Mairead is pregnant.

Big congratulations !!!
Always a fear for our ladies....
choosing a career or family 

Haha! 😄Fair point!
You are right though about the small chance Mairead stay. I really hope so! I guess we just have to wait and see what happens. (I am terrible at waiting and seeing!). 🙃

It seems like lately the thing after maternity leave is either resigning or self-demotion to being the "on call" member.
*Meav -- Maternity Leave: Summer and Fall 2005, Return: Early 2006, Rotation with Hayley: Spring 2007, Departure: Aug 2007. A Christmas Celebration DVD was the last project before her departure. Fill-in often: 2012-2016, Vocal director: 2016--???  New solo album releasing soon.
*Lisa K -- Maternity leave: Spring 2008 tour, Returned: Summer 2008 through the end of 2011, Maternity Leave again: 2012, Resigned to open voice academy at the beginning of 2013.
*Susan -- Finished the spring 2018 tour. Filmed her pregnancy announcement on stage in Nashville before the show. Sat completely out of Ancient Land. Filled in at the very end of the Ancient Land tour when Mairead had a medical emergency. Planned to take Chloe's place for a few shows in 2020 (got one in before the shutdown). Recorded a few songs for Postcards from Ireland. That tour began and they revived the plan where she did a few shows instead of Chloe, Recorded the 2022 christmas EP.
*Emma -- Last performed in May 2024. Not been seen at all since the 20 tour finished. Is it safe to assume Emma's gone for good??
Wonder if Eabha would return in Mairead's place???

Yeah, it’s quite the shame none of them went on further. But I think Lisa K was a different story…granted, I was barely a toddler when she officially left, but from what I’ve gathered, she didn’t necessarily leave because of having a kid, but moreso used that as a way to leave before officially signing off. She’d already been performing with three kids beforehand, including one that I’m pretty sure she had before CW even started. Alex also performed while having a kid, though she did eventually leave because she wanted to stay home with him. Granted, Alex is a part of the LDS Church and a single mother, so there’s cultural and practical differences there. (This is mentioned on her website, by the way.)

It seems a bit odd just how many have gone because of this, though. I’ve mentioned this before, but I wonder if management might be pushing them out because of financial constraints with potentially having to accommodate a child on tour. This, of course, applies to just the more recent years, since Lisa K was able to bring her kids with her on tour.

I’m not sure if Éabha would want to come back…she’s done a lot with her solo career since she left CW, so it’s not too unlikely that she’d have prior commitments during CW’s tour.

Giving how expensive things are nowadays, they might not be able to accommodate a child. That or the ladies can’t find someone to watch their kids while performing.

Even if they’re aren’t being pushed out, having kids on the road is a handful and it makes sense why Lisa K left after baby 4

It's official. CW announced Mairéad has left the group.

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1HaAauPMh6/

It's official. CW announced Mairéad has left the group.

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1HaAauPMh6/

Well, that’s tragic. But the new member does seem cool. We’ll have to edit the Wikipedia page and create a board on here for her. This is the third member from Northern Ireland.

Eiméar seems to have a very traditional background, and with Muirgen and Caitríona also singing very traditional material as their CW repertoire, I wonder if this could mark a musical shift away from their more classical-crossover-esque sound.

I’ll try to find some clips of Eiméar. I’m very sad that Mairéad is gone, but I do get a good feeling from Eiméar. Maybe it’s just that she kind of looks like Máiréad Ní Mhaonaigh to me, and that’s one of my favourite musicians.

This does make me wonder if this was a decision on Mairéad’s part or management forced her out, but that’s a different topic for a different day….

Edit: here’s (https://youtu.be/b6EN-cGCP_YiQkoUPAvmxyj9kpN) a clip of her singing. While her voice isn’t as high as Mairéad’s, she seems quite fit to take the high soprano role.

I also find it important to note that in the site announcement of Eiméar’s membership, they said

We hope to welcome her back to the Celtic Woman family again soon.

So I do wonder if this is supposed to be temporary. But you’d think they’d find an old member if this spot was just temporary. But this is also an odd thing to say if she’s leaving permanently. Does anyone have any insight?

Edit 2: I updated their Wikipedia page (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_Woman#History). This makes this the first lineup where none of them have their own Wikipedia pages. However, I do think that Kate and Muirgen (possibly Eiméar, too) are worthy candidates to get their own pages. (I’m unsure if Caitríona would qualify under the notability criteria). Could someone please help in getting those set up? But that’s for another thread. There’s a lot of updates that need to be made on the womens’ Wikipedia pages.

Good lord, I’m updating this response like The Guardian’s “breaking news” threads 😭.

Edit: here’s (https://youtu.be/b6EN-cGCP_YiQkoUPAvmxyj9kpN) a clip of her singing. While her voice isn’t as high as Mairéad’s, she seems quite fit to take the high soprano role.

Well wishes for Mairéad and can she her making appearances in the future like Susan, Chloe etc

I know that our new member will have her own forum board, but while I can't resist to wait because the second I began watching stars at Dawn's link that she shared here, I am always use to discovering a new voice, but with her I immediately began to shout oh they going back to the Chloe route rather than Mairead but as the video progressed than she sounded so much like Susan ❤️. 
She did give Meav by the image first to me . Hannah also gave Meav like soprano and young Chloe vibes which is a bummer because
I would of been curious if Hannah had stayed and recorded would there been touches like the Old days of Celtic Woman.

We hope to welcome her back to the Celtic Woman family again soon.

So I do wonder if this is supposed to be temporary. But you’d think they’d find an old member if this spot was just temporary. But this is also an odd thing to say if she’s leaving permanently. Does anyone have any insight?

Mairead posted this on her FB:
Thank you Celtic Woman for everything, I am so grateful for the friendships and for the music we’ve made and I promise you’ll see me again.

So that's a good sign. So maybe we'll see here like we saw Susan in the past. We'll see.

I do find it interesting that some CW leave quietly out the back door, but some have official announcements, etc.