May 9, 2024 • 27 mins
In this riveting podcast episode, we explore the life, passion, and stellar career of acclaimed Irish musician, Brian McGrane. From his early days in Navan county and formation of a rock band in school, to performing on world-renowned stages, Brian takes us through his extraordinary journey. Join us, as we delve into how his childhood fascination with a miniature keyboard ignited a lifelong love affair with music and how a chance audition for Celtic Woman propelled his career to unthinkable heights.
Brimming with humility and perseverance, Brian shares his exhilarating experiences while touring with the likes of Phil Coulter and Brian Kennedy. He provides riveting insights into his continuous evolution and how his narrative resonates with audiences of all walks of life. This episode also features intriguing updates on Brian's ongoing projects such as, 'Brave Collide,' his creative partnership with Chloe Agnew, their maiden organized tour, and plans for a future album release.
Brian also opens up about his recent move to Nashville and discusses his iconic work as a renowned multi-instrumentalist and producer. Get an exclusive preview into his new project, 'N-Grain,' an innovative blend of atmospheric and ambient sounds. Listen to his enriching experiences of performing with the Celtic Tenors and the challenges of being an independent artist in a fast-paced in music industry.
Diving deeper into Brian's life off-stage, the podcast explores his passion for meditation and how his piano project, 'N-Grain,' aids his routine. Brian ends the conversation on an enlightening note by offering advice on navigating the music industry and revealing how his listeners can connect with him on various social media platforms. Join us, as this episode unravels the inspiring journey of Brian McGrane, a man who encapsulates his unyielding spirit and passion for music through his unique language of rhythm and sound.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Good evening, everybody. So today I have with me Brian McGrane,
musician, singer, songwriter from Ireland.
Brian has toured with Celtic Woman for five years, selling out the biggest venues
in the world from the Red Rocks Co, Radio City New York, the Sydney Opera House and much more.
(00:20):
Brian has also toured with Celtic Tenors, Brian Kennedy, Phil Coulter,
Sharon Corr and has produced lots of music for upcoming artists.
So Brian, thank you so much for taking the time to come today. You're very welcome.
Thank you. Maybe start with telling us a little bit about yourself,
where you're from and how you ended up following a musical career.
(00:41):
Yeah, thanks for having me on. It's always good to chit chat a bit to new people
about stuff that you kind of forget, I suppose.
Those so yeah i i grew
up in navan county meath both parents didn't go too far to find each other both
navan people all their lives and yeah my dad owns has his own business in in
(01:04):
the town and my mother works in the the local parish and when i was very very
young i my mother was always.
Quite musical with piano and she sang a lot
in choirs and on my on my dad's side of
the family my grandmother handed me down this
tiny little keyboard with about 25 keys and
about six batteries in the back and I had never any interest in you know watching
(01:28):
tv or anything like that so I started to play along all the advertisement music
on the tv and I suppose fast forward five or six years my dad then had bought
me a bigger keyboard and a real piano and I started to take lessons,
but it was only really I suppose when I was in secondary school I started to
to start to play it live when I was 16 or 17, we formed a rock band in St. Pat's in Navan.
(01:53):
We toured up and down the country, did all the venues, all the pubs and clubs.
We were in there illegal and all as we were we were gigging away
for everybody and yeah i suppose i i never really my parents always wanted me
to get the the real job as opposed as i suppose most parents do so i went to
college for product design in dit and a funny story through product design,
(02:19):
a girl in my course she won't mind me mentioning her name emily brady her father
works with when in Milan and has big connections with PBS in the US the public
broadcasting service and the PBS,
broadcast all of the Celtic woman TV specials so
Emily gave me a couple of free tickets to see
(02:41):
a Celtic woman shoot in the Helix in Dublin I went
along on my own and I was kind of blown away by it
so I reached out to a friend of
mine David Downs a good close friend now wasn't a friend back
then reached out to david and about
two weeks later i had an audition and a week later the day of the all ireland
(03:01):
hurling final in september 2013 i got a phone call to say i was going to germany
on tour with celtic woman i was 23 at the time so yeah it was a big a big shock from you know.
Doing small small shows and small pubs and clubs around ireland to being told
you're playing the you're opening the tour in the O2 Arena in Dusseldorf in Germany.
(03:25):
To tell you though, when you talk and you reach out to people, they want to help.
If you've got talent, people with talent want to help people and help them and lift them along the way.
I didn't realise you were a Navan man. My family are living in Blyther,
but they moved many years ago. But Navan's beautiful.
(03:45):
Yeah, that's really good. I'm impressed with that. that. So when you were younger,
did you have friends that were into music as well? Was your mum and dad into music?
It's my mother always played the piano, but she would never really say that.
And she she still does sing in the local church choir, which, you know, it's one of her,
(04:06):
main hobbies, I suppose, alongside tennis, that singing in the choir is is one
of the things that keeps her going and keeps a lot of her friends going, you know? Absolutely.
What did they feel when you just said to your parents, I'm going to,
after never having talked about this before, and then all of a sudden you're
going touring with this amazing band.
(04:27):
How did they feel? Did they try to keep you at home? I mean,
you were 23. So how old are you now?
I am 34 now. So that's 11 years ago. Yeah. You've achieved so much.
Yeah. I mean, I suppose when you look back on the time, you don't realize how
much you've done and you're always looking to do more.
(04:48):
As you should, but sometimes even conversations like this with you today,
Ciara, is good to even reflect on a few things that you've done. Absolutely.
Because over the years, people do tend to start to follow you and they may know
you and your musicality, but they mightn't know you as a person and how you got to where you are.
