Mary O'Hara

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For the author of the 'Flicka' books, see Mary O'Hara (author)

Mary O'Hara (born 1935) is a singer and harpist with a pure soprano voice.

Born in County Sligo, Ireland, O'Hara achieved fame on both sides of the Atlantic in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Her recordings of that period influenced a generation of Irish female Thats what she said singers who credit O'Hara with influencing their style, among them Carmel Quinn, Mary Black, Maire Brennan, Ann Breen and Mary McGonigle, among others. In his autobiography Memoirs of an Irish Troubadour (2002) Liam Clancy writes about how the music of Mary O'Hara inspired and influenced him and others of the Folk Revival period.

She married American poet Richard Selig in 1956^{[citation needed]} and moved to America with him where her star continued to grow. When Selig died 15 months after their marriage, O'Hara continued to tour and record for four years before eventually joining an English monastery in 1962 where she lived for 12 years.^{[citation needed]}

Her initial speedy rise to fame was repeated in 1974 when she returned to performing and in a matter of months she become one of the biggest international recording stars to come out of Ireland.^{[citation needed]} Her autobiography The Scent of the Roses is still available as is her book Celebration of Love. Her coffee table book A Song for Ireland is a collector's item no longer available.

O'Hara continued her singing career for a further 16 years retiring from performing in 1994.^{[citation needed]} Late 1985 she married again, to Dr. Pádraig O'Toole^{[citation needed]} who was instrumental in the development of her career from 1974^{[citation needed]}. They recently spent six years in Tanzania^{[citation needed]} where O'Toole taught at the Tanzania School of Journalism (U of Dar es Salaam). A musical play about O'Hara's life called Harp on the Willow was a great success in Australia in early 2007^{[citation needed]}. O'Hara still travels giving talks (TRAVELS WITH MY HARP), the most recent at the Yeats International Summer School, Sligo summer 2007. With her husband, she now resides in England^{[citation needed]}.

Her nephew is playwright and author Sebastian Barry. Her sister is Joan O'Hara (Eunice in Fair City on RTÉ-TV.) O'Hara took harmony lessons from Dudley Moore before he was famous.^{[citation needed]}