The Jenny Greene Episode

An Irishman Abroad

Jarlath Regan

Society & Culture, News, Health & Fitness, Society & Culture:personal Journals, Personal Journals, Politics

4.8 • 834 Ratings

🗓️ 18 September 2021

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The beloved DJ Jenny Greene joins Jarlath for a wide-ranging discussion of her journey from a kid too sick to sit her state exams to filling arenas with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. Plagued for years with a chronic cough, Jenny had no choice but to go on a course of aggressive steroids and miss crucial months and years in school. The story of how she found solace in music while sipping from a converted nebuliser and deciding to not sit the Leaving Certificate has to be heard to be believed. Later in the chat Jenny opens up for the first time about her personal and professional journeys including her choice to leave RTÉ and how she met her wife at 14 years old while attending the Gaeltacht. There’s news on a potential new musical project, an inside look at how to convert dancefloor bangers into orchestral pieces, why she thinks she has never experienced homophobia face to face in Ireland and a whole lot more. Irishman Abroad is completely crowdfunded by our listeners. We would like to thank everyone who has signed up at Patreon.com/irishmanabroad. Without these people we would not be here. If you like what we do and want to see it continue, why not sign up this week. We are offering a 15% discount to all new signups this month. To hear every episode in full and to gain access to the entire back-catalogue of over 500 Irishman Abroad episodes that are not available on iTunes for just the price of a pint every month visit www.patreon.com/irishmanabroad Supplementary research provided by John Meagher. Our charity partner is jigsawonline.ie. In these tricky times, Jigsaw provides a range of resources, advice and care for your people to help them strengthen their mental health and the skills needed to navigate life. Please visit their website and consider making a donation. For updates on future episodes and live shows follow @jarlath on Twitter, visit www.jigser.com or email the show directly on [email protected]. Disclaimer: All materials contained within this podcast are copyright protected. Third party reuse and/or quotation in whole or in part is prohibited unless direct credit and/or hyperlink to the Irishman Abroad podcast is clearly and accurately provided.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	I mean, I was kind of sick from really young child up until probably 15, 16 maybe.
0:07.0	So I missed an awful lot of school and I just had this like chronic cough.
0:13.0	They thought I had asthma, a version of asthma.
0:15.0	So it was only years later that I went to a specialist and they thought,
0:19.0	actually, hang on a second, this mightn't be asthma. And it turned out that it was a sinus issue. So I had surgery then to open up the
0:26.5	inside and after that, that seemed to fix everything. But I mean, I was I was 16 when I got that
0:32.3	done. Just shortly a bit into fifth here that I got a call from F-104 to offer me weekend breakfast
0:40.4	because I'd been on Pulse FM for two years beforehand. I was 15 when I started on Pulse.
0:45.6	My mum and dad said, listen, we've been talking over the weekend and we think maybe you might
0:50.0	be better off just leaving school and if you were available in 104 you might get other work.
0:56.0	So I mean I couldn't believe what I was here and I took the hand off them. I didn't even have to think about it.
1:01.0	Jenny Green has spent the last 20 years as one of Ireland's most respected and beloved DJs presenting the biggest shows on Irish Radio packing arenas and festivals
1:12.7	with both her electric disco tour and her now legendary RTE concert orchestra shows.
1:18.9	As you'll hear, it all started with that first set of decks at the age of 12.
1:24.9	By the age of 17, Jenny was given her own weekly dance column in a national
1:29.5	newspaper and shortly after that she became the youngest DJ on radio, landing the weekend breakfast
1:35.4	show on Dublin's FM 104. It certainly wasn't all plain sailing though. I mean, I feel really
1:42.7	privileged to be honest that she chose our show for this very
1:46.5	rare interview. Like, she basically never talks about herself. A fact I kind of find of extraordinary,
1:53.2	really, when you consider how inspiring this story is, to hear the full uncut version of this
1:59.5	conversation. And you really need the further 40 minutes
2:03.0	about her decision to leave and come back to RT, how she met the love of her life at 14
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Jarlath Regan, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Jarlath Regan and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.