And I do think it's important because we should embrace where we're from and how we got there.
(05:12):
I mean, looking at some of the notes on you, You've worked and been around Phil Coulter people.
I mean, we idolize Phil and all these artists in Ireland. How did that feel
to be working with these people?
Surely they inspired you growing up. Yeah, definitely.
I think I think initially the Celtic woman, the whole Celtic woman era for me,
(05:33):
put me in among a lot of people who were, you know, at the same level of performing
and touring and songwriting.
So i suppose if you go from celtic woman
to other tours it kind of feels like you're just moving
sideways as opposed to a big massive jump because you're
kind of used to that you're used to i don't
(05:54):
want to say level because that sounds you know i
was once told i know what you're saying but i was once told by.
A good friend of mine excellence always finds its
own level so whatever you're in power with you know.
You'll you'll attract more people like that and you.
Know we're all on a a journey and we all try to help lift people up along the
way but i know what you mean of course the humble navin man
(06:15):
coming out yeah well there's plenty of
plenty of talent that's come out of navin between hector and
tommy and brian burn obviously is
is living over here now i'm not sure if you're familiar funny story
actually brian burn is brian burn's
brother paul burn and they actually have a hairdressers in
in navin but the burns are a very very
(06:37):
musical family in Navan and Paul Byrne taught
me piano but Brian Byrne
is has been living in the states for 15 20
years maybe and he's an
extraordinary talent he's been nominated for multiple big
awards and grammys and film scoring is his thing
along with jazz piano style stuff so
(06:59):
I did have a man on last week as well
and he's only starting out in his career he just released a single
a Christmas the single david cassidy and i
did put it out i said he's going to be big he's got a really really
unique voice and he's just been called there's
a record studio in navan is that right you're close by he's just
been called yeah yeah he's been called in thursday i think next week to talk
(07:22):
about doing more music with this guy so please god something good comes out
of it because you're right there is a lot of good talent from navan what's his
name again david cassidy cassidy yeah Yeah, if you look at my podcast.
I think I only shared his interview yesterday.
Yeah, David Cassidy, if you look at it.
I'll have a look at them and be sure to share them along the way.
(07:45):
Yeah. And I'll tell him to follow you too. And I mean, that's very impressive.
So now you're in Nashville. How did you end up in Nashville?
Yeah. So more mad stories, I suppose.
COVID happened. And I actually hate talking about COVID because it's just,
you know, it's in the past and it's long ago,
but it did change the way a
(08:08):
lot of things happened and the way a lot of online shows
happen now but anyway i pre-covid i
was getting a little bit tired of touring and i
was on the road with the celtic tenors at the time
and i just thought i think i'm just i'm finished
with this you know i've had i've had enough of the touring stuff and then
(08:28):
covid happened and we had a break for two years so i
think it was the middle of 2021 i was
living with a few friends in navan and i got a phone
call from matthew gilston from the tenors and he said brian look
we're going back out on the road we'd love to have
you what's the chances i know you've kind
of let us know you're not coming out but would you be interested and
(08:49):
i said let me think about it so i got off the
phone and my friend sean said brian you're absolutely
mad you've been sitting here at home for the
last two years you have the opportunity now to get back
out to the us do some shows make some money and travel again and yeah it just
clicked with me i said you know what i'm gone so i hopped on the plane and we
(09:12):
that was march 22 and i met a girl on that tour out here.
On the road in march 12th in orlando and
yeah we had a we had a bit of a lock-in a classic
irish style we had a bit of a lock-in and an irish bar in orlando till about
four in in the morning singing Irish tunes yeah and then you know the rest of
(09:38):
the tour finished and we kept in touch and we were over and back to each other
for the guts of a year and a half.
And I had always wanted to move to Nashville about six
years ago when I was still in Celtic Woman I'd
spent a good bit of time out here you know trying this
songwriting and that kind of stuff and i'd always wanted to
to be out here so it kind of just made sense
(10:00):
that i tried it now that i had you
know a valid excuse to actually just come out and and be here so yeah we've
been here for the last year is that the blonde lady in your platforms no so
that yeah that's that brings brings me to another area,
(10:23):
another project that I'm working on, and that's a project called the brave collide
with a very close friend of mine, Chloe Agnew.
So, no, Chloe is not my partner. That gets that gets mixed up all the time.
But I think we just laugh it off at this point.
So, yeah, we're in a group called the Brave Collide. We started that about two, three years ago.
(10:44):
And we last May was actually our first headline tour.
And we started that we did two shows in new
york and it was kind of a pretty surreal
thing i've been so used to doing you know bigger
shows and just arriving and everything's done for
you and then suddenly the two of us are on the road on
our own sorting out hotel accommodation cars
(11:07):
venues deals contracts we had
the best time ever though we we had an absolute blast and i went down so well
so ever since we have been writing a lot of new music and we are we've got a
bunch of shows coming up next month with another scottish artist actually his
(11:27):
name is grieger g-r-i-o-g-a-r.
And yeah we're currently in the middle of
writing our next our album so we
should be popping that out sometime next year i
think that will be a treat for us all because i've
just you can you can see these guides on instagram and
(11:47):
your your both your voices complement each other and it's it's really nice actually
i've just been listening to it before we came online today and well done and
congratulations to that and yes going on tour and having to do all those things
things that were done for you can be quite overwhelming.
I know. Growing up, I suppose, in Navan, when you started when you were 23,
(12:11):
so you were quite young, but growing up as a kid, I mean, there's not much to do.
I know myself from moving to Dublin and moving to the country,
which is nice because I've got the best about worlds at that point.
And I suppose Navan is a bit bigger.
