00:00 - Music as shared nervous system regulation
00:44 - Introduction to Louise Kelly and the episode’s focus
03:02 - Louise’s background in music therapy and why she speaks publicly about music’s power
04:32 - The TEDx selection process and the journey to speaking on stage
06:24 - Why music is a biological necessity, not just entertainment
07:46 - Sessions, teamwork, and rhythm as connection
09:01 - Growing up outside the Irish music tradition and feeling drawn in
10:55 - Discovering session etiquette through a therapist’s lens
12:49 - The nervous system’s job: keeping us safe
13:45 - Fight, flight, freeze, and fawn in session behaviour
15:05 - Loud playing as a possible fight response
16:33 - Playing louder after being ignored elsewhere
20:03 - Shy entry, fawning, and freeze in newcomers
21:00 - Humour and repeated movement as safety behaviours
22:25 - Watching body language and seat choice from the outside
23:39 - Why confrontation often pushes musicians toward flight
24:34 - Cultural identity, language, and why the tradition matters so deeply
25:08 - Louise rejoining beginner trad life through North Coast Antrim
26:43 - Practicing a session at home by recording and replaying it
28:26 - Therapy, music, and the value of repetition
29:44 - Confidence, anxiety, and finding a voice later in life
31:24 - Teenagers, music, and why young people live inside sound
32:28 - Why adults lose sight of music’s value
36:05 - What really stops newcomers is fear of getting it wrong
38:53 - How shame is learned through family and society
40:08 - School messages that damage confidence in music
41:16 - Everyone can participate without being “a trained singer”
42:06 - Walking in circles, staying on the periphery, and feeling safe first
43:19 - The sweet spot where musicians become one
44:17 - Coping strategies for anxiety and choosing music as support
46:20 - Breath work, self-awareness, and self-expression as regulation tools
48:08 - Session rules as a way to protect safety, not exclude people
49:28 - Mind-body awareness in music and in everyday life
50:44 - Music as mindfulness and being present in the moment
54:09 - Slow sessions as beginner-safe spaces and why they matter
57:47 - Session vibe, belonging, and why context changes everything
59:39 - Louise’s advice for listeners: be open, curious, and avoid perfectionism
61:34 - A memory of belonging in a school traditional group
63:48 - The tune that still moves Louise and why music stays personal
64:32 - Closing reflections on reopening a long-closed doorway
Conversational Transcript
*[This is an edited conversational transcript, lightly shaped for readability while keeping the spirit of the original conversation]
Music, nervous systems and the sweet spot
Louise:
One thing that happens with music, whether it is a band, a session, a choir or an orchestra, is that it surpasses everything.
All the nervous systems regulate, and it is like they nearly become one.
When you are playing music, you go to a different realm.
It is the hardest thing to explain to somebody who is not a musician.
But when you are playing with other musicians and you hit that sweet spot, it is like a different realm.
It is hard to put into words, so I will just say it like that.
If you can get there by sitting in the periphery, or by having to go up and down a few times, so be it.
Because it is way more important that you get to experience that feeling of togetherness than anything else.
Tara:
Welcome to In Tune with Tradition: Perspectives on Session Etiquette in Irish Traditional Music.
My guest today is Louise Kelly, a consultant music therapist from the North of Ireland, who is a TEDx speaker, an international keynote speaker on all things music, and co-founder of Resilient Rhythms.
Louise brings a fascinating perspective to this conversation, particularly around anxiety, the nervous system, and the different ways we try to create safety for ourselves.
There is a lot here for anyone who has ever felt nervous, overwhelmed or unsure of themselves in a session.
Before we begin, I need to warn you that Louise’s sound quality is quite poor in places. It has a crackle to it and occasionally sounds a bit like an old 78 record.
I considered recording the conversation again, but there was such a lively energy and flow between us that I knew we would lose something by trying to recreate it.
The conversation itself was far too good to leave sitting on a hard drive, so I hope you will treat the sound as part of the recording and bear with it.
Here is myself and Louise.
Tara:
Hello Louise. How are you keeping?
Louise:
Hello Tara. Lovely to finally see you.
Tara:
I know this does not go out as video, but we have been chatting back and forth that much now it is nice to see you.
