Cory at CelticChristianTunes.com: Hi, Moya! Thank you for taking the time to talk to me today.

Moya Brennan: Well, thank you for being interested.

Cory: Reading through the liner notes in "Two Horizons", it says: "The Hill of Tara, rising proudly over the eastern Irish landscape. Through the ages, the meeting place of kings, warriors, and saints. At the turn of time the harp that once played for their celebrations disappeared." Can you tell us briefly the story of this harp for those who haven't heard the album yet?

Moya: Well, you have to remember that there is such a place as Tara, and it was used for many celebrations and gatherings from the high kings of Ireland, so they say, to St. Patrick..., to political gatherings, so it's an important place, if you know what I mean. But the harp--that side of it is fictional. The way I came about thinking about the story of the harp, beside the fact that I am a harp player myself, is that in Ireland there are a lot of tunes and songs written about everything in Ireland, whether it's an event, or a place, a stone, and for such an important place--because Tara is quite an important place--there's only one song written about Tara. Which is fascinating.

Cory: That's interesting.

Moya: Yeah, it is. And the song is not regarded as a traditional song as such, it's maybe regarded more as a classical writing. The song is called "The Harp That Once Through Tara's Halls", and that's where my idea was born.

Cory: How old is that song?

Moya: I'm not terribly sure--you're talking about a couple of centuries ago, just. So, I had this idea then--wouldn't it be amazing that there was a special harp, an ancient harp that was part of the celebrations there. The funny thing is, I'm sure it's one of a lot of instruments that would have been played there, but I came across an old sketch of a gathering that was recorded there in the 18th century... and there was an old man with a harp on a cart, on a wheel-wagon. And I thought "there it is again", you know, there was something winking at me there all the time.

Cory: Is that the "ragged old man" that we read about in the liner notes?

Moya: It isn't really, because in a cryptic way it could be a lot of things. You see, I write in a sort of a way that the Irish traditional writer used to write, and that's with different kinds of meanings behind the statement. This is the way they used to write years ago, because they weren't allowed to write about their country and certain things, certain events, so they used to write in a very cryptic way. So because of singing with Clannad for years, and because the first six albums were collecting old stuff and old songs and doing them our way, we got used to very much adopting that into the way we've written ourselves. We don't write in a "ballady" way or in a "story-told" way. It's very much hidden within the song. So this is the way I write myself.

In the first song [on Two Horizons], which is "Show Me", I call him an "old man". Obviously he's very important, and he could be from the past or the future, but I also relate him as being blind. One of the most famous bardic harp players in Ireland in the 16th century was a guy called Turlough O'Carolan, and any harp player in Ireland or abroad will play O'Carolan pieces. He was blind. So, there's all sorts of these innuendoes or ideas that maybe it was him...

Really the story is based on this guy saying to me "Your quest is to follow the journey of the harp and to find it and to bring it back, and to bring back the virtues that it stood for." It's kind of like my Holy Grail--that's what spiritually I'm relating to, and Tara is such a spiritual landmark. The album is very earthy. That spirituality is where I'm coming at it from.

I've done Christian albums before this, and I'm claiming this is not a Christian album, but I'm still a Christian. The funny thing is that in Ireland some of the people I go to church with have turned around to me and said "I love your new Christian album", because that's what they see in it. Do you know what I mean?

Cory: I've experience that myself. I know it's not overtly that, but I find myself reading that into it.

Moya: I think it's wonderful, because over here, it's very different from the way you do your Christian music in America. First of all, Christian music is so geared toward all the Christians--you have Christian radio, Christian TV, Christian everything, and it's great. We don't have that over here. There's one Christian radio in London, just for an area of London, and there's one up in Yorkshire that you can kind of get in Ireland as well, and that's it. When I was in America, I suppose I was a little disappointed in the fact that when I was with a Christian company, that it was only for Christians. To reach beyond that is so important to me, whatever it takes. You sometimes have to step out to step back in again to reach these people. You know what I mean?

Cory: You know, I did appreciate the Christian message in your last two albums, but I also found "Two Horizons" refreshing musically, and artistically. You obviously have the freedom to put forth whatever message you want; do you think that the fact that "Two Horizons" is not a Christian album lends credibility or sincerity?

Moya: It does over here, because you mention "Christian" to non-Christians and they're scared. I've been asked "Is this album... um... er..." and I'm sort of going "What are you trying to say--is it Christian, spiritual?" "Yeah, yeah". I say no, it's a secular album--it's a story, a fictional story. And they kind of look at me as if to say "Oh, you're allowed to do that as well?"

