Martin Hayes: You can survive most challenges if you believe in what you’re doing

"My proudest achievement is probably that I’ve lived my life with my fiddle, and that it has managed to move me around the world"

Musician Martin Hayes curates the annual Masters of Tradition, taking place next week in West Cork. Picture: Joe Chapman

I grew up in the townland of Maghera near the village of Feakle, Co Clare on a relatively small farm. My father, PJ Hayes, was a fiddle player. My mother was an avid gardener and a very free-thinking and powerful woman. I was the eldest of the family and I have a younger brother, Patrick and two sisters following that, Anna-Marie and Helen.

I have this very early memory that never seems to go away of being wrapped up in the back of a horse cart with my father, going along this small, narrow road.