THE ‘ONE TO WATCH’ INTERVIEW

Sarah McQuaid: ‘I’d call out song requests to my mum in the next room’

The singer-songwriter on her musical childhood, listening to the Beatles on her Mickey Mouse turntable and how her mother's death sent her in a new creative direction.

Questions by David Rea

11 October 2025

Singer-songwriter Sarah McQuaid sitting cross-legged on the floor holding a fern leaf

Photo by Phil Nicholls (www.philnicholls.co.uk)

David Rea: What’s your earliest memory of hearing music?

Sarah McQuaid: I’ve actually written a song about this! My earliest memories are of lying in bed listening to my mother singing and playing her guitar in the next room. I used to call out requests — ‘Froggy Went a-Courting’ was a particular favourite of mine. Decades later, when I had children of my own, I discovered the best way to make time for guitar practice was to sit on the floor outside the kids’ room, playing and singing until they fell sleep. One night they were taking a while to drop off and I asked, ‘Are you still awake?’ I think we all have a moment in our lives when we hear the voice of our mother or father coming out of our own mouths, and it happened to me that night. That moment was the inspiration behind ‘Last Song’, which I recorded both on my 2008 album I Won’t Go Home ’Til Morning and also on my 2021 live-in-lockdown album The St Buryan Sessions.

You were born in Spain, raised in Chicago, and were taught piano and guitar as a child by your mother, who is a folk singer. You were also inspired by the celebrated singer/songwriter/storyteller Gamble Rogers, who was your distant cousin. In what ways did these figures inspire you, and influence your musical sensibilities at a young age?

My mother wasn’t a professional singer, she just played and sang for friends and family. She had a great collection of LPs, a wildly eclectic assortment ranging from Bach to the Beatles to Joan Baez to wonderful old Smithsonian Folkways recordings by obscure folk and blues musicians from the 1930s, 40s and 50s — all of which I used to listen to on my Mickey Mouse record player (Mickey Mouse’s white-gloved index finger held the stylus). As well as teaching me to play guitar and piano, my mother also encouraged me to join the Chicago Children’s Choir when I was seven, which was crucial for my musical development. Around that time I also met Gamble Rogers. He was a distant cousin and came to visit when I was staying at my grandmother’s farm. I was very impressed when I learnt he made a living entertaining people with songs and stories he’d written. Up to that point, I hadn’t realised such a career existed. I thought, ‘Ooh, that sounds like a nice thing to do.’

What was the first record/tape/CD you remember buying?

‘Rapper’s Delight’, the 12-inch single by The Sugarhill Gang. I still have it!

Brian Wilson has described hearing the Ronettes’ ‘Be My Baby’ as life changing. Bruce Springsteen said something similar about hearing Bob Dylan’s ‘Like a Rolling Stone' for the first time on the radio. Is there a piece of music which changed everything for you?

When I was fourteen I discovered Joni Mitchell and proceeded to buy every record of hers that I could lay my hands on. I listened and sang along with them all incessantly, and drove myself crazy trying to learn the guitar parts. That was how I started experimenting with alternative tunings, eventually settling on DADGAD when I was 18 or so. I’ve been playing in nothing but DADGAD for over 30 years now!

What’s the record you have listened to the most in your life?

Joni Mitchell’s Blue.

What’s your ‘getting ready to go out on a Saturday night’ song?

‘The Raven’ from Tales of Mystery and Imagination by The Alan Parsons Project. It’s the walking-off music at every gig I do.

What’s your Sunday morning record?

The Bach Cello Suites, the 1995 Rostropovich recording.

What’s the greatest gig you’ve ever seen?

I was lucky enough to have been a music reviewer when I lived in Dublin, so I got to see dozens of gigs by everyone from David Byrne to Emmylou Harris to James Brown. But the most amazing performance of all was Tina Turner at the RDS arena. I still don’t know how she managed to race up and down the rickety metal staircases between stage levels wearing six-inch heels and singing at the same time. She had such incredible stamina and energy. She’s a truly inspiring individual!

