Keening

A Living Tradition

An 8-week experiential journey and educational course into the Keening traditions of Scotland & Ireland

1st October – 19th November 2025

Wednesdays at 10:30am PT / 6:30pm GMT

May our time together draw us into the depths of our hearts, where love and grief intertwine, and where we touch the mystery of the unseen realms.

Teachers have been featured in

hl-logos-elephant
hl-logos-herald
hl-logos-huff
hl-logos-wwb
hl-logos-bv
TheWire
Shaman Portal
Medicine Festival
Advaya logo
The Bookseller
Sunnyside Expeditions

"Know dear one
The song of death
Dreams the birth of creation
As beloved life
Embraces your heart
She is planning on leaving
In the heart
Of the seed there
Hides the fullness of mystery
In the same seed
Hides the destroyer
Of all that is created
So live within
The heart of death
And die fully into birth."

~Phyllida Anam-Áire

One of our beloved teachers in this course.

What is Keening?

In this Weaving Remembrance offering, we return to ancient practices that once held grief with reverence, sacredness and song.

At the heart of this work is the Keen – a raw, embodied lament that lives in the bones of Irish and Scottish tradition.

The Keen is a vocal expression of grief, part cry and part song, offered at the thresholds of death. Traditionally heard at wakes, funeral processions, and gravesides, it arose from deep presence and embodied knowing. Women, often kin or hired keeners, would gather to call forth sorrow through wailing, chant, and improvised melody.

This was not performance, but invocation: a weaving of grief, memory, and love into sound. The Keen served as a bridge, carrying the soul onward, uniting the community in mourning, and giving voice to what words alone could not hold.

Though nearly silenced by cultural suppression, the spirit of keening endures and lives on.

This course is a heartfelt container for exploring the themes of keening and lamenting, grief and love, death and life.

Together, we will explore the sounds of grief, remembering how to be with sorrow, how to honor what has passed, and how to listen to what still wants to be heard.

Come As You Are

Bring your heart, your voice, your stories, your pain. We begin with the breath.

We begin in the place where grief and love meet.

Though severely diminished, the old ways have never died and are now being repaired and revived. We are reweaving the broken threads.

This course brings together some of our respected elders and tradition keepers from Ireland & Scotland, who are working deeply with the revival of these ancestral keening and grief-tending traditions.

It includes learning and receiving historical teachings, keening songs, stories, Celtic perspectives, and grief-tending rituals.

Register
Here

What’s Included

May this series touch our hearts and awaken remembrance of our original ways.

  • 7 Live Classes with Respected Elders and Tradition Carriers
  • 1 Community Sharing Call
  • A Community Sharing Forum (not on FB)
  • Recordings of all Classes
Register
Here

This Course Is For You If

  • You feel called to connect with ancestral keening traditions from Ireland & Scotland
  • You desire to participate in a course that blends ancient practices with modern insights for healing
  • You are seeking a sacred space to explore grief in a welcoming community
  • You're moved by the healing power of vocal expression and communal lament
  • You wish to deepen your understanding of grief as a transformative and spiritual journey
Register
Here

Get A Feel for the Course

"The Tides of Grief & Love: A Return to Keening"

RECORDED 75-minute online session with beloved elder Phyllida Anam-Áire

Come sit in a tender space, where sorrow and love are gently spun into gold. In this recorded gathering, we breathe together, connect with the Celtic heart, and listen for the sounds that rise from the depth of our grief.

Phyllida carries the living memory of this ancient tradition and invites us into its sacred rhythms through this intimate online session.

WATCH THE RECORDING

Participant Reviews

"This course was life altering for me in so many ways. In the first week of this course, I ended up booking a ticket back to Ireland, and I hadn't been back in 30 years... I used the strength of this course, and of Mary and everyone in the course to allow me to go back. The life changing aspect - I never expected it, but the courage that I found within myself is perfect. I'm so, so grateful."

~ Helen, Course Participant 24'
"Thank you so much for this so wonderful warm evening with the Keening Ladies… it is still flowing through me deeply."

