Dr Avril McLoughlin is an Irish traditional fiddle player and lecturer in Music Education at Mary Immaculate College, Limerick.  Her interest in literacy, orality, notation and music theory in Irish traditional music led her to conduct PhD research entitled, Bridging the Gap between Theory and Practice: Locating music theory and its pedagogies and curricula for Irish traditional musicians.  This research examined Irish traditional musician’s conceptual structures of music theory and investigated how these frameworks inform pedagogical approaches when teaching Irish traditional music students.

Avril has presented her research both nationally and internationally, including ISME 2018, ICTM 2019 and ICTM 2023.  She has taken part in a number of Erasmus+ exchanges including visits to Birzeit University and The Edward Said Conservatory, Palestine, Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia, Tbilisi State University, Georgia and University of Cape Coast, Ghana.  As a performer, Avril has been featured numerous times on national and international radio and tv, as well as performing at festivals such as Festival Interceltique de Lorient (France) and Alpentöne Internationales Musikfestival (Switzerland).

Avril’s key research interests include: democratic and inclusive pedagogies and curriculum development in music education; Irish traditional music in higher education; literacy and orality in music education; action research for teacher empowerment; primary and post-primary music education.