I should introduce you first.
Louise Kelly, you are a music therapist. I came across you because somebody forwarded me your TEDx talk recently, and I was blown away.
I said, I have to share this with everybody I know, and I have to meet this woman.
So here we are.
Louise:
I am really glad it resonated.
Tara:
It certainly did.
Tell us a bit about that talk before we go into traditional music and sessions.
Louise:
The TEDx talk was in Tralee.
You had to submit a two-minute idea first. Then they asked for five minutes, and the next round was a Zoom.
There were seventeen other women because this was an all-woman TEDx event. The theme was empower and resilience.
I was on this Zoom with these ladies, powerhouses in their own right, talking about amazing things.
For me, even getting to that point was nearly enough because I had overcome a big fear.
I had overcome the fear of speaking out and talking about the power of music.
I knew about it, but I was always very reticent about talking about it.
Then a few weeks passed, and on a Friday evening my phone pinged.
I had the contact saved under TED, and I thought, “No, here we go.”
It was ten o’clock at night, and I thought it could not be good.
But they said, “Out of 150 submissions, we have chosen your talk.”
That was the start of a fantastic journey.
Music is not just entertainment
Louise:
The title of the talk was Music Isn’t a Luxury, It’s a Biological Necessity.
At the core of it, from before birth while we are in the womb, to our last breath, music has a role to play.
An important role.
Not just entertainment.
My point was that when we get to adulthood, a lot of us turn the music down.
We forget the joy it brings us and the power it holds.
We get too busy, too important, too serious.
My message was: let us remember how important music was when we were toddlers, when we were teenagers, and how important it still is in elderly care.
Many listeners will know someone with Alzheimer’s or dementia, or know of it, and they will know the power music has to bring people back.
It is locked in so deeply in our brain, and there is science behind it.
So if it works in all these different areas, why are we leaving it out as adults?
Tara:
There does seem to be a gap.
Louise:
Yes.
I do a lot of corporate work now, and I will bang the drum until they are sick of me banging it.
Music is not just entertainment.
When you think of teams, a session is ultimately a team of people, a collective of people.
If they are not working together, it is not going to work.
If everybody goes off and plays different tunes at different times, it is not going to work.
So if companies want teams to gel and work together, why not use music as a powerful force?
I do not mean going in and singing at them or getting them all to sing. A lot of people are very resistant to that.
But rhythm, connection and the core of what music is can be powerful.
Growing up with violin, not fiddle
Tara:
You played fiddle, or violin, when you were younger.
Louise:
Yes.
When I picked up the fiddle, I had to go to orchestra to get violin lessons.
I learned to read music.
I started in junior orchestra and worked my way up.
Where I come from, my accent might give it away, I am from the North. North north. Any further and you are in the Atlantic.
I was not surrounded by Irish music or Irish culture.
I grew up in a small village, and I joke that I would have been more likely to hear a lamb or a marching band.
That is not putting shade on that. It was just my experience.
I remember being very conscious of having to walk up the road to get the bus to school, wearing my blazer and tucking my fiddle under the blazer.
I saw other people at school who came from villages where traditional music was at the heart of their family and community, and I felt envy.
I wanted to be part of it.
That got me to join the traditional group in school.
That was where I dipped my toe into Irish traditional music.
Tara:
There will be a lot of listeners in a similar place.
People who feel a little uncomfortable, or like an imposter.
Louise:
Totally.
Since you and I connected, I have been listening to your podcast like a child who has just found out about something.
I am like, give me more.
I am sitting outside when I should be making the dinner because I want to hear another episode.
It is like, this world exists and I did not know about it.
I had no clue that there was anything about etiquette or what happens in a session.
I had a romanticised view: the peat fire, the little Irish bar, the people magically appear, they all know what to play, and it is a wonderful experience.
My mind has been blown.
Session etiquette as nervous system
Tara:
In any group scenario, there is always some etiquette.
Maybe in sessions, because it is late at night, people are tired, alcohol might be involved, and things can explode more than they normally would.
Louise:
Yes.
But where you call it etiquette, and of course it is because there are rules, I look at it through my therapist brain as nervous system.
Tara:
Tell me more.
Louise:
I have not stopped thinking about this.