But did you find that you were inspired solely just on music?
You didn't want to go out with friends. friends weren't what inspired you i
(12:33):
suppose when you were younger or who inspired you.
It's a good question yeah i think it was always in my nature to create things
and i don't really know if it was specific to music but i to this day i always
remember my mother says to me even still still today,
(12:56):
Brian, you used to go into the shed and just pick up random pieces of wood and get, you know,
your dad's toolbox and just start making a table or
making a little stool now it might be absolutely wonky and
it wouldn't it might not hold
that belief brian in yourself that you can do that a lot
of us now think we need a degree you look back years ago i
(13:17):
always say this to my friends if you go into bliver there's
nobody that's qualified for doing for being a
mechanic but there's not one person that will be given money over to a mechanic
to fix their car they will know how to change their wheels change the oil do
all the things mechanically because that's what what it was back then people
saved on a few pounds now we're kind of at an era that we think we need these
qualifications to do this whereas obviously you were independent thinking you
(13:41):
knew that you could do it so perhaps if music didn't work out for you you could have been an engineer.
Well that's you know funny you say it i studied product design in college and when,
the the month i graduated my
best friend who was actually the drummer in the
in our in our secondary school band he offered me
(14:02):
a job in the same company engineering company that he
was working with in Galway and I remember driving
home on the motorway getting the text from him he said there's an interview there
for you if you want it and I just had to say no I just I it just wasn't really
what I was what I was into you know at the time but it's obviously the call
and creativity has no limits and obviously you were thinking bigger even back
(14:26):
then so you sing you You write songs,
you play instruments. What instruments can you play?
So my main instrument is the piano.
I'd say kind of 50 50 piano guitar really but i i kind of think that the piano was my first,
and i play drums i sing i i
(14:47):
produce and you know i i kind of dabble in a few other instruments but i wouldn't
really call myself i wouldn't call myself a baron player even even though i
can you know i can record a few bits if there's any baron players listening
they'll laugh at me so So yeah,
my the piano is actually something that I've dived into a lot more in the last three or four months.
(15:10):
And I have a brand new project, which is my baby at the moment.
It's called N-Grain, E-N-G-R-A-N-E.
Beautiful. I'm looking that up. Yeah. Yeah, I've got a new Instagram page with
250 followers. Absolutely massive.
And it's... Substance. doesn't matter about the followers yeah i know i know
(15:33):
it's but it's all kind of atmospheric,
relaxing ambient stuff now i'm not
going to probably just keep it to that but that's kind of where it lies
at the moment and i've got
some collaborations earmarked for some string players and some other instrumentalists
out here in nashville which i need to dig into in the next couple of weeks and
(15:55):
yeah so when last month when we were on tour with the celtic tenors I opened
up the set for the Celtic Tenors with some of my new instrumental stuff and,
The boys and the tenors, I really do have to hand it to them for,
you know, giving me that opportunity year in, year out to perform,
whether it be some of my own songs, some Brave Collide songs or now this new N-Grain piano project.
(16:19):
They've been very good at, you know, giving me my space on stage on my own to
do that for, you know, for a couple of numbers.
I don't blame you. You're producing good stuff, Brian. It's excellent, to be fair.
I've always I wish I picked up years ago an
instrument or something because anytime and particularly now
this month when we're talking to all the singer songwriters and artists
(16:40):
it's inspiring me maybe I might go back and
and do a few lessons you're inspiring me do you
find when you're writing music that the music comes
to you or songs do you find that you kind of wake up
and you have the words or you have a beat in your head or do you feel
that you have to work hard towards making something or
is it just this natural fluidity what
(17:01):
is it i don't know like so yesterday and
the day before chloe was over in
my studio here in nashville chloe agnew were
in the brave collide together and we were writing some new material for.
The brave collide for the new album and today is
saturday so thursday we had a session and we
(17:22):
wrote an absolute beautiful song it was just a
gorgeous song and we probably finished
it in two and a half three hours start to finish and then
yesterday we you know we had
another writing session just the two of us and we spent
about six hours on a song and it's good but
my head and my you know creative
(17:43):
energy it just wasn't near as good
as it was the day before so i don't know
you could probably get get into conversations about you know
sleep and or food or you know did you
have too much Brian when I
was writing my first book in 2020 I
remember one day living with my friend Alec and I remember one day I went out
(18:05):
I was doing I think the 100 miles for February or something and I remember coming
back and from morning to night when I came back from my run that day I wrote.
A whole chapter did not stop at one point Alec came up three or four times but he came up and he says,
I was just so in the flow and it was just coming to me and that's never happened
(18:27):
again since and I was trying to think what did I do.
What book is that Ciara? I must actually have a look. So it's my secret me.
It hasn't been published and I'm still, I'm on the verge.
I've got a huge social media, well not compared to some people,
but in the last two years I've built up my social media and I'm only new to Instagram now.
And I'm just so close to saying, will I allow everyone to know this about me or do I keep this?
(18:49):
And to me, it was a healing. It was a tool to heal over the years and put everything down.
But, you know, my partner, my husband, as I was saying, Ciara,
you need to just get it out there.
You've worked so hard doing it. Like, let it so what? This is your past.
This is what made you you. So, yeah, maybe I will publish it in September sometime.
