Angela Farrell Feature (Active
in Ireland 1966-1974)
Photo Gallery -
Band Lineups -
Discography
- Audio samples -
Where Are They Now?
The Story
Editor's note: Every care
has been taken to present only factual information in our stories
based on first person reports, newspaper articles and photographic
archives. If you can add anything or correct info in this story,
please email us and let us know.
After Dana's triumph in the 1970 Eurovision Song Contest with All
Kinds of Everything, the gala event was held in Dublin the
following year. Ireland's National Song Contest (from which its
Eurovision entry would be picked) featured showband favourites like
Red Hurley, Danny Doyle and Sonny Knowles among others. The cover of
the Spotlight issue dated March 6, 1971 featured a photo of
most of the National Song Contest singers...but surprisingly absent
was Angela Farrell.
The preview of the contest
described Portadown, Co. Armagh-based, 19 year old Angela, as
leading a "double life," working in a chemist shop by day and
singing cabaret at night. She was also making her debut on RTE
television, although the article reported that she had appeared on
Ulster Television and on RTE radio previously. Although living in
the North, Angela was actually born in Donegal.
The song, One Day Love, was written by Donegal dentist, Donal
Marin and Dublin housewife, Ita Flynn (although a report elsewhere
suggested Ita had arranged the song). Despite a strong showing by
the showband "heads," Red Hurley was edged into second place by the
relative unknown Angela, with the Coterie Folk group taking third
place. The showband loss continued a new trend as Ireland's first
five entrants in Eurovision had all been showband stars. But Dana
and Angela both came from cabaret, a growing entertainment trend at
the time. Additionally, Angela was the third consecutive female
singer based in the North to win the National Song Contest (Muriel
Day was the first).
The first reference we can find to
Angela was in 1966 when she stole the show at the Mother Mary Martin
(MMM) charity concert held in Drogheda at the age of 13. For the
next few years, Angela, finished her education and continued to sing
at local variety shows. In November, 1966 in a report about a
Variety Concert held in St. Patrick's Hall, Fintona, Angela was
described as the "singing discovery of 1966." However, we couldn't
find any other references to her until January 20th, 1971 when the
singers for the upcoming National Song Contest were announced.
In the run up to Eurovision,
Angela appeared in entertainment weekly, Spotlight, several
times, posing with her parents and in her old job at the chemist
shop. There was speculation that she would be backed by a local two
piece cabaret group from near Portadown called The Sandmen, but we
don't know if this ever happened. The article also featured Angela
with her manager, Bill Carville, who also happened to be her cousin.
It was also reported that although she had gone back to work for a
few days following the National Song Contest, she had quit her job
to become a full time cabaret artist before Eurovision.
However, lightning did not strike
twice and it would be another decade before Ireland would win
Eurovision again with Johnny Logan singing Shay Healy's What's
Another Year. Angela acquitted herself well, placing 11th
overall. Severine, from
Monaco, was the winner that year with
"Un banc un arbre une rue." She was signed
by Decca subsidiary, Rex Records prior to the song contest (as was
Dana the year before), the record of One Day Love entered the
Irish charts just before the Eurovision and went as high as number
4, staying on the chart for 5 weeks.
In the aftermath of the song
contest, Angela signed with George O'Reilly Enterprises which in May
started a new cabaret division and featured artists like We Four,
Angela and Terry McMahon. A decade earlier, George had been guiding
the fortunes of another fledgling female vocalist, Maisie McDaniel.
By September, it was reported by Donal K. O'Boyle that Angela (and
We Four) had parted company with George after being "very badly
treated since her Eurovision appearance."
It should be
pointed out that back in those early days, there was little
opportunity for singers with Angela's talents.
There was a reasonable circuit
of folk clubs which allowed artists like Danny Doyle and Johnny
McEvoy to make a living, but the real money (as both of these
artists eventually found out) was in the ballrooms. Even artists
like Johnny Logan, had difficulty after his Eurovision win making a
living in Ireland's dance halls. Angela was still limited to guest
appearances in ballrooms, variety concerts and the occasional TV or
radio spot.
In December, Angela finally
released her follow up single, I Am What I Am,
which also charted in the top ten, reaching number 9, but only stay in the
charts for two weeks. It would be her last chart entry. Although
1972 started well for Angela (as she had a record in the charts,
albeit briefly, she remained a "guest artist" for the most part. At
one stage she appeared several times with Australian group New World
(Tom Tom Turnaround) on the Irish leg of their European Tour.
In December, 1971 Angela took on
the starring role of Cinderella in the Cork Opera House's Pantomime
of the same name. Although she sang well, reviewers thought she
could have been "more vivacious in the role." In February, she was a
guest on the popular variety show hosted by the Patterson's folk
group on RTE. For the remainder of 1972, Angela on the new and
growing cabaret scene along with artists like Eileen Reid (who had
left the difficult life of a showband star) to go into the more
comfortable surrounds of the singing lounges, which were popping up
all over the country. By this point she had left her home in
Portadown and moved to Dublin. In an interview with Spotlight's
Julie Boyd, she said that she "regretted not making the moving
sooner" as Dublin was where it was all
happening musically.
Our records show that Angela
released one more record on Rex (the same label as Dana) in
November, 1972, Top of
the World, which failed to reach the charts. In 1973,
Angela was back in the spotlight when she wrote a letter to Maxi who
had been involved in the Eurovision with her entry Do I Dream.
A major row broke our between Maxi, her management and RTE as to the
speed the song was played. Angela wrote a letter to Maxi which had
harsh words for RTE and their lack of interest in actually winning
the contest (see letter below). It resulted in a "storm in a teacup"
with responses from both RTE and Decca records.
The last advert for Angela performing in cabaret we can find was in
March 1974 when she was on the same bill as Tony Kenny (who had
recently starred in Jesus Christ Superstar.
Although we have searched the Internet, we can find no information
on Angela today, other than You Tube videos of her 1971 performance.
An article in the Sunday
Independent in 1981 (below) reported that Angela had gone to
America where she was doing cabaret, but had ended ujp in Australia.
A check of the newspaper archives shows that in 1988, the Irish
Independent said Angela was living in Australia, by 1995, the
Evening Herald reported that Angela was living in Skerries and
working as a chemist. However, the following year (1996), RTE
producers could not locate her as they wanted to do a show featuring
past winners (maybe because she was actually still in Australia?!?).
In 2000, it was reported that Angela was living in Melbourne,
Australia with her family.
If you know any further info about Angela, please let us know.
Hopefully, more to come.....
click on thumbnails for full image
