Kristen Sinclair

folking.com Dani Larkin’s debut record Notes for a Maiden Warrior is an album in two halves. The first, based around the theme of the Warrior, represents the dark side of the moon. It explores the archetype of Ulster as the warrior province, home to Cú Chulainn and his superhuman abilities. Larkin reinterprets this image in her songs, presenting the warrior’s strength through reflection and resilience. The second half, Maiden, is sleepy and sincere. It plays with ideas of light and feminine energy, showing strength through vulnerability and a celebration of love and kindness. Notes for a Maiden Warrior draws on ancient, otherworldly tales as a study of tenderness, pain and learning. Larkin’s native Armagh-Monaghan borderlands inform the sense of duality of the record, with one foot planted in each. Similarly, the ancient Irish concepts of the underworld and the supernatural underpin the LP, with the lines between the tangible and the mystical blurring with uncanny ease.   The...

In Celtic mythology, the spirit of Ireland is commonly portrayed as a woman. Bygone nationalist symbols such as Róisín Dubh, Kathleen Ní Houlihan and the old woman of ‘Mise Éire’ personify the romantic view of the island embodied in the feminine ideal of Mother. Bríd, a Gaelic pagan goddess associated with fertility, later Christianised as St. Brigid of Kildare, is now one of Ireland’s patron saints. As a hallmark of Irish society, this concept of Mother Ireland, a gendered land to be fought for and possessed, requires male intervention to vindicate her sovereign rights. She is something of a supernatural being and incarnation of Ireland’s womanhood, a sacrificial heroine of the family. The ideal of Mother or virgin, further fuelled by the dominance of the church over the centuries, subdued women into becoming patriarchal stereotypes. Centuries ago, Irish women who, among other allegations of heresy, did not fulfil this archetypal ideal, were often accused of witchcraft. Last recor...