The world’s a sadder place with out Sinead O’Connor: Former radio presenter Mike Edgar calls Irish singer extraordinary, completely different and sang from her soul as he remembers pop star following her shock demise

Standing on the stage of the Irish Music Corridor of Fame on Dublin’s Center Abbey Avenue, Mike Edgar may really feel his rigidity ranges rising. 

As one of many hosts of that yr’s Sizzling Press Music Awards, it had come to the spotlight of the night — the presentation of a lifetime achievement award to legendary American singer/songwriter and activist Nina Simone.

It had been an surprising coup to get the excessive priestess of soul to fly to Dublin to just accept her award and town centre venue, full of the Irish rock ‘n’ roll royalty of the day, was throbbing with pleasure.

Deciding who ought to current it to her, Mike says, was a no brainer.

‘Myself and Niall Stokes, we simply checked out one another and mentioned, ‘it is acquired to be Sinéad O’Connor’,’ he says of the Sizzling Press editor and Mike’s co- producer of the awards present.

However as Mike now smilingly admits: ‘You by no means knew what was going to come back subsequent with Sinéad — in an thrilling approach.’

The Irish star Sinead O’Connor was discovered useless in her London flat aged 56 this week

Mike Edgar, the previous head of leisure, music and sport on the BBC and who now runs his personal massively profitable manufacturing firm, is unequivocal in his evaluation of Sinead as being considered one of music’s nice figures

He was quickly to seek out out on that October night time in 1999, as he and Niall waited on stage for Sinéad to hitch them.

‘I bear in mind listening to somebody in my earpiece saying, ‘Sinéad is on her approach, she’s coming by way of the again doorways.’ It was being broadcast dwell,’ Mike explains. ‘With dwell programmes there’s at all times an air of rigidity and expectation of what was coming subsequent.’

There was one other message shortly relayed by way of his earpiece. ‘By the best way,’ they advised him. ‘You have to handle her as Mom Bernadette Marie.’

Seconds later, Sinéad walked by way of the door of the auditorium. ‘She was within the full priest outfit,’ Mike smiles.

‘She got here as much as us and I feel it is one of many proudest moments of my life, to be sharing a stage with Sinéad O’Connor and Nina Simone.’

Fairly what Nina considered being handed a big piece of Waterford crystal by a diminutive Dublin singer sporting a black swimsuit, clerical collar and enormous gold crucifix round her neck, is anyone’s guess.

‘In equity, Nina was within the latter phases of her life,’ says Mike diplomatically. ‘However she was extraordinarily gracious and had an enormous heat smile, I simply acquired the sense that these have been two ladies who linked immediately.

Mike, who this yr obtained an OBE in King Charles’s birthday honour checklist, invited Sinéad into BBC studio 5 in Belfast in March 1987

‘They have been two fighters for justice, two enormously gifted performers and in addition two enormously gifted musicians, they’d a lot in frequent.’

As a former long-time presenter and producer of considered one of Europe’s longest working specialty music reveals, Throughout the Line on BBC Radio Ulster, Mike commonly got here throughout Sinéad all through her profession. He remembers their first assembly vividly.

 ‘I acquired a name from her good friend and supervisor Fachtna O’Ceallaigh, who requested if I’d be interested by having a chat along with her,’ he explains. ‘She’d simply written The Lion and the Cobra; I acquired a cassette tape of it and it was mind- blowingly good.’

Mike, who this yr obtained an OBE in King Charles’s birthday honour checklist, invited Sinéad into BBC studio 5 in Belfast.

‘It was March 1987, and I consider it was the primary ever BBC session with Sinéad,’ he says. ‘She did a dwell model of Jerusalem and two different tracks. I am going to fortunately admit I used to be completely mesmerised by her magnificence, but additionally, and extra importantly, by the facility of her efficiency, it was simply fairly extraordinary.

‘I would seen {a photograph} of her beforehand, however that did not do her justice. While you met her at the moment, you’d by no means met anybody like her earlier than — she was so completely different, so placing.

‘It was such a superb look and on high of that was her pure magnificence.

‘She was charming and gracious and surprisingly shy. It was early days in her profession and she or he was discovering her ft, she was turning into the performer she would develop into.’

Sinead presents Dr Nina Simone an award for her lifetime achievements  music on the 1999 Heineken Sizzling Press Awards 

Mike, the previous head of leisure, music and sport on the BBC and who now runs his personal massively profitable manufacturing firm, is unequivocal in his evaluation of Sinead as being considered one of music’s nice figures.

‘You knew you have been assembly somebody who was the real article,’ he says. ‘It was virtually like assembly David Bowie. These are people who find themselves completely different from different individuals in lots of respects, you realize in your coronary heart that they sing from the soul and with a reality.

‘They’re individuals who do not compromise. Typically they get it proper and, like the remainder of us, typically they get it mistaken. On points Sinéad felt strongly about, a lot of what she mentioned was true and beautifully courageous and fearless.

‘Different instances she might have mentioned issues that later she went again and considered and altered her opinion on it.’

Certainly, Sinéad was typically controversial in her opinions about many issues, which she was by no means shy about expressing. Again in 1989 she declared her help for the IRA, however a yr later retracted her assertion.

‘I used to be very, very younger and I did not know what I used to be speaking about,’ she defined in later years. ‘Clearly one has compassion and understanding of the circumstances that drive individuals to violence. However y’know, particularly for somebody like me who’d come from violence, to speak like that was b******s.’

