Paul Durney a.k.a Saoirse Mhór recieved a second-hand guitar for his tenth birthday from his father in 1972. Serving behind a military bar in The Curragh, Ireland, his father more or less tricked the guitar from a soldier who had run out of money on a drinking session. It was an Ibanez classical guitar with steel strings and although it played havoc on his fingers it also introduced him to the world of music and lyrics. At the age of sixteen he had already occasionally  ‘performed’ a song or two for his friends. In 1980 he left Ireland in search of fortune in Europe busking in England & Germany on the way. He cannot ever remember a time not being attached to a guitar.

 In 1987 now settled in Southern Germany. he joined the jazz-rock formation band Nine to Five and co-wrote most of the material in that venture. They won a ‘Local Heroes’ competition in 1989 before breaking up in 1990. After this he went on to join various local bands including Set Out and Zero man Zero and by this time he was the main vocalist and writing most of the material. Songs from that period include  ‘Johnny & Mary’,’ Highway Love’, African Plains’ and ‘Dancing with Dinosaurs’. 

In 1997 he collaborated with producer, sound engineer & singer/ songwriter Andy Horn in ‘The Dolldrums’ which turned out the demo CD ‘The Dolldrums’ featuring  his songs ‘Skin’ and the beautiful ‘Mirror’. He also produced the lyrics for Andy’s ‘Lucky Day’ and ‘Perfect Love’ on that CD. 

Concentrating on family life raising three children,musical activities were reduced to a minimum but in this time he worked quietly away in and on his home studio and came up with the songs ‘Lorraine’ and ‘Diamonds in your Eyes’ but to mention just a few. 

On a trip to Ireland in 2004 he had the chance to watch Luka Bloom playing in The Riverbank in Newbridge and overawed by Luka’s performance the idea and the pseudoname Saoirse Mhór was born. 2005 found Saoirse traipsing through the Irish Pub’s in southern Germany. 

In 2006 Skin was released. Helping on this project was the Belgian busker flute player Tom Drost and Saoirse accompanied Tom on the streets and at Busking Festivals that year. 

The end of 2007 found Saoirse joining the Irish Folk Band Fleadh as singer/ guitarist. 

Saoirse  released Thursday Asks in April 2008.

Putting more emphasis on Fleadh, Saoirse and the band made their debut in 2009 at various Festivals around Germany. In July the band played their first International gig in Warsaw, Poland.