~ J.A., Workshop Participant
"This course is something that I will always hold in admiration, because I've discovered that my grief doesn't have to be something that holds me back... doing this in community is such a bigger impact. When one person grieves, it gives us all permission to grieve and we don't even have to necessarily understand what it is we're grieving in that moment."

~ S.R., Course Participant 24'
"Hanna Leigh helps people to connect more deeply with earth by bringing together teachers of traditional song, story and craft. Her work helps those yearning for ancestral European wisdom to recover what has been forgotten. She has been deeply influenced by her own experiences in Ancestral Lineage Healing.

She has spent lots of time making pilgrimage to the old country of Scotland and Ireland to connect with elders, and to prepare this course. This is NOT TO BE MISSED!!"

~ Nala Walla, Grief Tender & Ancestral Healing Guide
"This course has been especially humbling for me. It really helped catalyze something and open my heart again to all those hidden, accumulated pockets of grief in my life and body. It also helped affirm grief as one of my superpowers."

~ Vanessa, Course Participant 24'
"At the intro workshop for this course, I was absolutely BLOWN AWAY by depth of knowledge and powerful presence of these women. I knew immediately that I wanted to spread the word to all of you who are thirsty for the deeper wellsprings of ancient traditions. For all those interested in reviving our rituals for grieving, this is an amazing opportunity to study with living elders and experts in the field."

~ L.P., Workshop Participant
"I am writing to say a deep thank you for yesterday's Keening workshop, and the introduction to your upcoming 'Keening: A Living Tradition' course. I sat here at 4am joining the call live from Melbourne, Australia, and was touched by everything shared."

~ A.M., Workshop Participant
"Yes, yes, yes - deep soul resonance to this rich multifaceted weave Phyllida 💕 Such liberating truth and depth. Sounding through the altars of our body. Thank you."

~ S.L., Workshop Participant
"This is incredible. So much wisdom and compassion here. What a gift that Mary McLaughlin & Phyllida Anam-Áire bring 💕 What power."

~ S.J., Workshop Participant
"Phyllida is such an inspiring woman. I hope I am like this at the elder stage of my life ❤️🙏. powerful gnosis and perspective on life."

~ S.L., Workshop Participant
"I am sitting now in stunned silence, after going to this Zoom workshop on "Keening", (which is an ancient Irish means of dealing with grief). This workshop had over 100 women from all over the world. I even felt like I was in Ireland! Whoa. So Deep. I am so blissed out from experiencing such deep grief."

~ C.M., Workshop Participant

Honouring Traditions

Personal use

The songs and stories shared in this course are intended for participant’s own personal education, healing and enrichment. In the traditional way, may we receive them, integrate them and allow them to live through us, before we consider sharing with others.

Preserving

We honor the path that each teacher has walked to cultivate and carry these songs, stories, crafts and traditions that they share with us. By joining the course you agree not to replicate, alter or dilute the content, understanding that in doing so we lose the essence of that which we are wanting to preserve.

Respecting

We welcome the ongoing exploration and conversation around the appropriate ways to receive and honor these teachings. We see this as part of the education this course aims to provide – bringing awareness to the respectful ways to connect and learn from these traditions.

Presence

As if we were gathering together around the fire in the old way, may we come bringing our full presence. We invite you to have your video on and make a space where you can fully be with us, receiving the gifts of this wisdom.

Meet Your Course Creators

THE FOUNDERESS

Greetings! My name is Hanna Leigh, (IG: @hannaleighsong) originally from California (Chumash territory).  I am a Singer-Songwriter, Voice Doula, Weaver, and Devotee of this precious, living Earth. My people migrated to the U.S. several generations ago from England, Scotland, Norway, Germany and the Netherlands

For the past several years I have been on an inspired journey to reclaim ancestral wisdom and connect with the indigenous spirit of the “Great Sacred Motherland of Europe” – a term I first heard from activist Lyla June.

This longing for reconnection was the impetus to create this Weaving Remembrance organization, and its first course a few years ago called “Songs of Mother Europe”, which features song carriers from all over Europe who still carry the old songs.

We have welcomed over 1500 participants into our online courses & in-person events in the past few years, which speaks to me of the growing collective impulse to remember and preserve ancestral & earth-based wisdom.