I thought, I know, I will flip the script on Tara and get her to think the way my brain thinks.
When people start thinking this way, they might say, “My goodness, that is why Tara was like this. That is why Louise does that in a session. That is why Johnny always sits on the outskirts.”
Our nervous system’s main role is to keep us safe.
It does that very well.
But because of previous experiences, where we have grown up, or different things that have happened to us, small things can trigger us and make us dysregulated.
You are either regulated or dysregulated.
When you are dysregulated, or a bit out of sorts, there are the four different responses people have heard about: fight, flight, freeze and fawn.
Every one of us has a nervous system.
So every person who walks into a session is walking in with a nervous system state.
That does not mean we are all walking in dysregulated. We are not.
The reason we come to a session is because somewhere we want to feel connected, community and identity.
But when you think of those four nervous system responses and relate them to people within a session, it gets interesting.
The person who dominates the room
Louise:
Think of the person who comes into a session and plays really loudly.
They will not stop.
They play tune after tune after tune.
Everybody is looking around, and it is like they are dominating the room.
For me, that could be a fight response.
They may be saying, “If I just keep going here, and I am the loudest in the room, that keeps me safe.”
That is always the ultimate thing: keeping themselves safe.
Maybe they do not feel trust within a group.
Maybe group situations have not always felt safe for them.
Maybe they had to be the dominant one.
Maybe it is their family dynamic.
They always had to fight for survival, and that is so ingrained that when they get into a session, it is head down, go, go, go.
It might be that they do not know the people in the session. They are walking in thinking, “I do not know this group. I do not trust them. I do not feel safe. So my go-to is to keep playing until somebody tells me to stop.”
Tara:
Do you think the volume thing might sometimes be someone feeling they have not been heard?
Louise:
Absolutely.
Again, this is surmising.
It could be somebody coming from a home where they were not heard.
Maybe they were a younger sibling and the older ones always got their turn.
Then suddenly, here is their opportunity.
They are in a session thinking, “You are going to hear me now.”
Tara:
I do find there are times when I go into a session after being at a meeting or somewhere where I was pushed to the side, and my ideas were brushed off.
When I go into a session after that, my energy is huge. I will play loudly because I will be here.
Louise:
That is great, because what you are saying is that you are going from dysregulation into a place where you think, “This is my space. This is my music. This is where I feel safe.”
So you use it to regulate yourself.
I am not saying everybody who plays loud is in fight mode.
Not at all.
What I am saying is that as a collective, when we are sitting there, maybe we can look at it with a different set of eyes.
Maybe it is the night for Tony or Tara to play loud because they are regulating themselves.
It is about being aware of others.
We come in with our own stuff.
If we can be mindful of why somebody might be doing something, it might make for a nicer feeling.
The quiet person at the edge
Louise:
Imagine a younger girl coming in the door.
Her head is down.
She scuttles around the outskirts for a while.
Then she gets into a chair, and it takes her ages to get the instrument out.
For a long time, she holds the instrument and does not play it.
What response might she be in?
Tara:
Is that fawn, possibly?
Louise:
Probably.
There is not really a right or wrong answer.
But it would allude to fawn.
“I will not be disruptive. I will avoid conflict. If I sit back here, nobody will notice me. I will play quietly.”
That is a way of creating safety.
The person getting up and down
Louise:
Another example might be somebody who gets up and down a lot.
They go to the bar, to the toilet, outside to answer the phone.
It might just be that they want to go to the bar or need the toilet.
But if they are skittish, playing a new tune, with their coat on the back of the chair ready to go, that could be nervous system too.
That is, “I need out now.”
They may sit facing the door so they know where the exit is.
I find positioning extremely interesting.
It would be fascinating to video a session and look back at it from a bird’s-eye view.
You might see one person going in and out, another with their head down, and you would think, “My goodness, this is fascinating.”
Tara:
If somebody is doing something that feels like anxious behaviour, or what I hate calling a breach of etiquette, it is hard to call it out.
Sometimes musicians will do the flight thing themselves.
They go up and down to the bar, trying to get back in and thinking, “Is it safe yet? No, it is not.”
They do not want to get into confrontation.
Louise:
Absolutely.