I think that'd be great. my secret me is what
(19:12):
it's called but you'll see it on on on my story yeah
yeah i mean your your your instagram
and your your social media has been on point it's it's
a tricky thing to get right but you've you've done a really good job on it thank you
i do appreciate you saying that because you know we spend so much time
doing this and sharing our lives on social media it's nice
to get that feedback so thank you i think the
(19:35):
social media side of things is a pain in the the ass
but to be honest with you it's important it is
important and even me now i wouldn't be the best at
technology but i do enough to get by and
i read up what's important when you should you know put stories
up blah blah blah but it seems to be working so please god it
will go steady can you give us an example before you
(19:55):
go maybe of a step back or something that
i suppose as a musician that you'd face what would
your hurdles be i mean it sounds like you've had a
beautiful but we know everything isn't always
great so so share something and how you
overcame it i suppose or could combat it at the
time yeah i think i
(20:16):
think finances as a solo as an independent musician or an artist are the is
the one thing that i see time and time again just messing people up and you
know i'm lucky enough now that i've i've worked and i've figured it out it for now.
You know, things are always changing, but I have figured it out. And.
(20:40):
Yeah, I remember, you know, the very first, or I suppose after the first two long US tours I did.
So I said the first one was 2013, the second 2014.
And when you go on the road for six months and you come home with a ball of
money and then you spend it all because you don't really have any structure
(21:01):
or any, you know, you don't have any other line of work to get into.
To so you missed a lot of you know parties and friends and you know weddings
and all that kind of stuff so you end up overcompensating for the time that
you're away and you spend a ton of money.
And you don't really then ever realize or or know how to handle it,
(21:27):
i think that's one thing that can trip people up even if you're not doing big
tours tours, like lengthy tours, I think just musicians in general,
it's such an unstable, unstable,
industry, that if you can find something that can take over in the background,
that gives you X amount of a month, so that you know, you can lean on that.
(21:51):
And it will cover your costs and maybe your rent and your basic bills,
then you can be creative.
But I see so many,
extremely talented people but they're
just struggling a little bit financially and the.
Creativity cannot come out in in
that circumstance it just stress and
(22:13):
creativity are two different that's very.
True i see it in different careers myself over here.
As well in the uk do you make time to have
maybe some meditation or just to come
away from work so that you can allow that creativity to
flow through you yeah well i i
started meditating in 2017 and i
(22:35):
have not done it every single day since for anybody who thinks i
have but you know in i
think in the last six months i realized
i hadn't really been doing it as much as i wanted to and i
think my new piano project is now my
new meditation so my my
morning would just really consist of getting up
(22:57):
doing my journaling going to the gym shower and then
straight to the piano for an hour and whatever
comes out in that hour i record it and i
upload it to my similar to a soundcloud account
but it's called disco and i upload that piece of music and
it lives there on a private playlist online and i
know that i have created something for the day
(23:19):
and it doesn't have to be perfect or finished but at least i can
come back to it then that's very
nice so instead of me spending you know
a half an hour sitting sitting and breathing with my eyes closed i think i spend
that half an hour sitting breathing at the piano with my eyes probably half
closed anyway yeah but that that's beautiful that you can do that and it's it's
(23:40):
just about finding that That's something that kind of brings you away from the
reality of the world that we're living in.
I do TM meditation and I'm a very hyperactive person by nature,
but I find it very good, to be fair.
And I didn't think I would at the start. I did struggle, but...
TF, Transcendental Meditation. Yeah, it's really, really good.
(24:04):
You're kind of saying a mantra.
You go with somebody and you have to have three continuous days with this person,
your mentor, your shaman, and they'll give you a mantra that you say then.
And I have to say it's been very good.
Yeah, I've heard a lot of people talking about Transcendental Meditation and
I always wanted to try it, but I never. Do you know why I find it's good, Brian?
(24:26):
Because if you think of meditation when you close your eyes,
what's the first thing we do?
Our heads get very full and we're thinking, oh, we should be doing this or you
should be thinking, oh, you're at the piano or I'm thinking I should be doing this.
And then we feel like, oh, we're not meditating because we're getting all this
stuff in when we try to close our eyes.
But with transcendental meditation they give you let's
just pretend the mantra is one word saying angel angel
(24:48):
or gratitude gratitude love whatever the word is right
i've got my own when you're not allowed to repeat it but you're saying that
and as you're saying that it's vibrating out and you go deeper into that state
there's a good analogy my tm teacher said to me so think of a bowl of water
and imagine that the bowl of water had nothing in it it's just water and you
(25:08):
have a blue or whatever whatever color dye beside it.
And you get a piece of cloth, you dip the cloth into the dye and then you pour it in the water.
First, it's going to be like a diluted mywadi or cordial. Then you dip it again.
He says, every time you're doing that meditation, you're going deeper.
And how right he was. It is. It's fascinating.
Brian, I just want to say thank you so much for giving us your time today.
(25:29):
I can't wait to see what else is in the pipeline for you because you have your hands at everything.
Well, yeah, I have hands on a few things. Once it doesn't, And once nothing
gets out of control and I keep it, keep things moving in the right direction. Yeah.
Absolutely. Have you met anybody famous over there yet?
Have I? I don't.
(25:49):
I mean, I've seen a few artists live. I haven't actually met anybody in person.
No, I don't think so. It's quite quickly. When I went to Nashville,
they were turning more rock and roll as opposed to country.
I wanted my country and I couldn't believe it.
Yeah, there's still a lot of country.
(26:10):
I mean, I'd say it's probably primarily, I'd say 50, 60% country.
And then the other 40% is rock and roll, pop, everything else.
But the percentage of country to everything else is kind of shrinking a little bit.
Yeah, I've seen that. Did you go to see Elvis's house? I did,
not since I moved here, but I have seen it.
(26:31):
Great land. A couple of years back, yeah, it's fascinating.
Have you seen it? I did, I went a couple of years ago and I was in awe. Yeah, it was brilliant.
