Tuam singer recipient of Arts Council Bursary Award

TUAM singer-songwriter Kathleen Keenan has been announced as a recipient of the highly competitive Arts Council Bursary Award for Traditional Arts.

The Bursary Award supports individual artists to develop their artistic practice through payments of between €5,000 to €20,000. It focuses on providing artists with the time and resources they need to think, research, reflect, and deeply engage with their artistic practice.

Kathleen is originally from Ennis but currently lives and practices her art in Tuam. Her talent first captured the nation's heart in 2015, when country music legend Daniel O'Donnell tipped her for stardom. This was after nearly 700,000 people watched footage of her busking on his Facebook page.

She is active in the music industry again having taken a break due to personal reasons. Her latest single, Mother’s Song, was recorded in 2025 and featured in the film Where the Road Meets the Sky, directed by John Connors.

Back in 2024 she released her debut studio album, Beautiful Angels—which was inspired by the memory of her beloved mother Biddy and brother Jim. The bursary funding provides Kathleen with the vital time and resources to focus on other similar traditional music projects.

Kathleen has bravely used her musical platform to highlight suicide and mental health as critical issues in the community, having lost her beloved brother Jim to suicide when he just 23 years old.

Through her music, she works to preserve heritage, honour the memories of those she lost, while progressing the unique musical storytelling traditions of the Irish Traveller community.