Not many of us like confrontation unless we are constantly stuck in that hypervigilant fight-to-survive state.
The majority of us do not.
I doubt many people go into a session wanting to fight with everybody.
From the sessions I have seen from the sidelines, people are there for the main reason: to share music, identity and something that could have been taken from our culture many years ago.
That is why it runs so deep in us.
It could have been taken away if we had not held it so deeply.
Music, language and reconnection
Tara:
The language is still only hanging on by a thread.
A thin thread.
Louise:
Especially here, I have seen with young musicians, even if it is not necessarily Irish traditional music, there is a resurgence of the Irish language, whether in rap, pop or other music.
I welcome it.
Since chatting to you, I have signed up to North Coast Trad.
I swear to God, I am going on a beginner course.
I thought, I have missed this.
So thank you for reminding me.
My fiddle is there, and I do not use my fiddle in therapy.
I use music every day, but there are parts of it I have to reconnect with.
Playing along as practice
Tara:
For learners who are nervous about sessions, I often say: record yourself playing a tune, get Bluetooth speakers, blare it out and play along with yourself.
You will never play it the same by yourself as you do in a session.
If I am playing something here by myself, it is not how I play in a session.
I play amazing in a session.
I play terribly by myself.
Louise:
That is how we get music in.
Repetition.
Repeat, repeat, repeat.
That is how we retain everything.
Playing it again and again makes it part of our psyche.
Then you become more comfortable.
The fingers and the brain connect, and you surprise yourself.
The more comfortable we get, the more we can add the little nuances.
It is a bit like a therapy session.
There are never two the same.
Therapy sessions and Irish sessions
Tara:
I suppose you could compare a therapy session and an Irish session.
They can have a lot of the same outcomes.
We are experiencing joy, healing, companionship.
It is amazing.
I read something recently about being seen, heard and safe as the ingredients for confidence.
Louise:
If you do not feel safe, you are not going to speak out.
If you do not feel seen, you are not going to speak out.
If you do not feel heard, you are not going to speak out.
Those are three ingredients.
When you get them, you find your voice, pardon the pun.
Then confidence comes.
Anxiety and the appearance of confidence
Louise:
What really surprises people is that all my life, I have been crippled with anxiety.
From primary school through secondary school, university and work, I took massive panic attacks.
People look at me and laugh and say, “No way Louise, you are so confident.”
But anxiety has been there.
That is why music matters.
Tara:
How did you get over your anxiety?
Louise:
Lots of therapy.
No, lots of self-work.
Intuitively, maybe because I am a musician and rhythm is part of me, I always knew to follow my breath.
I looked into breathwork, then the nervous system, and what was happening in my body.
Once I realised it could be as simple as saying, “Am I in danger or am I not?” something changed.
I recommend therapy if people want to do therapy, whether musical, creative or otherwise.
Self-expression helps.
I do scribbling, journaling, meditation, breathwork, reading, educating myself.
It goes back to the core of what we are.
Finding the breath.
Finding the beat.
Regulating the body.
Louise:
Before I came on here today, I had to sit and take a few deep breaths to calm myself.
For me, the issue is not not being able to talk.
As you might have noticed, I can talk.
It is regulating myself enough to get the important things out.
And being kind to yourself.
God almighty.
We are all walking around with baggage nobody can see.
We do not need to add to it by beating ourselves up because we do not know a tune, or because we did not play as well as last week, or because we made a mistake.
That is not what a session is about.
Yes, a session needs rules. Society needs rules.
But I think the rules are there to keep people safe and bounded, so it is a safe space for everybody.
That is what etiquette is.
It is not about, “Do this right,” or “Do that wrong.”
It is about inviting curiosity.
If somebody is struggling, the older, wiser or more experienced person can lend a hand, a listening ear or a little encouragement.
Like we would do in any other walk of life.
Tara:
Once you start exploring these things, you might catch yourself thinking, “Why is my stomach slightly uncomfortable? Why are there butterflies there?”
Then you ask why and begin to find what is really going on.
Louise:
Totally.
When I was at school, everything was up here in the brain.
The body was for playing outside, climbing and doing things.
Now, thankfully, we are more aware of the mind-body connection.
The gut, the brain and everything working together.