Okay. Okay, Brian McGrane, thank you so much.
Lovely to catch up and best of luck and congratulations on all the success.
Thanks for having me, Ciara. I've got a new Instagram buddy to keep an eye on as well. Absolutely.
(26:56):
Brian, just before we go, actually, can you give us what way can we contact
you best for the listeners?
Yeah, so Instagram is ngrane, E-N-G-R-A-N-E.
Or you can get Brian McGrane Music.
Facebook is the same tiktok the same so
it's just n grain and brian mcgrane perfect
(27:19):
and then obviously the brave collide if you want to have a look there you can
see our stuff on spotify and everything everything is all of the places to be
honest you know once you have the names you're everywhere brilliant brian great
stuff thank you so much have a beautiful day you too kira thanks for having me appreciate that.
Good evening, everybody. So today I have with me Brian McGrane,
musician, singer, songwriter from Ireland.
Brian has toured with Celtic Woman for five years, selling out the biggest venues
in the world from the Red Rocks Co, Radio City New York, the Sydney Opera House and much more.
(00:20):
Brian has also toured with Celtic Tenors, Brian Kennedy, Phil Coulter,
Sharon Corr and has produced lots of music for upcoming artists.
So Brian, thank you so much for taking the time to come today. You're very welcome.
Thank you. Maybe start with telling us a little bit about yourself,
where you're from and how you ended up following a musical career.
(00:41):
Yeah, thanks for having me on. It's always good to chit chat a bit to new people
about stuff that you kind of forget, I suppose.
Those so yeah i i grew
up in navan county meath both parents didn't go too far to find each other both
navan people all their lives and yeah my dad owns has his own business in in
(01:04):
the town and my mother works in the the local parish and when i was very very
young i my mother was always.
Quite musical with piano and she sang a lot
in choirs and on my on my dad's side of
the family my grandmother handed me down this
tiny little keyboard with about 25 keys and
about six batteries in the back and I had never any interest in you know watching
(01:28):
tv or anything like that so I started to play along all the advertisement music
on the tv and I suppose fast forward five or six years my dad then had bought
me a bigger keyboard and a real piano and I started to take lessons,
but it was only really I suppose when I was in secondary school I started to
to start to play it live when I was 16 or 17, we formed a rock band in St. Pat's in Navan.
(01:53):
We toured up and down the country, did all the venues, all the pubs and clubs.
We were in there illegal and all as we were we were gigging away
for everybody and yeah i suppose i i never really my parents always wanted me
to get the the real job as opposed as i suppose most parents do so i went to
college for product design in dit and a funny story through product design,
(02:19):
a girl in my course she won't mind me mentioning her name emily brady her father
works with when in Milan and has big connections with PBS in the US the public
broadcasting service and the PBS,
broadcast all of the Celtic woman TV specials so
Emily gave me a couple of free tickets to see
(02:41):
a Celtic woman shoot in the Helix in Dublin I went
along on my own and I was kind of blown away by it
so I reached out to a friend of
mine David Downs a good close friend now wasn't a friend back
then reached out to david and about
two weeks later i had an audition and a week later the day of the all ireland
(03:01):
hurling final in september 2013 i got a phone call to say i was going to germany
on tour with celtic woman i was 23 at the time so yeah it was a big a big shock from you know.
Doing small small shows and small pubs and clubs around ireland to being told
you're playing the you're opening the tour in the O2 Arena in Dusseldorf in Germany.
(03:25):
To tell you though, when you talk and you reach out to people, they want to help.
If you've got talent, people with talent want to help people and help them and lift them along the way.
I didn't realise you were a Navan man. My family are living in Blyther,
but they moved many years ago. But Navan's beautiful.
(03:45):
Yeah, that's really good. I'm impressed with that. that. So when you were younger,
did you have friends that were into music as well? Was your mum and dad into music?
It's my mother always played the piano, but she would never really say that.
And she she still does sing in the local church choir, which, you know, it's one of her,
(04:06):
main hobbies, I suppose, alongside tennis, that singing in the choir is is one
of the things that keeps her going and keeps a lot of her friends going, you know? Absolutely.
What did they feel when you just said to your parents, I'm going to,
after never having talked about this before, and then all of a sudden you're
going touring with this amazing band.
(04:27):
How did they feel? Did they try to keep you at home? I mean,
you were 23. So how old are you now?
I am 34 now. So that's 11 years ago. Yeah. You've achieved so much.
Yeah. I mean, I suppose when you look back on the time, you don't realize how
much you've done and you're always looking to do more.
(04:48):
As you should, but sometimes even conversations like this with you today,
Ciara, is good to even reflect on a few things that you've done. Absolutely.
Because over the years, people do tend to start to follow you and they may know
you and your musicality, but they mightn't know you as a person and how you got to where you are.
And I do think it's important because we should embrace where we're from and how we got there.
(05:12):
I mean, looking at some of the notes on you, You've worked and been around Phil Coulter people.
I mean, we idolize Phil and all these artists in Ireland. How did that feel
to be working with these people?
Surely they inspired you growing up. Yeah, definitely.
I think I think initially the Celtic woman, the whole Celtic woman era for me,
(05:33):
put me in among a lot of people who were, you know, at the same level of performing
and touring and songwriting.
So i suppose if you go from celtic woman
to other tours it kind of feels like you're just moving
sideways as opposed to a big massive jump because you're
kind of used to that you're used to i don't
(05:54):
want to say level because that sounds you know i
was once told i know what you're saying but i was once told by.
A good friend of mine excellence always finds its
own level so whatever you're in power with you know.