May this course bring us into the heart of what truly matters.

Register
Here

COURSE CO-CREATOR

Welcome, I’m Lana Lanaia. I live in the Scottish Highlands, and my lineage is woven through many lands. 

I am musician, and facilitator of retreats, ritual & healing spaces. I have been studying and working with earth wisdom traditions and sound healing for over 25 years.

I have a deep love for these holy Isles of Albion, her ancient places & wisdom. I have spent many years journeying to sacred sites, living in wild places, questing and communing with the land, sea & sky.

I am passionate about re-awakening the ancient, living wisdom within our hearts and lands;  weaving remembrance that we are all children of the Earth.

Courses Offered Thus Far
0
Guest Teachers Thus Far
0
Students served thus far
0

Program Overview

Through the sounds and stories shared by our guest teachers, may the living reality of earth and ancestral belonging be rekindled within you.

Classes are on Wednesdays @ 10:30am PT / 6:30pm BST and are 2 hours each.

Note: We orient to UK/Ireland time for this course, so due to daylight savings transitions, class times may shift by one hour starting October 29th depending on your location. More information will be provided upon registration.

Week 1

1st October

Opening Call & The Irish Keening Tradition

w/ Mary McLaughlin

Week 2

8th October

Learning an Ancestral Lament

w/ Mary McLaughlin

Week 3

15th October

The Scottish Keening Tradition 

w/ Madge Bray

Week 4

22nd October

Bagpipes & Keening Relationships

w/ Allan Macdonald

Week 5

29th October 

Of Water & Bones

w/ Oonagh O’Sullivan

Week 6

5th November

A Tear at the Center of Creation

w/ Phyllida Anam-Áire

Week 7

12th November

Watching with the Dying, Traveling with the Dead

w/ Phyllida Anam-Áire

Week 8

19th November

Closing Call & Community Sharing Circle

w/ Hanna Leigh & Lana Lanaia

Program Deep Dive

Many may have forgotten the old ways, though gratefully there are those still keeping the skills and songs alive, and others of us who are relearning them.

Week 1

Opening Call & The Irish Keening Tradition

with Mary McLaughlin

We begin our 8-week journey by arriving together, settling into our shared space and opening the container with intention.

Elder Irish song teacher Mary McLaughlin will then guide us through an overview of the ancient Irish keening tradition: its history, cultural roots, and the context in which grief and remembrance were expressed in Ireland.

This is a tradition that has existed for millennia and, though diluted, still lives on and is being revived in Irish culture.

Week 2

Learning an Ancestral Lament

with Mary McLaughlin

In this session, Mary McLaughlin will teach us a centuries-old lament based on the keen that Fionn Mac Cumhaill, a third-century warrior, is said to have performed over his grandson, who had been killed in battle. As we learn the melody and its meaning, we are invited into the shared sonic language of mourning, connecting personal grief to the broader, timeless experience of human loss.

Week 3

The Scottish Keening Tradition

with Madge Bray

In 1642 at the Synod of Argyll, the cultural grief tending practice of Keening – or ritual wailing – at funerals was banned by the church. Women lost their sacred, traditional grief tending role honoured within the retinue of the Scottish Highland Clan Chieftains. Yet during roughly the same time frame, the eternal threads of these transmissions were to remain unbroken through the masculine — carried in the sounds of the Scottish Highland Bagpipe laments. These laments were transmitted from teacher to pupil through oral, somatic tradition and the canntaireachd (chant). 
 
In this workshop, we will explore Madge’s own journey of personally meeting the ‘lost’ practice as a young woman. She will share the sounds of the canntaireachd and outline how ancient trauma resolution practices in traditional societies can potentially impact our understanding of the current day. Madge will share how she views these practices could help to heal our troubled world by assisting us in processing intergenerational suffering.

Week 4

Bagpipes & Keening Relationships

with Allan Macdonald

In this session we will deepen our understanding of the Scottish keening tradition and how it is carried in the sounds of the Scottish Highland Bagpipes.

