Ó Súilleabháin, Mícheál, 1950-2018

Musician, composer, and academic Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin was born in 1950 in Clonmel in County Tipperary. He performed and composed Irish traditional music on piano and harpsichord and his musical activities also included arranging and producing. He earned his Ph.D. from Queen's University Belfast, writing his dissertation on the music of Tommy Potts. From 1975 to 1993 he was a member of the music faculty at University College Cork. He expanded UCC's traditional Irish music offerings and in 1990 spent a semester at Boston College as a visiting professor of ethnomusicology. In 1994 he was recruited by the University of Limerick to establish the Irish World Music Centre, later renamed the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance. He developed and led the academy until 2016 and received many honors and awards. He died in 2018.