In 2014, she introduced that she supposed to hitch Sinn Féin, however the next yr she mentioned she’d modified her thoughts after speaking to a few social gathering officers. On her Fb web page she accused them of not b heing critical a couple of united Eire: ‘It is not sensible for Sinn Féin to talk of sovereignty and water however not communicate of ending partition.’

Mike appreciated the very fact she was a ‘actually robust and opinionated particular person’, who by no means backed down when she actually believed in one thing

Whereas Mike remembers speaking to her concerning the state of affairs in Northern Eire at instances, he does not recall ‘the specifics’.

‘As a presenter I used to be imagined to be neutral,’ he explains. ‘However I feel my opinion differed from Sinéad’s about what the North was going by way of on the time. She needed to combat for injustice and there was loads of injustice right here on the time, so she was proper to take action.

‘However there was additionally a romanticism about it, and I feel later in life she most likely felt there have been components she possibly would have needed to learn up a bit extra on.

‘There have been complexities concerning the North, it was a barely tougher place to grasp, you needed to dig a wee bit deeper, however she did realise that herself. So I had the utmost respect for her. Typically you blast off about issues and you then come again later in life, and also you go, I’ve discovered a bit extra about that. I feel she was a type of individuals.’

Mike appreciated the very fact she was a ‘actually robust and opinionated particular person’, who by no means backed down when she actually believed in one thing.

‘That was the punk in her and I beloved that,’ he says. ‘For me who was from Belfast, a music metropolis, it felt like I used to be getting again in contact with punk once more, she had an unimaginable punk rock spirit.

‘Punk had been alive in Belfast within the Seventies and early Eighties earlier than it simply appeared to vanish after which Sinéad got here alongside. All the pieces she did was fearless, particularly [talking] about victims and abuse, the Church and State, refugees. She was forward of her time, banging on about stuff.’

It is clear Mike, one of many North’s most revered figures within the music neighborhood, believed Sinéad (pictured in 1990 on the MTV Video Music Awards) was a really gifted performer

It has been a query typically requested over the previous couple of days, did Sinéad have any inkling how a lot she was beloved by her followers?

‘I hope she realised how extremely all of us considered her,’ says Mike. ‘I at all times felt it wasn’t about commerciality along with her, she did not wish to be a pop star. I feel she needed to be somebody who did some good and shared her expertise.’

It is clear Mike, one of many North’s most revered figures within the music neighborhood, believed Sinéad was a really gifted performer.

‘In equal measure she may come throughout as somebody who was very shy, after which the powerfulness of her efficiency and her lyrics have been such a juxtaposition of that,’ he explains. ‘The energy of character and the realism of what got here out of her mouth, it might bowl you over.

‘In lots of respects she was fairly small and diminutive, elfin-like, however on the identical time, she might be like a 747 jet, enormously highly effective. I feel she owned each efficiency, what you bought was from the very depths of her soul.

‘She additionally knew how to take a look at the digicam, how you can get her message throughout, and she or he knew nice mic approach. She used all these instruments to get throughout her lyrics and her ideas, it is a reward that only a few have.’

One other of his favorite recollections is when Sinéad duetted with Ronan Keating on a particular dwell efficiency of the tune Good Day for BBC Music Dwell.

‘It was actually advanced, we have been hooking up everybody from Lou Reed doing the intro, by way of to all these different performers throughout Eire, the UK and America. A few of them did not work out precisely as we hoped,’ he laughs. ‘However Sinéad and Ronan, the 2 of them rose to the event.

‘Sure, they got here from very completely different music backgrounds, however they did an incredible job collectively.’

Sinéad was typically beneficiant along with her time when it got here to travelling to Northern Eire.

‘This was pre-Good Friday Settlement and I consider music is a good healer,’ says Mike. ‘There aren’t any borders in music and there are at all times individuals who swing in behind to assist out. Sinéad was one of many individuals who once we invited her, she got here.

‘It was at all times a second along with her, when she stepped as much as the microphone, it was nerve- tingling stuff, it was at all times particular. You simply knew it wasn’t simply one other night time at work, it might be one thing you’d at all times bear in mind.

‘She popped up on different issues for us, she’s a really non secular particular person and she or he did Songs of Reward for us just a few instances, which have been at all times sensible. I did the Late Present on BBC2 along with her. Any time it felt proper for her, she’d do it and put 101% into it. If it wasn’t for her, she’d let you realize.’

It has been just a few years since their paths final crossed.

‘I left the BBC in 2019 and arrange my very own TV firm,’ says Mike. ‘Now I discover the concept she’s gone form of exhausting to consider. Anybody who has a coronary heart and anybody within the music neighborhood actually felt for her over the previous couple of years, she went by way of a fantastic deal in her life.

‘She had rather a lot to take care of and skilled loads of tragedy and once you contextualise all of that, it is wonderful what she achieved along with her life.

‘Typically it is easy to knock individuals, significantly after they have robust views and do issues others can be afraid of doing. However this was a unprecedented particular person and superb human being, somebody who’d gone by way of a tumultuous life herself and had that burn inside her to combat for justice for others, it is so commendable.

‘While you marry that with a voice like no different, you then’re bumping into one thing extraordinary and really uncommon. Genuinely, she’s a type of lights all of us share for some time, after which when it goes out, the world is a sadder place.

‘However the legacy is there with the music.’