Anne-Marie Redmond, 1981-2024
I had the great honour to share more than two decades of music-making, and, above all, friendship with Anne-Marie. We set up The Gospel Project together; I may have been the Musical Director, but she was my second-in-command. The ensemble would probably never have become a reality if she hadn’t gently suggested* that I stop talking about it and actually implement my hare-brained scheme.
Together with Cian Mekitarian (baritone), Jenny Kelly (piano), Eithne Cunningham (alto), and Aidan Lawlor (tenor/guitar), we launched The Gospel Project as a gigging and wedding venture in Summer 2004. Within a short time, Eithne would leave us for Australia, succeeded by Clara Rose on alto duty, and Aidan would be replaced by Kieran McEvoy on vocals and guitar. Both Clara and Kieran became hugely significant figures in Annie’s life, through their friendship and creativity.
Putting all of these crazily talented people in a room together and watching them bounce off each other was an awful lot of fun. There can be an assumption that vocalists of that calibre couldn’t possibly work together – and female vocalists in particular – but, while there may have been occasional ahem…differences of musical opinion, there was never any diva behaviour. Annie was a consummate professional, with an astonishing ability to bring out the message of a song, whether or not she believed a word of it. She could lend massive importance to any composition, even songs I happened to know she greatly disliked – such was her conviction as a performer. She was a rock-solid atheist who could have made anybody believe in God when she sang the likes of Oh Happy Day – or, my personal favourite, her rendition of Wade in the Water.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0AES2YwSTw
If you ever heard her perform with us, you know what I’m talking about. I’m thinking in particular of some of those magical gigs at the Blue Note, a then-renowned Dublin music venue sadly gone the way of so many other small arts venues in the capital. If she sang at your wedding celebration, then you will remember that voice. If you were a wedding guest, you probably craned your neck when she started to sing, eager to see who this extraordinary vocalist was. And if, like me, you had the phenomenal privilege of making music with her, then you will never forget the places that voice could take you.
She left us on December 15th 2024. Go in peace, sister.
Cathy, January 2025
*anyone who knew Anne-Marie Redmond will be aware that ‘gentle suggestions’ were not really her thing.