You'll you'll attract more people like that and you.
Know we're all on a a journey and we all try to help lift people up along the
way but i know what you mean of course the humble navin man
(06:15):
coming out yeah well there's plenty of
plenty of talent that's come out of navin between hector and
tommy and brian burn obviously is
is living over here now i'm not sure if you're familiar funny story
actually brian burn is brian burn's
brother paul burn and they actually have a hairdressers in
in navin but the burns are a very very
(06:37):
musical family in Navan and Paul Byrne taught
me piano but Brian Byrne
is has been living in the states for 15 20
years maybe and he's an
extraordinary talent he's been nominated for multiple big
awards and grammys and film scoring is his thing
along with jazz piano style stuff so
(06:59):
I did have a man on last week as well
and he's only starting out in his career he just released a single
a Christmas the single david cassidy and i
did put it out i said he's going to be big he's got a really really
unique voice and he's just been called there's
a record studio in navan is that right you're close by he's just
been called yeah yeah he's been called in thursday i think next week to talk
(07:22):
about doing more music with this guy so please god something good comes out
of it because you're right there is a lot of good talent from navan what's his
name again david cassidy cassidy yeah Yeah, if you look at my podcast.
I think I only shared his interview yesterday.
Yeah, David Cassidy, if you look at it.
I'll have a look at them and be sure to share them along the way.
(07:45):
Yeah. And I'll tell him to follow you too. And I mean, that's very impressive.
So now you're in Nashville. How did you end up in Nashville?
Yeah. So more mad stories, I suppose.
COVID happened. And I actually hate talking about COVID because it's just,
you know, it's in the past and it's long ago,
but it did change the way a
(08:08):
lot of things happened and the way a lot of online shows
happen now but anyway i pre-covid i
was getting a little bit tired of touring and i
was on the road with the celtic tenors at the time
and i just thought i think i'm just i'm finished
with this you know i've had i've had enough of the touring stuff and then
(08:28):
covid happened and we had a break for two years so i
think it was the middle of 2021 i was
living with a few friends in navan and i got a phone
call from matthew gilston from the tenors and he said brian look
we're going back out on the road we'd love to have
you what's the chances i know you've kind
of let us know you're not coming out but would you be interested and
(08:49):
i said let me think about it so i got off the
phone and my friend sean said brian you're absolutely
mad you've been sitting here at home for the
last two years you have the opportunity now to get back
out to the us do some shows make some money and travel again and yeah it just
clicked with me i said you know what i'm gone so i hopped on the plane and we
(09:12):
that was march 22 and i met a girl on that tour out here.
On the road in march 12th in orlando and
yeah we had a we had a bit of a lock-in a classic
irish style we had a bit of a lock-in and an irish bar in orlando till about
four in in the morning singing Irish tunes yeah and then you know the rest of
(09:38):
the tour finished and we kept in touch and we were over and back to each other
for the guts of a year and a half.
And I had always wanted to move to Nashville about six
years ago when I was still in Celtic Woman I'd
spent a good bit of time out here you know trying this
songwriting and that kind of stuff and i'd always wanted to
to be out here so it kind of just made sense
(10:00):
that i tried it now that i had you
know a valid excuse to actually just come out and and be here so yeah we've
been here for the last year is that the blonde lady in your platforms no so
that yeah that's that brings brings me to another area,
(10:23):
another project that I'm working on, and that's a project called the brave collide
with a very close friend of mine, Chloe Agnew.
So, no, Chloe is not my partner. That gets that gets mixed up all the time.
But I think we just laugh it off at this point.
So, yeah, we're in a group called the Brave Collide. We started that about two, three years ago.
(10:44):
And we last May was actually our first headline tour.
And we started that we did two shows in new
york and it was kind of a pretty surreal
thing i've been so used to doing you know bigger
shows and just arriving and everything's done for
you and then suddenly the two of us are on the road on
our own sorting out hotel accommodation cars
(11:07):
venues deals contracts we had
the best time ever though we we had an absolute blast and i went down so well
so ever since we have been writing a lot of new music and we are we've got a
bunch of shows coming up next month with another scottish artist actually his
(11:27):
name is grieger g-r-i-o-g-a-r.
And yeah we're currently in the middle of
writing our next our album so we
should be popping that out sometime next year i
think that will be a treat for us all because i've
just you can you can see these guides on instagram and
(11:47):
your your both your voices complement each other and it's it's really nice actually
i've just been listening to it before we came online today and well done and
congratulations to that and yes going on tour and having to do all those things
things that were done for you can be quite overwhelming.
I know. Growing up, I suppose, in Navan, when you started when you were 23,
(12:11):
so you were quite young, but growing up as a kid, I mean, there's not much to do.
I know myself from moving to Dublin and moving to the country,
which is nice because I've got the best about worlds at that point.
And I suppose Navan is a bit bigger.
But did you find that you were inspired solely just on music?
You didn't want to go out with friends. friends weren't what inspired you i
(12:33):
suppose when you were younger or who inspired you.
It's a good question yeah i think it was always in my nature to create things
and i don't really know if it was specific to music but i to this day i always
remember my mother says to me even still still today,
(12:56):
Brian, you used to go into the shed and just pick up random pieces of wood and get, you know,
your dad's toolbox and just start making a table or
making a little stool now it might be absolutely wonky and
it wouldn't it might not hold
that belief brian in yourself that you can do that a lot
of us now think we need a degree you look back years ago i
(13:17):
always say this to my friends if you go into bliver there's
nobody that's qualified for doing for being a
mechanic but there's not one person that will be given money over to a mechanic
to fix their car they will know how to change their wheels change the oil do
all the things mechanically because that's what what it was back then people
saved on a few pounds now we're kind of at an era that we think we need these
qualifications to do this whereas obviously you were independent thinking you
(13:41):
knew that you could do it so perhaps if music didn't work out for you you could have been an engineer.