We have the blessing of being taught by Allan Macdonald, “the single most important living source of Gaelic musical culture.” One of his myriad gifts is to make pibroch accessible and lovable. We will be exploring the relationships between keening and the bagpipes, and between Pibroch and Gaelic Song; reuniting seventeenth-century piping with its Gaelic roots.

Week 5

Of Water & Bones

with Oonagh O'Sullivan

Whilst certain traditional grieving practices may be almost forgotten on the Celtic Isles, the wisdom of the keening women (mná chaointe) is held within our water and bones, regardless of our gender. Akin to the wisdom of these lands bubbling up through springs and being felt in thresholds, the landscapes of our bodies contain all that we need to remember. We will sound, move, feel, express and awaken the keening one within to meet the medicine needed for these times. Crack open to the whispers of your ancestors and drink from the salty well of their tears. We may have forgotten, but all is not lost.

Week 6

A Tear at the Center of Creation

with Phyllida Anam-Áire

Held within old Irish poetry are words that reach into the soul and invite the movement of our internal waters, inviting us to reflect on our personal relationships with grief. This class is a journey into the heart, and the holy tears that flow from the center of Creation.

Drawing from the well of her Celtic tradition, Phyllida will be sharing poetry and inviting inner contemplation. This will be woven with an exploration into sound, and the importance of sounding our internal experiences ~ which is at the heart of keening.

Week 7

Watching with the Dying, Traveling with the Dead

with Phyllida Anam-Áire

Phyllida will be sharing stories from her own decades of life experience in accompanying those through dying, death and the journey of the soul. Weaving words, sacred sounds, and deep Celtic wisdom, Phyllida invites us into the caludron of inquiry into how we meet life with our presence and how we may accompany ourselves as we die to old versions of ourselves.

Week 8

Community Sharing Call

with Hanna Leigh & Lana Lanaia

Come and gather together as we share and integrate our experiences during the course. Bring a cup of tea, a song, a story, or simply your presence.

Meet the Teachers

Mary McLaughlin

Dr. Mary McLaughlin is internationally known for her knowledge of the ancestral Keening practice in Ireland. An acclaimed singer who has released five albums (one on Sony Music) and has had over a million hits on Spotify, she combines her artistry with an academic approach to the Keen, grounding it in its history and context.

She has released four solo albums and two teaching books, sang the theme song for the PBS special about the Titanic, ‘Lost Liners’, contributed to 13 compilation albums on major labels and had two albums, ‘A Gaelic Christmas’ and “Sacred Days, Mythic Ways’ nominated for the international JPF Indie awards.

Her biggest recording successes were as the singer leading off the hugely popular Narada / EMI hit ‘Celtic Voices’ (1995) where she sang three songs including ‘Sealwoman’ which she composed over a traditional Scottish chant, and ‘Celtic Requiem’ (Windham Hill / Sony – 1998) on which she collaborated with William Coulter. The songs on ‘Celtic Voices’ had originally been recorded for the ‘Daughter of Lir’ album (1991/93/98), by the internationally acclaimed Jon Jacobs, famous for his work with Paul McCartney, the Divine Comedy and many others.

Mary is currently planning her next recording adventure which will probably be attached to the book she is now writing on the Keen and the World of Faerie.

Madge Bray

Born into a Scottish Highland family of village musicians, poets and storytellers, Madge Bray worked internationally in the field of childhood trauma, pioneering approaches to trauma resolution. Exploration of the sounds of dissonance in human suffering led her to Georgian polyphony and ultimately to cultural retrieval of music as a container for grief within her own Scots Tradition – and the unfolding of a deeper journey into lamentation and keening.

Allan Macdonald Pibroch Keening Piper Bagpipes Scottish

Allan Macdonald

A leading light in the Gaelic musical scene, Allan MacDonald is in demand internationally as a composer, musical director, piper, singer, workshop leader, and lecturer on Gaelic music. One of his myriad gifts is to make pibroch accessible and lovable. His work as a scholar-performer reuniting seventeenth-century piping with its Gaelic roots is influencing a whole generation of pipers.

