Culture That Made Me: Louise Cantillon of Today FM picks her touchstones
Limerick-born broadcaster Louise Cantillon is co-presenting her live podcast at Triskel in Cork in March.
Louise Cantillon, 31, grew up in Kilcornan, Co Limerick. In 2022, she joined Today FM radio station, and began anchoring its lunchtime show last year. She has presented several television shows. She married Limerick hurling star Declan Hannon in 2023. She’s also one third of the How to Gael podcast, along with Doireann Ní Ghlacáin and Síomha Ní Ruairc. They will do a live podcast show, 8pm, Friday, 7 March, at Cork’s Triskel Arts Centre. See: www.triskelartscentre.ie
Back in fifth year at school in Limerick’s Laurel Hill Coláiste in 2008, a friend said: “There's a band coming to Limerick that is unreal. They sing a song about a lion.” So we got tickets to their gig. We had fake IDs. So we headed along and got to see Mumford & Sons play this intimate set in Dolans, not realising at the time they would go on to be what they were. There was a time in my life I had their album Sigh No More on repeat all the time. I had discovered my independence, having finished school in Limerick and moved to Cork to study PE teaching in UCC.
With my friends and family, there's a great culture of a sing-song at the end of the night. I don’t have a note in my head. I do a terrible 'Galway Shawl' as my party piece: “At Oranmore in the county Galway...” I can just about hold the right key. Lisa O'Neill does a lovely Galway Shawl. I tried to do a duet with her at Other Voices, but she was having none of me.
Although I cannot sing, I have incredible singers in my life. When I was in secondary school, there was an amazing choir in school, a choir that won all sorts of awards. I auditioned three times for it and never got in. I’ve never gotten over it.
On my wedding day, seven of my closest friends from that school choir sang me up the aisle with Casadh an tSúgáin by The Gloaming, a lovely old Irish song about tying the knot.
As a young wannabe radio star, some of my earliest opportunities to interview artists backstage was at the Indiependence Festival in Mitchelstown. A shout-out to Shane Dunne who brought some massive artists to Cork in his time. I remember at the height of Lewis Capaldi fame being in a green room backstage in Mitchelstown sitting on a couch chatting with him and telling him my initials were also “LC” and he said, “You should caption that photo ‘LC²’.” I was like, “Oh, my goodness, I’ve forever made it – Lewis Capaldi has given me an Instagram caption.”
When I was living in Cork, I remember going upstairs in the Hi-B bar where you got a discount if you spoke as Gaeilge. You might get a euro off a pint. A load of old Irishmen sat at that bar at labhairt as Gaeilge. At the end of the night, if you stayed late enough, there’d be a lovely bit of sean-nós singing, and they’d break into song themselves.
I saw Sive last year at the Gaiety Theatre. It was phenomenal. As someone who is reared with Gaeilge – my parents are from Ballyheigue in Kerry – what I love about John B. Keane, a Listowel man of course, is how he uses Hiberno-English syntax in his plays. He’s the king of that kind of turn of phrase. Sade Malone, as Sive in the play, was fantastic.
I was once obsessed with Kevin McCloud’s Grand Designs. It's a British house show on TV, with these outrageous houses being built, these massive innovative projects. You’ve never met a man with more flowery language. It’s such a guilty pleasure. If I couldn't find it on telly, I would go to YouTube to watch the back catalogue. Don't know what that says about me! I still don't own a house – and probably never will! A girl can dream. I've all the designs done since my teenage years.
The Graham Norton Show is fantastic. He has that authentic Irish charm – obviously, as a Cork man and a fellow UCC alumni. He breaks down the fourth wall – you feel like you're on the couch with the guests. I love the way he can have a mixture of people sitting on his couch from A-listers to someone new on the scene and there's a beautiful flow between them. He creates this incredible, natural chat. I’m in awe of him.
I love all seven Harry Potter movies. I grew up reading the Harry Potter books so even now I love to dip back into the movies. They’re formative movies for me. I feel like I grew up with the characters. I'm around the same age as the actors Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson. It was such a highlight of our calendar year – for me and my friends – when a new Harry Potter came out. When I watch them back now, there's so much nostalgia, but I also fully believe in magic. I love the magic in them.
Growing up, we were big fans of Kerry football in their glory years, the late Nineties and early Noughties. My father would turn on television to watch RTÉ, but turn off the volume and have Weeshie Fogarty on Radio Kerry for his completely biased commentary. Weeshie used his own language and these amazing phrases. One of his funnier moments was when he mentioned on air his sound engineer was gone to a “Bianca” concert. It went viral. He’d never heard of Beyoncé before. He knew his trade inside out. That's all that mattered. He probably knew every sportsman west of the Shannon, but Beyoncé was not on his radar.
Doireann Ní Ghlacáin, my podcast co-host, made a beautiful documentary about Seán Ó Riada. It aired on TG4 Christmas 2021. It’s called Seán Ó Riada, Mo Sheanathair. It’s a documentary she made about her grandfather, from her perspective as his granddaughter, living and working in media, carrying on his legacy, but also being a young woman in modern Ireland. The day after I watched it, I got engaged back in Dingle. So it sticks in my mind. It's a phenomenal documentary about a phenomenal man who paved the way for many gaelgoers and traditional Irish musicians.
I'm a millennial gal who loves a bit of pop culture. In Alex Cooper’s podcast Call Her Daddy, she interviews the big stars. You're a fly on the wall for a long-form chat. She's a brilliant interviewer. She recently interviewed Hailey Bieber who famously never gives away anything, but Alex Cooper had her talking about her favourite sex positions.
I like Grace Campbell’s podcast. Grace Campbell is Alastair Campbell's daughter. It's kind of a comedy podcast. She's a comedian. She's hilariously disrespectful in a clever way about the state of the UK and the world. She’s politically opinionated, but in a modern way. I like the way she handles herself. It’s gas.
