Mags McCarthy
{{short description|Irish country singer}}
{{Orphan|date=February 2021}}
{{Infobox musical artist
| name = Mags McCarthy
| image =
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| background = solo_singer
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| birth_date = {{birth-date|1989}}
| birth_place = County Cork, Ireland
| instrument =
| genre = Country
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| associated_acts = Dolly Parton
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}}
Mags McCarthy (born 1989/1990) is an Irish country singer.{{Cite web|title=Watch: Cork woman's new single is taking the US country music charts by storm|url=https://www.echolive.ie/wow/arid-40106564.html|access-date=2020-11-10|website=Echo Live|date=12 August 2020}}
Early life
McCarthy grew up on a family farm in Dripsey, County Cork, Ireland, where she milked cows and tended to cattle. Her grandfather (who died when she was two years old) played the fiddle. She uses his fiddle, reported to be 134 years old in 2020, when playing music. Her interest in performing began at age four,{{Cite web|last=Vissman|first=Donna|date=2018-03-17|title=VIDEO: Irish Country Artist Mags McCarthy Performs|url=https://williamsonsource.com/video-irish-country-artist-mags-mccarthy-performs/|access-date=2020-11-10|website=Williamson Source|language=en-US}} where she started Irish dancing classes and began playing the fiddle. McCarthy lived in Los Angeles for a short time in 2010.
She spent three years as a lead with Rhythm of the Dance and completed post-graduate studies in ethnomusicology at University College Cork. McCarthy taught music at the Terence MacSwiney Community College in Knocknaheeny, Cork. As of 2020, she was 30 years of age.{{Cite web|title=Meet the Cork musician whose latest single was written by Dolly Parton|url=https://www.echolive.ie/corknews/Meet-the-Cork-musician-whose-latest-single-was-written-by-Dolly-Parton-a918ad3d-eefd-4514-a3a1-10a49695021d-ds|access-date=2020-11-10|website=Echo Live|date=4 May 2020}}
Music career
In 2016, during a two-week holiday, McCarthy initially travelled to Nashville to record 16 of her original songs. Later, in 2017, McCarthy moved fulltime to Nashville where she met Dolly Parton and Parton's management team. McCarthy was given the chance to play at the Grand Ole Opry and later played at the Wildhorse Saloon and Country Music Association Festival. She was also invited to perform for U.S President Barack Obama in the White House on St Patrick’s Day, which she counted as the "highlight of her career".{{citation needed|date=September 2021}}
She has received invitations to perform before other dignitaries such as the President of Ireland, the Mayor of Shanghai, members of the British Royal family and the European Parliament in Brussels.{{Cite web|title=Muskerry News {{!}} Congratulations Mags!|url=http://muskerrynews.biz/wp/?p=7288|access-date=2021-02-19|language=en-US}}
In 2020, her single, a cover of Dolly Parton’s Light of a Clear Blue Morning, reached number 37 in the US country charts, and number 1 on the Hot Disc European Top 40 chart.{{citation needed|date=September 2021}} During the COVID-19 pandemic, she was back home at her family farm in Dripsey and said that she was delighted to drive around in her Massey Ferguson 35.{{Cite web|last=Allen|first=Caroline|date=2020-04-19|title=Country singer swaps Nashville for life on Cork farm|url=http://www.agriland.ie/farming-news/country-singer-swaps-nashville-for-life-on-cork-farm/|access-date=2020-11-10|website=Agriland.ie|language=en}}{{Cite web|title=Milking and making music|url=https://www.farmersjournal.ie/milking-and-making-music-557384|access-date=2020-11-10|website=www.farmersjournal.ie|language=en}}