Allan has performed at every major Celtic and piping festival on the planet. He lectures on the Scottish Music course at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama, and has had numerous commissions to compose for BBC television. In 1999 and 2004, Allan directed two pioneering series for the Edinburgh International Festival, presenting every aspect of the piping tradition in 13 concerts, linking music with Scottish history and culture. In 2005, he co-directed a six-part television series screened on RTE, BBC3 and ITV—“The Highland Sessions”—addressing the common language and musical traditions of Scotland and Ireland, which won the best documentary music award in Ireland.

The BBC made a documentary on Allan and his brothers, Dr Angus and Iain (also world-famous pipers), broadcast in January 2007. The three brothers were born in the tiny Gaelic-speaking township of Glenuig in Moidart. Allan won the highest award in piping, the Clasp at the Northern Meeting, two years running (1989 and 1990). He then followed his heart and developed a style of playing more in tune with the Gaelic culture of 1550-1750. His approach is infused with an insider’s ear for the fragile traces of historical continuity that survive within Gaelic-speaking communities, and he attempts to reverse the effects of post-Industrial sanitisation and cultural colonialism.

Phyllida Anam-Áire

Phyllida Anam-Áire is an 82 year old Irish grandmother. She comes from an ancestral line of deep trauma. After boarding school in the 60s, Phyllida trained in Montessori, and then entered a convent. Her study in Theology and doctrine taught her a lot; not about God, but about dysfunctional patriarchal indoctrination.

Having finished her studies in humanistic psychology, Phyllida trained and worked for ten years with Elisabeth Kübler -Ross MD. After ten years working with Celtic Consciousness in Germany, she moved to Edinburgh to be with her son and grandchildren. Phyllida still shares her “Teachings from the Cauldron”, which is a combination of humanistic psychology and Spiritual wisdom.

Oonagh O'Sullivan

Oonagh is a multidisciplinary artist, ritualist, grief-tender, singer, embodiment guide & festival maker from West Kerry, Ireland. She blends her deep love for the human heart & body as part of the web of life, with song as prayer to create spaces of remembrance, connection, expression & belonging. She enjoys weaving threads of tradition, mythos, ritual and storytelling into her art making. Oonagh has been teaching yoga & somatic practices and holding group spaces through classes, workshops, training & retreats for 8 years.

She holds an MA in Ritual Chant & Song from the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, where she specialised in the use of ritual song in Irish pre-Christian grief ceremonies called An Caoineadh/keening. Her interest lies on how to contemporise these ancient ways through our bodies and voices during this crisis of unprecedented individual and collective grief. Oonagh loves creating meaningful communal spaces of embodied artistic exploration for co-regulation, creative alchemy and social change.

Register Here

Pay In Full

Pay in full for:
$ 345 ≈ £255
  • 7 LIVE Workshops on Zoom
  • 1 Community Sharing Call
  • Weave with a network of like-minded folks
  • Connect with a living keening tradition
Pay in Full

Payment Plan

Pay in installments
$ 115 x 3 ≈ £85
  • 7 LIVE Workshops on Zoom
  • 1 Community Sharing Call
  • Weave with a network of like-minded folks
  • Connect with a living keening tradition
Pay in Installments
Popular

Payment Plan

Pay in installments
$ 70 x 5 ≈ £52
  • 7 LIVE Workshops on Zoom
  • 1 Community Sharing Call
  • Weave with a network of like-minded folks
  • Connect with a living keening tradition
Pay in Installments

Please note that prices listed in GBP (£) are approximate and will be adjusted based on the exchange rate at the time of purchase.

We have a limited amount of partial scholarships remaining for those in sincere financial need. If you feel a clear desire to join us in this journey and need financial assistance, please email us sharing your heart & situation, along with what you are authentically able to pay, so we may see what is possible.

Please contact us at support@weavingremembrance.org to inquire about partial scholarship.

Frequently Asked Questions

This offering is happening online through Zoom, with teachers joining us from several different countries.

Yes. They will be recorded and sent out soon after each class.

No. The nature of the content delivery is that you purchase the entire course.

You will have access to the recordings for two years from the start date of the course.

No. Anyone who is called to this course is welcome to join!

No. Due to the delivery of course content, all sales are final.