Tesco worker has something to sing about
After hugely successful concerts at the National Concert Hall Dublin and the University Concert Hall in Limerick, soprano Carmel Conway is leaving her job at Tesco to become a full-time professional.
And on Monday next she will head the bill at the National Concert Hall.
Carmel has worked for the past 16 years at Tesco in the Crescent Shopping Centre in Limerick.
She said: “I work in checkout, customer service and other areas, but I have decided to leave in order to pursue a full-time career as a professional singer.”
Carmel went to have her voice professionally trained on the encouragement of friends.
She said: “I used always be called on to sing at parties and on nights out and fried just kept saying I should get professional training. So six years I started going to Mary Fulham in Castletroy and I still go to her once a week. Mary has trained singers in Limerick for 40 years and she has been a tremendous help and support. I go to Mary once a week for about two hours and I exercise my voice each day for about 40 minutes. You are learning all the time. Mary is very good at helping me with Italian, French and German material. I am not a linguist but she has enabled with the pronunciations.”
As well as opera, Carmel does a lot of contemporary material.
She is managed by Dublin-based Karma Productions and she hopes to get work abroad now that she is turning full time professional.
Carmel said: “I have recorded one CD, titled ‘Timeless’ and it is on local release in Limerick.”
She is in big demand for weddings and other local events in Limerick.
A cousin of Carmel’s, Alan Costigan from Pennywell, Limerick, is studying opera in London and also means to embark on a career as a singer.
Carmel lives in Castletroy with her husband, Hassan Alam, a computer engineer.
