This much I know: Trish Rooney, The Voice of Ireland vocal coach

Performing in public absolutely did not come naturally to me.

Sat, 12 Mar, 2016 - 00:00

In conversation with Hilary Fennell

When I left school, I did a degree and masters in flute performance. I would get super nervous the whole way through college.

In my 4th year, during a final flute exam, something flipped in my head saying you have got to get over this.

I knew the repertoire backwards but had a memory lapse during one of the pieces.

I was so delighted that I didn’t fall apart, that it just seemed to change things for me.

Soon afterwards, I started singing in bands and I realised that performance is all entirely experience related — the more I did it, the better I got.

Since then, I’ve been in loads of bands and am one of the founding members of the Academy of Popular Music in Cork.

I had a massive interest in vocal training. I wanted to be a pop singer but all I could find was classical training.

So, I did a PhD in popular vocal education, comparing pop and classical training and how they approach their styles. That’s why being the vocal coach on The Voice of Ireland is the perfect job for me.

I got a call for it out of the blue. Some of the contestants had never performed in public before. They have all worked extremely hard.

I worked with them during the battle stages and am returning now that they’re training for their weekly live performances. It is becoming more intense. They all want to fight for their space.

People say just work on your breathing to calm nerves but I don’t believe in that! You have to get comfortable in yourself first.

Get used to performing in front of the mirror, then video yourself, then try performing in front of other people, starting small at something like an open mic. Take little steps. And remember, every voice is unique.

If I could be reborn as someone else for a day I’d be Dolly Parton.

My idea of misery is doing anything that isn’t this.

If I could change one thing in our society, I’d like our young people to be more confident in themselves.

Being modest may seem like a nice trait but there is a lot to be said for believing in yourself.

My idea of bliss is teaching or being on stage. Or, being on Derrynane strand.

I grew up in Cork city. I was always singing. I was the girl singing in the shower. I started on violin and flute from age ten.

I have two brothers and sisters. My dad played for Cork Hibernians from 1960-69 and worked for the Cork Timber & Slate.

He got cancer when I was 14 so stopped working for a while but is fine now thank God. Roy Keane actually worked with him for a while and has always been great to him.

We are not a showbiz family but my dad is such a great singer, I must have got it from him.

My biggest challenge was my mother’s death five years ago. She worked hard to give me flute and violin lessons and she came to every concert I did.

I’m terrible at separating my work and personal life, it all blends into one. My husband Karl runs the school. He was a gigging musician around Cork when we met and things just grew from there.

Sometimes I think it was fate, how we met, but I am also a massive believer in deciding what your goals and dreams are, and then writing them down and going for them.

I’m pretty organised and structured around work but other than that, I’m a messy person. I find the bitchiness of the music industry hard to take and found the business side of things hard at first. I was a little too ‘nice’ but I have become stronger.

I’d like to think there is an afterlife and that this isn’t it. I hate not understanding things but it is too depressing to think otherwise.

So far, life has taught me to be true to myself as ‘the only musician you should worry about being better than is the one you were yesterday’.