If your body has butterflies, a shaky leg or tension, it is trying to tell you something.
Listen to it.
The session as mindfulness
Tara:
I find gratitude helps me in a session.
Sometimes I used to think the session should be this or should be that.
Then I decided I would just enjoy it for what today’s session is.
Because if I always want it to be something else, I am always searching and never happy.
Louise:
That is one of the things music can do.
We are in the moment.
It is a mindful practice.
People think mindfulness is sitting cross-legged, but no.
When your mind is focused on one particular thing, and it takes you away from what happened during the day, that is mindfulness.
You are focused.
You are present.
You are in the moment.
The thinking brain switches off and the body takes over.
Ducks, joy and regulation
Tara:
I had such a busy day today that it was one of the first days I was not grateful for what is around me.
I do not like when I do that.
I love going up to let the ducks out in the morning.
The ducks, hens and geese run into the pond.
The ducks groom themselves before food, and the hens go straight for the food.
It is lovely to watch their joy.
They feel safe.
They are like children playing around.
Louise:
Regulation in action.
Maybe we should be more like ducks.
Tara:
Maybe.
Louise:
There is still time in the day for gratitude.
I am instantly thinking of a beautiful slow air to put on.
Take three minutes to listen to that piece of music.
Tara:
I like that.
Or I might play a tune on the concertina, because I am learning concertina.
I never thought of introducing music into my stress there now, so thank you.
Louise:
Absolutely.
Slow tune learning sessions
Tara:
How do you feel about slow tune learning sessions?
There are different types of sessions: advanced sessions, slow sessions for learners or improvers, and sometimes youth sessions.
One listener asks: how do you feel about slow tune learning sessions, separate from the regular session, to help learners build repertoire?
Session anchors often walk a fine line between fostering good music and craic while also handling other people’s egos, anxieties and sometimes session-wrecking behaviours.
Can you suggest any concepts or strategies for treading that line?
Louise:
That makes me think about learning anything.
I would say wholeheartedly yes.
Why would you not have a slow learning session?
It is a safety space.
Did you get on a bike and ride without stabilisers straight away?
Did you get into a car and start driving it?
It almost seems like it should be a prerequisite.
If you go straight into a session where people are playing ten to the dozen and you cannot play, it will put you off.
You will become disinterested.
You will feel inadequate.
It will not be an encouraging space.
So yes, have beginner, medium and higher spaces if you can.
When you feel ready, you can dip in and out and test the water yourself.
Etiquette still applies in slow sessions
Louise:
In a slow session, you can still have a wide range of standards.
So you have to have your expectations too.
When you go into a slower session, you might pick up a tune faster than someone else.
But it does not mean the session is built specifically for you.
The etiquette remains the same.
You encourage.
You support.
You wait.
You listen.
You attune.
You give space.
Social structures and belonging
Tara:
Someone asks about the social structures of the session.
Would you join a senior hurling team training session if you were a junior B player?
Or would you sit with a random group to eat a meal in a restaurant without an invitation?
Louise:
That reiterates the importance of connection and acceptance within a session.
If you walk in and everyone is a stranger, and there are no welcoming faces, you are not going to feel part of anything.
It will not encourage you to stay.
It will not encourage you to try harder.
You are not going to leave enthused with a desire to learn more about the music or culture.
We all have to be advocates.
A weekly local session, or a session among friends, is completely different to a high-energy session late at night at a festival.
If you are with your hurling team training friends, you can cross the divide because they are your friends.
Why?
Because you are all regulated.
You all know each other.
That nervous system work is already sorted, so you can get straight into the joy.
Whereas if it is a new situation, you have to deal with all the different personalities and figure them out before you get to the bit you want to be there for, which is the music.
Advice from a music therapist
Tara:
Is there anything you would say to listeners from the music therapy side?
Louise:
Be open.
Be curious.
Please do not try to be perfect.
Please do not stop because you are not the best or because you do not feel good enough.
Your voice, your fiddle, your whistle is just as important as any other one in that session.
Whether you have played for thirty years or three weeks, if you have had the courage to step in when others do not, use it.
Use music for calmness, for up-regulating, but do not forget it.
Anybody listening here probably loves music and potentially plays music.
