Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin is well known internationally for his unique Irish piano style, which he has developed throughout his many recordings including, most recently, Becoming (Virgin 1998) and Templum (Virgin 2001). New work includes a masque entitled Madison’s Descent, commissioned by Montclair State University, New York. In March 2006, the Irish Film Institute released a DVD of his music (recorded by the RTECO under Proinsias Ó Duinn) for the 1925 silent movie Irish Destiny. Having developed the Irish Music Programme at the Music Department, University College Cork, he was appointed the first Professor of Music at the University of Limerick in 1994 where he established the Irish World Music Centre. Ten years on, this has now become the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance with nine postgraduate taught programmes, one undergraduate programme, and doctoral research programmes with some 200 students from over twenty countries. Several of these programmes are the first of their kind in the world.

He is a frequent guest speaker at international conferences and gatherings taking him in recent years to China, Kenya, India, Cuba, Mexico as well as Europe and North America. In March 2005 he was appointed by Minister John O’Donoghue at the Department of Arts, Sports and Tourism as the first Chair of Culture Ireland, a new body set up by the Irish Government to promote Irish Arts internationally. In June 2005, the National University of Ireland awarded him an Honorary D.Mus at his Alma Mater, University College Cork for playing " a seminal role in contemporary Irish culture in the last three decades". In October 2005, Boston College awarded him Honorary Alumnus status “for providing the genesis of the Boston College Irish Music program, as well as conceiving the premiere Irish Music archive in North America”.

Mick Moloney currently teaches at New York University in the Department of Music and the Irish Studies Program at Glucksman Ireland House. He combines the careers of professional musician, musicologist, folklorist, teacher, lecturer and arts presenter and advocate. He is an accomplished singer as well as an instrum¬entalist and possesses a vast storehouse of songs and instrumental pieces from the Irish and Irish-American tradition. He is the author of Far From the Shamrock Shore: the story of Irish American history through song published by Random House in 2002 with an accompanying CD on Shanachie Records. He has also written many articles for academic journals and specialized collections of essays in the fields of folklore, musicology and popular culture. He holds a Ph.D. in folklore and folk life from the University of Pennsylvania. He has taught ethnomusicology, folklore and Irish studies courses at the University of Pennsylvania, Georgetown University, Boston College and Villanova University. For the past five years he has directed The Washington Square Harp and Shamrock Orchestra, the only Irish music ensemble in any university in the U.S.A. He has recorded and produced over fifty albums of traditional music and has hosted three nationally syndicated folk music series on American Public Television.

He was a consultant, performer and interviewee on the Irish Television special Bringing It All Back Home, a participant, consultant and music arranger of the PBS documentary film, Out of Ireland and a music researcher and performer on the 1998 PBS special The Irish in America: Long Journey Home. In 1999 he was awarded the National Heritage Award from the National Endowment for the Arts – the highest official honor a traditional artist can receive in the United States. He currently serves on the advisory board to the Library of Congress in planning the Library’s first ever Irish American music and social history exhibit planned for 2007. He is also interested in international travel particularly in Southeast Asia and is currently working on major research projects in the area of cultural tourism and heritage in Burma, Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia and Laos.