What tends to be your songwriting process? Do the words or music come first? Do you write with the guitar or piano?

It’s more often the words that come first, but some of my best songs — ‘The Sun Goes on Rising’, for example — started with the guitar riff, followed by the melody, with the lyrics coming last. And while I mostly write on the guitar, I’ve just lately been writing more on the piano. There’s also a lot of variation in how long it takes me to write a song — some of them seem to just emerge spontaneously as finished songs, while others take years to write. I’ll note down a few words or hum or play a bit of music into a voice memo, and it could be months before I sit down to flesh them out into a full song.

“I was still deeply affected by the loss of my mother. The music I heard her sing and play in my childhood was very much on my mind, and my second album, I Won’t Go Home ’Til Morning consisted mostly of songs connected with her in some way. Another result of her death was that we moved to what had been her home. Going through her books I found one of John Dowland songs that blew my mind and sent me down a rabbit hole of research into medieval and Elizabethan music.” — Sarah McQuaid

Your releases have covered a range of different traditional folk music styles, from traditional Irish songs and instrumentals on your debut, Appalachian folk on your second album and songs from the mediaeval period on your third. What are the reasons for these choices — are they down to personal preferences?

They were mostly determined by external factors — the influences that happened to be around me at the time. In 2007, when I went back to playing music after a 10-year break, I was still deeply affected by the loss of my mother in 2004. The music I heard her sing and play in my childhood was very much on my mind, and my second album, I Won’t Go Home ’Til Morning consisted mostly of songs connected with her in some way. Another result of her death was that we moved to what had been her home. Going through her books I found one of John Dowland songs that blew my mind and sent me down a rabbit hole of research into medieval and Elizabethan music.

You have talked about how your collaboration with Zoë Pollock on 2008's ‘Crow Coyote Buffalo’ made you start to think about yourself as primarily a singer-songwriter. Could you tell us a little more about that?

Yes! Prior to meeting Zoë I thought of myself not so much as a songwriter, but more as a folksinger who happened to write an occasional song. Then quite by accident Zoë and I started co-writing. We met as mums at the school gates and got to be friends before I had any clue she was a former pop star, and then one day she played me a song she was writing. I said, ‘I really like the melody, but I can’t understand the words you’re singing — could you write them down for me?’ She said, ‘Oh, I’m just singing gibberish — I don’t have any lyrics for the song.’ I asked if she would like some and she said yes, and we wound up writing an album together. Working with Zoë taught me pretty much everything I know about songwriting, and the fact that someone of that calibre actually wanted to co-write with me was a tremendous confidence booster.

The St Buryan Sessions, released in 2021, is a personal favourite of mine. It was recorded without an audience at a church only a mile from your home. Perhaps my mind is playing tricks on me, but I feel the church contributes a really unique atmosphere to that recording. What were the reasons behind choosing to record there?

Yes, one reviewer described the album as a duet between me and the church, and I love that! Martin [Martin Stansbury, producer, engineer and Sarah’s manager] and I had been talking for years about making a live album. We both feel there’s something that comes out in a live performance that’s difficult to capture in a studio — and then when lockdown made touring impossible, Martin had the brilliant idea of recording a whole album live in a beautiful setting without an audience. St Buryan Church was a gorgeous space to sing in, with beautiful acoustics, and had loads of visual interest. The cameras could pan away from me and hone in on all the beautiful woodcarvings, stained glass, stonework and vaulting before coming back to me.

What are your plans for the future in terms of recording and performing?

 I’m currently on tour in the USA, and hope to start recording my new album at the end of November. Work’s also nearly finished on my new studio. My tour plans for next year include a short UK tour in January and early February; a five-week Netherlands, Germany and Denmark tour from February through to March; and then a longer UK tour that starts in April and continues into June. After that there are a few summer shows around the UK and a 10-week American tour in September, October and November. And in between all that I’ll be very busy with the new album!

Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to me, Sarah, I really appreciate it.

Thank you, Dave!