You have to reach out, over here. But there again, because I'm kind of moving between the different areas, I get played on secular radio, which I think is very important. And if I'm doing shows, I will be doing, along with my new album and Clannad songs, I'll be doing "The Big Rock" and Perfect Time. I don't rub it in, because I don't know if people are ready for it over here. There was one lady coming up to me [in Germany] who took my hand--a young girl--and said "your Perfect Time brought me through the hardest time ever." If that was just for the sake of the whole tour of Germany... isn't that brilliant? Because that's what it's about.

Cory: That's great.

Moya: It's happened to me on a couple of occasions; there were other people coming up to me as well and I get beautiful letters. The funny thing about when I started my Christian work--my Christian albums--people thought I had just become a Christian. I'm never going to convince the people that disregard me as New Age--that I'll always be there no matter what I say--so I just don't care about that anyway. You're just knocking your head against the wall. And it doesn't concern me; it saddens me more than anything. It saddens me greatly.

So many people came up to me, as if coming out the closet to say "You know, I have Clannad albums, but I daren't tell anybody before." How ridiculous! Does being a Christian mean you aren't allowed to listen to anything else? You know what I mean?

Cory: Oh yeah.

Moya: It's very sad. Because if you feel like that, then non-Christians are not going to listen to Christian music, because that's the way you're doing it. You know what I mean?

Cory: Yeah, you couldn't expect them to listen to Christian music. It's funny you say that, because I've been a Christian for a long time, but my first exposure to Celtic music was Clannad.

Moya: [laughs]

Cory: In about 1990. Pastpresent. And so I've been a fan of yours through Clannad long before you did your Christian albums. Obviously as a listener of Christian music, I was sort of floored when you came out with Perfect Time. It's not something we see very often.

Moya: Well you know, there was a great reason for me to do this.... I've been doing a couple of interviews today, and the great thing is that I'm talking to you, and I'm talking to a non-Christian interviewer as well. And when they ask me, I had a very good reason for doing it. When I was traveling with Clannad, people were sort of saying, like in Japan someone said "Are you into Druids?" And I said "Why?" They said, "Well, 'Celtic'..." I said "Is that what you think that 'Celtic' is?" I actually got on my hobby horse.

Doing those Christian albums made me talk about the importance of Christianity and faith in Ireland, that people even in Ireland forgot about. And I was very respected in Ireland for the two Christian albums to my own surprise, because they saw that I was genuine about what I was doing. I wasn't doing it for the sake of "hey look, Christian music is really big now in America and I want to break into it". I wanted to make an issue of the fact that Irish people for years emigrated from Ireland and they brought with them their culture, arts and everything, but also their faith. It was so important to them. And I'm saying "Did you forget all that? Did you forget that in the year 500 Ireland was known as the land of saints and scholars? And that we sent Columcille to Iona, sent Aidan to Lindisfarne, sent Killian to Europe, Brendan to America?" And people are looking at me as if to say "Oh yeah."

So it was a great opportunity for me to talk about it, and that was one of my main reasons for doing it, and it was really great. I was doing interviews with rock journalists in Ireland and getting serious respect--it was great for me. It opened a completely different door for me in Northern Ireland.

I also have a book published. I was approached because of my Christian work, and my initial reaction was NO WAY, you know, but when somebody told me that it might bring great hope and courage to people because [of the journey from] my dark side to where I am now as a Christian, and how much I benefit from it, it might help one or two people. I have had thousands of letters from men, women, priests, nuns, young, and old, it's been translated into German and I'm humbled by it. Just totally humbled by it. It's wonderful when the Lord puts you in situations... in Northern Ireland, because I was brought up as a Catholic, the Catholics kind of regarded me as theirs, and because I was going to a Christian church in Dublin, I was regarded as kind of a Protestant as well. I've had the privilege to sing and perform and talk at different gatherings of like 400 people where the two communities sit there together.

Cory: That's fantastic.

Moya: Cory, I'm humbled by it. I mean, they way I look at it is, I don't know what the Lord has for me. He's guiding me. I made this album, and the Lord's with me in this album. It's not specifically a Christian album, but as you say it has helped me to widen my sound and everything. But you take a song like "Bright Star", and the words in it. I know who I'm talking about. "Played this part with noblesse, Stood up in the wilderness"; who else would I be talking about? I don't have to explain that to you. But I would never say that to a non-Christian journalist because it might drive them away. And I don't want them to be driven away.