Well that's you know funny you say it i studied product design in college and when,
the the month i graduated my
best friend who was actually the drummer in the
in our in our secondary school band he offered me
(14:02):
a job in the same company engineering company that he
was working with in Galway and I remember driving
home on the motorway getting the text from him he said there's an interview there
for you if you want it and I just had to say no I just I it just wasn't really
what I was what I was into you know at the time but it's obviously the call
and creativity has no limits and obviously you were thinking bigger even back
(14:26):
then so you sing you You write songs,
you play instruments. What instruments can you play?
So my main instrument is the piano.
I'd say kind of 50 50 piano guitar really but i i kind of think that the piano was my first,
and i play drums i sing i i
(14:47):
produce and you know i i kind of dabble in a few other instruments but i wouldn't
really call myself i wouldn't call myself a baron player even even though i
can you know i can record a few bits if there's any baron players listening
they'll laugh at me so So yeah,
my the piano is actually something that I've dived into a lot more in the last three or four months.
(15:10):
And I have a brand new project, which is my baby at the moment.
It's called N-Grain, E-N-G-R-A-N-E.
Beautiful. I'm looking that up. Yeah. Yeah, I've got a new Instagram page with
250 followers. Absolutely massive.
And it's... Substance. doesn't matter about the followers yeah i know i know
(15:33):
it's but it's all kind of atmospheric,
relaxing ambient stuff now i'm not
going to probably just keep it to that but that's kind of where it lies
at the moment and i've got
some collaborations earmarked for some string players and some other instrumentalists
out here in nashville which i need to dig into in the next couple of weeks and
(15:55):
yeah so when last month when we were on tour with the celtic tenors I opened
up the set for the Celtic Tenors with some of my new instrumental stuff and,
The boys and the tenors, I really do have to hand it to them for,
you know, giving me that opportunity year in, year out to perform,
whether it be some of my own songs, some Brave Collide songs or now this new N-Grain piano project.
(16:19):
They've been very good at, you know, giving me my space on stage on my own to
do that for, you know, for a couple of numbers.
I don't blame you. You're producing good stuff, Brian. It's excellent, to be fair.
I've always I wish I picked up years ago an
instrument or something because anytime and particularly now
this month when we're talking to all the singer songwriters and artists
(16:40):
it's inspiring me maybe I might go back and
and do a few lessons you're inspiring me do you
find when you're writing music that the music comes
to you or songs do you find that you kind of wake up
and you have the words or you have a beat in your head or do you feel
that you have to work hard towards making something or
is it just this natural fluidity what
(17:01):
is it i don't know like so yesterday and
the day before chloe was over in
my studio here in nashville chloe agnew were
in the brave collide together and we were writing some new material for.
The brave collide for the new album and today is
saturday so thursday we had a session and we
(17:22):
wrote an absolute beautiful song it was just a
gorgeous song and we probably finished
it in two and a half three hours start to finish and then
yesterday we you know we had
another writing session just the two of us and we spent
about six hours on a song and it's good but
my head and my you know creative
(17:43):
energy it just wasn't near as good
as it was the day before so i don't know
you could probably get get into conversations about you know
sleep and or food or you know did you
have too much Brian when I
was writing my first book in 2020 I
remember one day living with my friend Alec and I remember one day I went out
(18:05):
I was doing I think the 100 miles for February or something and I remember coming
back and from morning to night when I came back from my run that day I wrote.
A whole chapter did not stop at one point Alec came up three or four times but he came up and he says,
I was just so in the flow and it was just coming to me and that's never happened
(18:27):
again since and I was trying to think what did I do.
What book is that Ciara? I must actually have a look. So it's my secret me.
It hasn't been published and I'm still, I'm on the verge.
I've got a huge social media, well not compared to some people,
but in the last two years I've built up my social media and I'm only new to Instagram now.
And I'm just so close to saying, will I allow everyone to know this about me or do I keep this?
(18:49):
And to me, it was a healing. It was a tool to heal over the years and put everything down.
But, you know, my partner, my husband, as I was saying, Ciara,
you need to just get it out there.
You've worked so hard doing it. Like, let it so what? This is your past.
This is what made you you. So, yeah, maybe I will publish it in September sometime.
I think that'd be great. my secret me is what
(19:12):
it's called but you'll see it on on on my story yeah
yeah i mean your your your instagram
and your your social media has been on point it's it's
a tricky thing to get right but you've you've done a really good job on it thank you
i do appreciate you saying that because you know we spend so much time
doing this and sharing our lives on social media it's nice
to get that feedback so thank you i think the
(19:35):
social media side of things is a pain in the the ass
but to be honest with you it's important it is
important and even me now i wouldn't be the best at
technology but i do enough to get by and
i read up what's important when you should you know put stories
up blah blah blah but it seems to be working so please god it
will go steady can you give us an example before you
(19:55):
go maybe of a step back or something that
i suppose as a musician that you'd face what would
your hurdles be i mean it sounds like you've had a
beautiful but we know everything isn't always
great so so share something and how you
overcame it i suppose or could combat it at the
time yeah i think i
(20:16):
think finances as a solo as an independent musician or an artist are the is
the one thing that i see time and time again just messing people up and you
know i'm lucky enough now that i've i've worked and i've figured it out it for now.
You know, things are always changing, but I have figured it out. And.
