"The most satisfying part of being Enya is when someone comes up and says 'Your album is wonderful and it has made me so happy'. All the months of work go out of the door and you think 'It was worth it'."

"I did want to be a music teacher at one time. It just didn't happen though because as soon as I started to tour I got the love for the stage, and the contact with the people and it just took off from there."

"I'm extremely emotional and I get upset really easily. I can sense immediately when things are happening and I go up and down in mood a great deal. I always argue in the studio because it's so intense all the time."

"I get so little free time that it's very precious. Usually I want to spend it on my own. I like to just sit in the quiet. Sometimes I go outside the studio, see ordinary people with nine-to-five jobs and I'm envious. But sometimes I think 'Oh, God help them!'."

"When I've released a new album, I love when somebody comes up to me and says, 'My favorite song is . . .' and then tells me why he relates to it. When people interpret the music through their own emotions, it's really, really moving and encouraging to me."

"I work hard in the studio and my emotions change, moreover if my works seem to be endless. I get angry over myself..."

"Some artists enjoy being bigger than the music. But it's something I choose not to concern myself with. To this day, people don't recognize me if I walk into a lobby of a hotel. People know the music.(...) It's good for me and it's good for the music. I'm able to take success at a very slow pace. (...) I let the music take over."

"Some artists are to a certain extent bigger than their music: People know what they look like and how they perform. People don't know what I look like or anything about me, but they know the music. I enjoy that, because that's what's really important."

"People think I live a hermit's life, sneaking about. Because I do spend a lot of time in the studio, they think in my free time I want to be on my own."

"I write and perform much of the music I'm taken more seriously than the girls who just walk into a studio, do a vocal and that's it. I can't even imagine what that would be like."

"My music is too important for me to pine in a small attic room. Music is my life, and because you can't eat scores I play momentarily the part of the marketing person that shouts that she sells good wares. (...)I'm very happy when I'm busy with my music. Then the real me comes to the surface. And that real me is rather self-contained."

"I enjoy not knowing what the end result would be. I end up going into journeys with the melody without any idea where it's leading me."

"I usually needed quite a long time to write a song. I wrote songs in the studio. The inspirations varied, like from my childhood days in Gweedore, or sometimes from something I watched on TV, or from other things that I experienced."

"New Age music is less structured than my music, there's no spine in it. You never get the feeling somebody's trying to tell you something, tries to evoke something. It's air, thin air. It's a musical drug."

"I'm a native Irish speaker so when I look at English words I often pronounce them the Irish way."

"We're not afraid to have a very complicated piece and then something really simple. One of the album's most attractive qualities is that you don't try to make every sound huge, you allow some small, frail, even ordinary sounds to stand alone in big spaces."

"Melody is very important to me. Some tracks are extremely emotional like 'Na Laetha Geal M'Oige' which is about my childhood. It was very personal."

"The lyrics have to revolve around the melody, and quite often English is too much of a burden on the melody, so we try Gaelic or then Latin because singing hymns when I was young I loved the sound of Latin words."

"The best moments are when I finish a melody. That is a moment I love most - I sit back and listen to what I created. I never tire of that moment, but the feeling is quite short - lived because then the work starts again and I have to arrange and perform the music."

"When I come into a studio I don't think of how much will I sell. I forget about it. Success depends on how the public understands my work. That's a goal I use to leave at the door."

"I like drinking champagne and very dry white wine. Irish Guinness is superb but it's not my cup of tea."

"I love to go to the cinema, that relaxes me, I don't like noisy atmospheres. I go to see the old classics and the ones that one has to see."

"I have received many letters from people after they have been touched by such and such a title from the album, for various reasons that they explain to me. It is staggering to what extent three persons can find three different meanings in a song."

"I don't have many chances to really put cosmetics on, only when I'm doing videos clips and the pictures for the album covers. Because when I'm working in the studio, doing my music, not many people see and look at me."

"I was asked the question 'What was the first single you ever bought?' and I thought 'I have never bought a single or an album'. Even as a teenager! It's strange. I don't like listening to music. People find it hard to understand that."

"I like almost every classical composer. But among them all, I love listening to Bach, also Mozart. For the more modern classical music, I like Debussy and Stravinsky."

"I loved to sing in the choir, and I still love to go to the church and sit when there's nobody there."

Extracts from Máire Brennan's autobiography, "The Other Side of the Rainbow" mentioning Enya:

MUSIC LESSONS: (p.35-36)
"Then there were music lessons. Mummy by that time was teaching music herself but it's never a good idea to try to teach your own, so she sent us off for piano lessons with Sister DeSales at the convent in Falcarragh. Despite ballet being my main distraction, I still loved going to Sister DeSales because it also meant an adventure with my brothers and sisters. We went in twos, threes or fours for a one- or two hour lesson. None of us wanted to go first. Sister DeSales would often get so caught up in the first lesson and if you were lucky she'd run out of time before your turn. There was only one rooom, so if weren't being taught at the piano we'd play dominoes on the floor. We tried to keep as quiet as posssible so she might forget we were there, but of course children trying to keep quiet is always a recipe for disaster. Eithne was a terrible giggler. I would get cross and tell her to 'shush'. Then Deirdre would start and before long we'd all be rolling on our tummies, stuffing our hands in our mouths to try to stifle our snorts and giggles."