Sometimes we just need that wee reminder.
It is in us.
Our heart beats.
Sound is the first hearing to develop and the last sense to go.
If somebody is very ill and everything else is shutting down, hearing is the last sense to go. That is why they encourage people to keep talking and keep singing.
Music is a powerful tool.
If you play it, it is an honour to own and share.
And if you do not play, that does not mean you cannot enjoy it.
It is a universal language.
We do not need to know everything about it to enjoy it.
Tara:
The previous guest left a question for you.
Can you recall a moment in a session when something shifted in the room, even before the music changed?
Louise:
I am thinking of the traditional group at school.
We were the only group to stay after school on a Friday. Everybody else wanted to get home.
At that time, it was all about choirs and orchestras.
We had one wee music teacher, and people always say there will be one teacher who you remember and who has an impact on you.
This teacher did that for me.
I can actually see myself sitting in that wee music room now.
There were the Brollys, who had all this Irish musical wonderfulness about them, and then there was the likes of me and another girl playing guitar, not that great.
But there was something.
Everything aligned.
I had a moment of belonging.
A bit of, “Wow, this works.”
It was beautiful.
It was not a session. We were practising.
But it was a moment, and it was beautiful.
Thank you to whoever asked that question because it has brought me back to that lovely moment.
I think when I come off here, I will sit and think about it a wee bit longer.
Remembering tunes, remembering feeling
Tara:
You might even take out your fiddle again.
Louise:
You never know.
I know there will be tunes in my earphones tonight.
I am terrible with names of tunes.
That might be part of what stops me.
People say the name of a jig or reel, and I go, “I do not know what that is.”
Tara:
I would not let that stop you.
Louise:
There is an air, I think it is Éamonn an Chnoic.
It just moves me.
Sometimes when I am driving, I put it on and it takes you somewhere else.
Tara, I could stay on and chat to you forever.
Tara:
I know.
Thank you so much. You have been brilliant.
Louise:
Thank you, Tara.
It has been my absolute pleasure.
And thank you for reopening a wee doorway that has been closed for quite a few years.
I am getting emotional.
Thank you for reminding me of it.
I am definitely going to revisit it.
I use music every day, but there are wee parts of it that I have to reconnect with, and I am looking forward to it.
Thank you for reminding me of that.
Louise Kelly’s episode gives us a different way to look at what happens in a session.
Not instead of etiquette.
Underneath it.
When someone plays too loudly, dominates the room, hides at the edge, gets up and down all night, refuses to join in, or cannot seem to settle, the easy response is to label the behaviour.
Rude.
Awkward.
Arrogant.
Nervous.
Difficult.
Louise does not ask us to excuse everything. She asks us to stay curious for a moment longer.
What is the person trying to protect?
Do they feel safe?
Are they trying to be heard?
Are they avoiding conflict?
Are they looking for an exit?
Are they using the music to regulate something they cannot quite name?
That does not mean anything goes.
The session still needs boundaries. It still needs listening, respect, awareness and care for the people already in the room. But Louise’s framing helps explain why the same session can feel joyful to one person and threatening to another.
It also explains why music matters so much.
A session is not just notes in the right order.
It is bodies regulating together.
It is breath, rhythm, attention, memory, nervous systems, belonging and courage.
It is the person at the edge slowly taking the instrument out of the case.
It is the learner discovering that a slow session is not lesser. It is a safety space.
It is the experienced musician remembering that a little encouragement can change somebody’s relationship with music.
It is the adult who thinks they have left music behind finding a doorway open again.
Louise’s strongest reminder is that music has been with us since before birth. It is not new to us, even when a tune, instrument or tradition is new.
Maybe that is why sessions can affect us so deeply.
They are not only social spaces.
They are nervous system spaces.
And when they work, when the music, people and room begin to breathe together, they give us something that is very hard to explain to anyone who has not felt it.
Togetherness.
Regulation.
Belonging.
A different realm.
*Produced & recorded by Tara Connaghan and edited by Anita Alvarez Santos
*Intro music: "Untitled Highlands" from the album Far Side of the Glen by Derek McGinley & Tara Connaghan
Louise Kelly, TedX Talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTKezQB0A3E
https://resilientrhythms.co.uk/
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