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Mícheál Ó Domhnaill (7 October 1951 – 7 July 2006) was an Irish singer, guitarist, composer, and producer who was a major influence on Irish traditional music in the second half of the twentieth century.

He is remembered for his innovative work with Skara Brae, the first group to record vocal harmonization in Irish language songs, and The Bothy Band, one of the most influential groups in Irish traditional music.

His reputation was enhanced by a successful collaboration with master fiddler Kevin Burke, and his work with the Celtic groups Relativity and Nightnoise, which achieved significant commercial and critical acclaim.

Ó Domhnaill was raised in Kells, County Meath, Ireland and spent his summers in the Donegal Gaeltacht (Irish-speaking) area of Rann na Feirste, where the Irish language is the main spoken language.

He inherited a deep love and understanding of Irish culture and Irish traditional music from his parents.

In Donegal, Mícheál spent time with his aunt Neilí, a renowned singer who had a vast repertoire of Irish and English songs.

He formed lifelong friendships with Pól and Ciarán Brennan (future members of Clannad) and Dáithí Sproule (future member of Skara Brae and Altan).

Mícheál Seosamh Ó Domhnaill was born 7 October 1951 in Kells, County Meath, Ireland.

His father, Aodh, was a teacher, a singer, and a collector of traditional music for the Irish Folklore Commission.

His mother, Bríd, was a choral singer.

Mícheál's father was raised in the Donegal Gaeltacht (Irish-speaking) area of Rann na Feirste, where the Irish language is the main spoken language.

Mícheál, his two sisters, Maighréad and Tríona, and two brothers, Éamon and Conall, inherited a deep love and understanding of Irish culture from their parents.

The family spent their summers in Rann na Feirste learning the Irish language and Irish traditional music.

During these summers in Donegal, Mícheál and his siblings spent time with their aunt Neilí, a renowned singer who had a vast repertoire of Irish and English songs.

They also formed lifelong friendships with Pól and Ciarán Brennan (future members of Clannad) and Dáithí Sproule (future member of Skara Brae and Altan).

Mícheál's musical literacy was encouraged throughout his early years.

At the age of six, he started taking piano lessons from the Kells nuns, which left a lasting influence on him.

He also sang in a choir founded by his father.

At the age of twelve, Mícheál suffered an appendicitis.

To ease the boredom of his recuperation, a religious brother who taught at Mícheál's school gave him a guitar.

By the age of sixteen, Mícheál began devoting his musical energies to the guitar.

Throughout his early years, he and his sisters Tríona and Maighréad continued to sing the Irish songs together in close harmony.

With their father's advice to "listen across one another" to pick up subtle shifts in harmony, the siblings developed a seamless texture to their singing.

Tríona would later recall, "We could just look at each other in the midst of a song, and that look would communicate so much. When you've close family ties, it's instinctive."

In the late 1960s, Mícheál and his sister Tríona began attending University College Dublin, where they met up with singer-guitarist Dáithi Sproule (future member of Altan) from Derry.

They began performing together around Dublin, producing "beautiful, adventurous" arrangements of Irish Gaelic songs.

In the summer of 1970, Mícheál and Dáithi performed as the house band at Teach Hiudaí Beag in Gaoth Dobhair (Gweedore), Donegal.

Later that year, Mícheál, Tríona, Maighread, and Dáithi formed the group Skara Brae, a name suggested by Mícheál in reference to Skara Brae, an archaeological site in the Orkney Islands in Scotland consisting of a bleak stone village built in the second millennium BC.

In 1971, Skara Brae released an eponymous album of "beautifully performed Gaelic songs" on Gael Linn Records.

It was notable as the first recording to include vocal harmonisation in Irish language songs.

In 1973, while playing the club circuit in Ireland and still a student at University College Dublin, Ó Domhnaill met Mick Hanly, a Limerick-born singer, guitarist, and dulcimer player, and soon the two formed a duo called Monroe.

Playing a mixture of Irish, English, and Scottish ballads, many sung in Irish and Scottish Gaelic, Monroe's music centered on acoustic guitars, dulcimer, and voices, with "Hanly's brusque tones complimenting Mícheál's lower-key vocals".

In 2004, Ó Domhnaill described the influences on the group in an interview with the RTÉ radio program Rattlebag:

"Once a year we'd go up and we'd meet the Derry lads, and we'd form great bonds and they had a great interest in the language and love for it, and as did we, and we kind of sparked off each other. And we used to go down to the lake after classes and we'd sing. We'd sing Beatles songs, but we'd also sing Irish songs. And experiment with chords. We learned a lot from the Beatles. We listened a lot to them and all the music that was happening at the time and we tried to bring that to bear ... on the Irish."

Skara Brae's version of "Tá mé 'mo shuí" shows the unique influence of Rann na Feirste.

The song is performed differently in other parishes of the same area.

The four voices are skilfully supported by Triona's harpsichord, and the unique guitar work of Mícheál and Dáithi.

Mícheál in fact was one of the first guitar players, along with Dáithí, in Irish traditional music to employ DADGAD tuning.

His guitar style had a dramatic impact on guitarists who followed in the genre.

Both Mícheál and Dáithí were influenced in their early years by John Renbourn and Bert Jansch.