Cory: Well I think it's great the way your song writing--without being too vague--it allows people to see in it what they're going through at the time.

Moya: Yeah, well if I can do that, it's more than I could hope to achieve. I love music, I adore music. Every time I do something I love it, and I had an absolute ball doing this album. I enjoyed it so much, and I think there's something extra in this album. It think the harp and the goodness that it represents and how people relate to the harp is important. When I decided it would be a story based around the harp, a lot of it kind of was written by itself. It was quite amazing because I wrote it all in the studio. I had different ideas, different riffs, different melodies, but really I was painting in the studio. Starting with the piece and adding the colors and shades. It was a joy to do. What a privilege. [laughs]

Cory: As you said, you've played the harp since you were a child, and the image--not just the instrument itself--but the image of the harp is important in Irish culture. It's a state symbol, it's on coins...

Moya: It's kind of nearly too important. You know the harp kept winking at me and I kept winking back saying "No". Because the harp is used as an emblem. You get official papers and there's a harp on them. You don't want to open it because it's probably a bill or something. Or you buy Guinness or you open a newspaper, The Irish Independent, and there's a harp in there and you kind of go "argh". It's overused, and I nearly didn't go down that road simply for that reason. But I had to look beyond Ireland.

The funny thing is that the harp on all the Clannad albums and on my albums up to this one was always the last color going on my albums, the last piece to be written. On this album, it was kind of leaning up against my right shoulder all the time. It was amazing--I became really a part of it. It was a lovely experience to get involved in playing a lot more harp. You know it's not a "harp album". Somebody said to me "I don't hear enough harp in it." I said "The story is about the harp and you have to listen." There's harp throughout the album in nearly all the songs, but it may be camouflaged in different ways or it may be the little steel-stringed harp that I use.

Cory: I was surprised that I didn't hear it more overtly.

Moya: Well it's there. It really is. I didn't want to really flower it too much. Too me then that would be too much. You can really ornament something to the extent--I think sometimes when you're writing, it can be what you leave out that is as important as what you leave in. You can get too elaborate with things. If you play the harp and you play five notes on the harp sometimes across something, it can be more intriguing and more standing out than playing loads of arpeggios. And that's what I like; I sometimes love the simplicity of things. It's a lot to do with the sound that I create--the space that's in there is part of that.

You mightn't realize it, but I had 80 minutes of music created with this story and it was the hardest thing to try to hone it down to 56. I couldn't just slice it up because the story was from top to bottom. So I really had to kind of feel my way through it. [The editing] took nearly as long as it did recording, because of the danger of losing what was already there. Sometimes leaving something standing stark there by itself can be very hard to do for an artist because you just want to completely put loads of things on it all the time.

I have two harps on tour with me. There's another gentleman that plays the harp with me on stage--he's really great. It's wonderful because there's so much harp in the live performance. Live performances are different anyway, and when I'm singing I'm singing, and then we play together, and there's a guitar player and a fiddle player, and keyboard player, and we all double up singing. There's a bigger band with me here in Europe [than in America] because there are bigger halls. I have a drummer and a bass player, and a pipes player, but I could only afford to bring one main lead instrument [to America] this time around. I'm hoping that when I get over there there's a bit of a vibe so I can come back with my full band. But it will still be a great show with the two harps and guitar and the keyboards, and the guitar player and harp player can double up on bodhran (the Irish drum).

Cory: Since this is a theme album, has it been hard to translate to the stage?

Moya: There's a couple of songs missing, but I'm playing nearly all the songs and they sound amazing. I've had to maybe fine-tune a couple of things because you do things live differently. But obviously without the percussion particularly and the drums, it's going to sound a bit different because that's very important to the album. But it's still nice to be able to perform these songs--otherwise you [just] can sit at home and listen to the album!

When I bring my full band back, it is quite a great sound. I have to say the reaction in Europe here has been absolutely amazing, particularly with this new album. You know when you go out on tour, you're presenting new stuff and people want to hear you old stuff, Clannad stuff or whatever, and their reaction to the new stuff has been fantastic and I'm really really thrilled with it. So it's sounding really good, and it wasn't that difficult. Even with my songs, if you can't do a variation of the songs and still be able to retain the feeling of it, then it's not worthy of the song. It's very enjoyable, the way the band enjoys it and the audience with me.

Cory: Moya, again, I really appreciate you speaking with me today.

Moya: It's a pleasure.

More information about Moya can be found on her website, which is linked from our "Artist Links" section.