SINEAD O'CONNOR
Name: Sinead Marie Bernadette O'Connor
Born: 8 December 1966 Dublin, Ireland
Sinead Marie Bernadette O'Connor (born December 8, 1966)
is a Grammy Award winning Irish singer and songwriter.
Sinead O'Connor was born in Dublin and was named after Sinead de Valera, wife of
Irish President Éamon de Valera and mother of the doctor presiding over the
delivery, and Saint Bernadette of Lourdes. She is the middle of five children,
sister to Joseph, Eimear, John, and Eoin. Joseph O'Connor is now a notable
novelist.
Her parents are Jack O'Connor, a structural engineer later turned barrister, and
Marie O'Connor. The couple married young and had a troubled relationship,
splitting up when Sinead was eight. The three eldest children went to live with
their mother, where O'Connor claims they were subjected to frequent physical
abuse. Her song "Fire on Babylon" is about the effects of her own child abuse,
and she has consistently advocated on behalf of abused children. Jack O'Connor's
efforts to secure custody of his children in a country which routinely gave
custody to the mother and prohibited divorce motivated him to become chairman of
the Divorce Action Group and a prominent public spokesman. At one point, he even
debated his own wife on the subject on a radio show.
In 1979, O'Connor left her mother and went to live with her father and his new
wife. However, her shoplifting and truancy led to her being placed in a reform
school at age 15, the Grianan Training Centre run by the Sisters of Our Lady of
Charity. In some ways, she thrived there, especially in writing and music, but
she also chafed under the imposed conformity. Unruly students there were
sometimes sent to sleep in the adjoining nursing home, an experience of which
she later commented, "I have never and probably will never experience such
panic and terror and agony over anything".
One of the volunteers at Grianan was the sister of Paul Byrne, drummer for the
band In Tua Nua, who heard O'Connor singing "Evergreen" by Barbra Streisand. She
recorded a song with them called "Take My Hand" but they felt that at 15, she
was too young to join the band.
In 1983, her father sent her to Newtown School, an exclusive Quaker boarding
school in Waterford, an institution with a much more permissive atmosphere than
Grianan. With the help and encouragement of her Irish language teacher, Joseph
Falvy, she recorded a four-song demo, with two covers and two of her own songs
which would later appear on her first album.
Through an ad she placed in Hot Press in the summer of 1984, she met Columb
Farrelly. Together they recruited a few other members and formed a band called
Ton Ton Macoute, named for the zombies of Haitian myth. In the autumn, the
band moved to Waterford briefly while O'Connor attended Newtown, but she soon
dropped out of school and followed them to Dublin, where their performances
received positive reviews. Their sound was inspired by Farrelly's interest in
witchcraft, mysticism, and world music, though most observers thought O'Connor's
singing and stage presence was the band's driving force.
On February 10, 1985, O'Connor's mother died in a car accident. O'Connor was
devastated despite her strained relationship with her mother. Soon afterward she
left the band, which stayed together despite O'Connor's statements to the
contrary in later interviews, and moved to London.
Name: Sinead Marie Bernadette O'Connor
Born: 8 December 1966 Dublin, Ireland
Sinead Marie Bernadette O'Connor (born December 8, 1966)
is a Grammy Award winning Irish singer and songwriter.
Sinead O'Connor was born in Dublin and was named after Sinead de Valera, wife of
Irish President Éamon de Valera and mother of the doctor presiding over the
delivery, and Saint Bernadette of Lourdes. She is the middle of five children,
sister to Joseph, Eimear, John, and Eoin. Joseph O'Connor is now a notable
novelist.
Her parents are Jack O'Connor, a structural engineer later turned barrister, and
Marie O'Connor. The couple married young and had a troubled relationship,
splitting up when Sinead was eight. The three eldest children went to live with
their mother, where O'Connor claims they were subjected to frequent physical
abuse. Her song "Fire on Babylon" is about the effects of her own child abuse,
and she has consistently advocated on behalf of abused children. Jack O'Connor's
efforts to secure custody of his children in a country which routinely gave
custody to the mother and prohibited divorce motivated him to become chairman of
the Divorce Action Group and a prominent public spokesman. At one point, he even
debated his own wife on the subject on a radio show.
In 1979, O'Connor left her mother and went to live with her father and his new
wife. However, her shoplifting and truancy led to her being placed in a reform
school at age 15, the Grianan Training Centre run by the Sisters of Our Lady of
Charity. In some ways, she thrived there, especially in writing and music, but
she also chafed under the imposed conformity. Unruly students there were
sometimes sent to sleep in the adjoining nursing home, an experience of which
she later commented, "I have never and probably will never experience such
panic and terror and agony over anything".
One of the volunteers at Grianan was the sister of Paul Byrne, drummer for the
band In Tua Nua, who heard O'Connor singing "Evergreen" by Barbra Streisand. She
recorded a song with them called "Take My Hand" but they felt that at 15, she
was too young to join the band.
In 1983, her father sent her to Newtown School, an exclusive Quaker boarding
school in Waterford, an institution with a much more permissive atmosphere than
Grianan. With the help and encouragement of her Irish language teacher, Joseph
Falvy, she recorded a four-song demo, with two covers and two of her own songs
which would later appear on her first album.
Through an ad she placed in Hot Press in the summer of 1984, she met Columb
Farrelly. Together they recruited a few other members and formed a band called
Ton Ton Macoute, named for the zombies of Haitian myth. In the autumn, the
band moved to Waterford briefly while O'Connor attended Newtown, but she soon
dropped out of school and followed them to Dublin, where their performances
received positive reviews. Their sound was inspired by Farrelly's interest in
witchcraft, mysticism, and world music, though most observers thought O'Connor's
singing and stage presence was the band's driving force.
On February 10, 1985, O'Connor's mother died in a car accident. O'Connor was
devastated despite her strained relationship with her mother. Soon afterward she
left the band, which stayed together despite O'Connor's statements to the
contrary in later interviews, and moved to London.