were living homeless in Dublin that she performed at the United Nations in New York. With the poet Paul Muldoon, she is artistic director of Feis Teamhra, an annual festival of poetry and music at the ancient site of Tara in County Meath, Ireland. Hers is the woman’s voice singing on the audio recording in the Irish apartment of New York’s Tenement Museum.