Joanie Madden

Joanie Madden, the 2021 National Heritage Award recipient is a tin whistle and flute player who leads the internationally renown Irish Music and dance ensemble, Cherish the Ladies.

JOANIE MADDEN was born in the Bronx, New York to Irish parents, her mother Helen hails from County Clare and her father, Joe Madden was a well-known accordion player from County Galway. Joanie won All-Ireland Championship titles on both flute in addition to becoming the first American to win the Senior All Ireland Championship title on whistle. She was named the recipient of the 2021 National Heritage Fellowship Award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the highest award bestowed on a traditional artist and is considered a national living treasure to the country for her musical contributions to the cultural fabric of America.

She is the top selling whistle player in history with 500,000 solo album sales through the success of her "Song of the Irish Whistle" series. Joanie has recorded 24 albums and performed on over 200 albums including three Grammy Award winning albums. She has recorded with such luminaries as Pete Seeger, Sinead O’Connor, Vince Gill, The Clancy Brothers, Nanci Griffith and the Boston Pops.

Joanie has amassed a plethora of awards and citations to her credit including Irish America Magazine's Top 100 Irish Americans, chosen Traditional Musician of the Year by the Irish Voice newspaper and immortalized on the streets of her native Bronx with a street named after her, “Joanie Madden and Cherish the Ladies”. She was bestowed one of the nation’s highest awards as she was chosen for the Ellis Island Medal of Honor and also a recipient of the esteemed USA Artist Fellowship grant, singled out as one of the most innovative and influential artists in America, becoming the first Irish musician to win this prestigious grant. The Irish Music Awards presented her with a Lifetime Achievement and Irish America Magazine named her one of the Top 50 Most Powerful Irish Women in the world. The Irish Voice Newspaper named her one of the topmost influential Irish Americans of the past quarter century and the Irish American Writers and Artists chose Joanie for the Eugene O’Neill Lifetime Achievement Award.

For the past 38 years Joanie has been the leader and driving force behind the internationally renowned Irish traditional music and dance ensemble, Cherish the Ladies. During that time, she has become one of the most visible and respected Irish musicians as a composer and arranger and invariably entertaining stage performer. She organizes annual sold-out Irish Musical bus tours to Ireland and legendary Irish music and dance cruises, “Joanie Madden’s Folk ‘N Irish Cruise” where to date10,000 people have joined her on these cultural floating musical extravaganzas. She is a consummate musician and one of the most mercurial and revered figures in Irish music today.