(20:40):
Yeah, I remember, you know, the very first, or I suppose after the first two long US tours I did.
So I said the first one was 2013, the second 2014.
And when you go on the road for six months and you come home with a ball of
money and then you spend it all because you don't really have any structure
(21:01):
or any, you know, you don't have any other line of work to get into.
To so you missed a lot of you know parties and friends and you know weddings
and all that kind of stuff so you end up overcompensating for the time that
you're away and you spend a ton of money.
And you don't really then ever realize or or know how to handle it,
(21:27):
i think that's one thing that can trip people up even if you're not doing big
tours tours, like lengthy tours, I think just musicians in general,
it's such an unstable, unstable,
industry, that if you can find something that can take over in the background,
that gives you X amount of a month, so that you know, you can lean on that.
(21:51):
And it will cover your costs and maybe your rent and your basic bills,
then you can be creative.
But I see so many,
extremely talented people but they're
just struggling a little bit financially and the.
Creativity cannot come out in in
that circumstance it just stress and
(22:13):
creativity are two different that's very.
True i see it in different careers myself over here.
As well in the uk do you make time to have
maybe some meditation or just to come
away from work so that you can allow that creativity to
flow through you yeah well i i
started meditating in 2017 and i
(22:35):
have not done it every single day since for anybody who thinks i
have but you know in i
think in the last six months i realized
i hadn't really been doing it as much as i wanted to and i
think my new piano project is now my
new meditation so my my
morning would just really consist of getting up
(22:57):
doing my journaling going to the gym shower and then
straight to the piano for an hour and whatever
comes out in that hour i record it and i
upload it to my similar to a soundcloud account
but it's called disco and i upload that piece of music and
it lives there on a private playlist online and i
know that i have created something for the day
(23:19):
and it doesn't have to be perfect or finished but at least i can
come back to it then that's very
nice so instead of me spending you know
a half an hour sitting sitting and breathing with my eyes closed i think i spend
that half an hour sitting breathing at the piano with my eyes probably half
closed anyway yeah but that that's beautiful that you can do that and it's it's
(23:40):
just about finding that That's something that kind of brings you away from the
reality of the world that we're living in.
I do TM meditation and I'm a very hyperactive person by nature,
but I find it very good, to be fair.
And I didn't think I would at the start. I did struggle, but...
TF, Transcendental Meditation. Yeah, it's really, really good.
(24:04):
You're kind of saying a mantra.
You go with somebody and you have to have three continuous days with this person,
your mentor, your shaman, and they'll give you a mantra that you say then.
And I have to say it's been very good.
Yeah, I've heard a lot of people talking about Transcendental Meditation and
I always wanted to try it, but I never. Do you know why I find it's good, Brian?
(24:26):
Because if you think of meditation when you close your eyes,
what's the first thing we do?
Our heads get very full and we're thinking, oh, we should be doing this or you
should be thinking, oh, you're at the piano or I'm thinking I should be doing this.
And then we feel like, oh, we're not meditating because we're getting all this
stuff in when we try to close our eyes.
But with transcendental meditation they give you let's
just pretend the mantra is one word saying angel angel
(24:48):
or gratitude gratitude love whatever the word is right
i've got my own when you're not allowed to repeat it but you're saying that
and as you're saying that it's vibrating out and you go deeper into that state
there's a good analogy my tm teacher said to me so think of a bowl of water
and imagine that the bowl of water had nothing in it it's just water and you
(25:08):
have a blue or whatever whatever color dye beside it.
And you get a piece of cloth, you dip the cloth into the dye and then you pour it in the water.
First, it's going to be like a diluted mywadi or cordial. Then you dip it again.
He says, every time you're doing that meditation, you're going deeper.
And how right he was. It is. It's fascinating.
Brian, I just want to say thank you so much for giving us your time today.
(25:29):
I can't wait to see what else is in the pipeline for you because you have your hands at everything.
Well, yeah, I have hands on a few things. Once it doesn't, And once nothing
gets out of control and I keep it, keep things moving in the right direction. Yeah.
Absolutely. Have you met anybody famous over there yet?
Have I? I don't.
(25:49):
I mean, I've seen a few artists live. I haven't actually met anybody in person.
No, I don't think so. It's quite quickly. When I went to Nashville,
they were turning more rock and roll as opposed to country.
I wanted my country and I couldn't believe it.
Yeah, there's still a lot of country.
(26:10):
I mean, I'd say it's probably primarily, I'd say 50, 60% country.
And then the other 40% is rock and roll, pop, everything else.
But the percentage of country to everything else is kind of shrinking a little bit.
Yeah, I've seen that. Did you go to see Elvis's house? I did,
not since I moved here, but I have seen it.
(26:31):
Great land. A couple of years back, yeah, it's fascinating.
Have you seen it? I did, I went a couple of years ago and I was in awe. Yeah, it was brilliant.
Okay. Okay, Brian McGrane, thank you so much.
Lovely to catch up and best of luck and congratulations on all the success.
Thanks for having me, Ciara. I've got a new Instagram buddy to keep an eye on as well. Absolutely.
(26:56):
Brian, just before we go, actually, can you give us what way can we contact
you best for the listeners?
Yeah, so Instagram is ngrane, E-N-G-R-A-N-E.
Or you can get Brian McGrane Music.
Facebook is the same tiktok the same so
it's just n grain and brian mcgrane perfect
(27:19):
and then obviously the brave collide if you want to have a look there you can
see our stuff on spotify and everything everything is all of the places to be
honest you know once you have the names you're everywhere brilliant brian great
stuff thank you so much have a beautiful day you too kira thanks for having me appreciate that.
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