JOINING CLANNAD: (p. 114)
"It was 1979 and our younger sister, Eithne, was finishing school. She had become a very accomplished pianist and was keen to pursue a music career so it seemed a very natural progression that she should join the band. We had the keyboard player we needed and, being a member of the family, her voice blended very well with our sound. We also had a string of summer festivals arranged and it was lovely for me to have another girl on the road."

LEAVING CLANNAD AND STARTING A SOLO CAREER (p. 121)
"There was also a lot happening in other areas of my life. Even around my brothers, I could feel lonely, so I appreciated having Eithne on the road with us, but towards the end of the European tour there was a lot of tension between us all. We were exhausted, having been on the road too long, and were beginning to get on one another's nerves. It didn't help that I had a terrible temper that flared all too easily. Playing in a family band has many advantages, but it can often mean that when the going gets tough you take it out on each other with a liberty that only family can tolerate. I suppose it had always been difficult for Eithne. We loved what she brought to the band, but I know it was hard for her to infiltrate our years as a tightly knit nucleus. Musically, Ciarán and Pól had always been the creative force, and Noel, Pádraig and myself had then worked our own expression around them. It was a good formula that worked well. Inevitably, when Eithne joined us full time, she found it hard. She hadn't been part of the original song-collecting days and consequently didn't share our enthusiasm for the old songs. I suppose she always felt little more than a 'guest musician'. As sisters we had always been close and talked about everything together, so I was sorry when band business caused a strain between us. One day, just after the tour, Eithne announced that she had decided to leave Clannad. She was going to pursue a solo career with Nicky Ryan as her manager. (Later she changed her name to the easier-to-read phonetic spelling, 'Enya'.)
In the long term it turned out to be a good decision. I missed her, but I'm sure the apprenticeship with Clannad helped Eithne develop her own sound and afforded her strong contacts in the music business. She is talented and ambitious and, in the years that followed, the family was delighted to watch the success that came her way."

RELATIONS WITH ENYA (p. 151)
"Over the years I have learnt to be on my guard but, as any artist will testify, you are completely poerless if a writer has a certain agenda. There have been many damaging articles that have hurt my family deeply - stories about our relationships, particularly between myself and Enya. We resolved in the early days not to talk about our private lives but, especially in Enya's case, this has often led to more intrigue and false speculation. For an artist, it is the unfortunate consequence of being in the public eye, but what makes me really angry is the way the family inevitably bears the suffering."

FIRST SUCCESS (p. 194-195)
"As autumn approached, the record company suggested we should do a compilation album of favourite tracks, plus a couple of new songs (...).
Meanwhile, Eithne had been working on her album and the single, 'Orinoco Flow', was released while we were in the studio. We were so excited for her. It was already at number eleven in the charts and we felt sure it was going to go up. We'd watched her on Top of the Pops the week before, so come Sunday evening we expectantly gathered in the house near the studio to listen to the Top Forty. Our youngest brother, Bartley, was working in London and he came over to be with us to hear the news. Flicking between the BBC charts and the independents we held our breath as the countdown continued. Number two in the independent chart. Brilliant. Then the BBC. Number one! We were all shouting and screaming and hugging each other and you couldn't have heard the record playing above the din in the room. First we spoke to Eithne on the phone. More squealing. She was so happy and we knew that sharing the moment with us, even over the telephone, was very special. Then we rang our brother Leon who was over in Donegal. He'd been driving Mammy to church and they'd been frantically trying to get the radio station on the car radio so they could hear the result. The whole family were over the moon. That evening at dinner we had a bottle Peter presented us with a bottle of champagne and we all celebrated Eithne's success."

CHRISTMAS 1990: (p. 214-215)
"Christmas that year was everything that a family Cristmas should be.
(...) All the sisters were at home and, being a couple of weeks before I was to get married, it was more 'girly' than ever.
(...) On Christmas Eve I went down to help my sister Olive who was running the bar at the time. Daddy was on top form and the place, as always, was absolutely packed. Deidre, Eithne and Brídín went with Mammy to midnight mass and joined the rest of the family later on."
Christmas Day:
"Back at the house the traditional Brennan Christmas continued in full swing. It was wonderful that we could all be at home together. This was one of only two days in the year when the pub would remain closed - the other was the Good Friday. The girls set about preparing the meal while the boys rearranged the furniture so we could all sit around the table together.(...)
Eithne had just got a video camera and was skulking from room to room trying to catch everyone at their most embarrassing."

MÁIRE'S WEDDING: (p. 227-229)
"Over at the church, our own guests had started to murmur. I heard the stories afterwards from poor Eithne who sat alone on the left-hand side of the church, cringing and willing the family to arrive. She had been there for what must have seemed like ages, having rehearsed the song she was to sing, and was now enduring the intensity of the wait as all Tim's family and our friends had arrived and taken their places. (...)
After our vows Eithne sang a psalm. Then Pól on the flute and Ciarán at the piano played a traditional Irish air, 'Tabhair Domh Do Lámh' ('Give Me Your Hand').
(...) Towards the end of the service all four of my sisters took their place in front of us and sang 'Close to You, Lord'. It was a beautifull song with words so meaningfull that we were all in pieces by the end. (...)
I'm sure some of the congregation thought the girls were giggling, but the truth was that they were so overcome with emotion that they all but sobbed their way through the final chorus."