CMAT: 'I fractured my neck rocking out on stage' - bbc.co.uk

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By Sam Gruet

Newsbeat reporter

As workplace injuries go, fracturing your neck on-stage while rocking out in to a crowd of thousands of fans is a pretty unusual one.

But that's what happened to singer CMAT, real name Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson.

What's even more surprising about her injury is that she didn't realise she'd done it. At least not straight away.

It was only when her larynx collapsed - causing her to lose her voice - that the problem became obvious.

CMAT - who won the Ireland's Choice Music Prize for Best Album of the Year - spoke to BBC Newsbeat as she prepared for her first gig since.

She was in the middle of her last tour when she injured her neck.

"I didn't know I fractured my neck from rocking out," she says.

"I was just throwing my head in a circle, head banging and stuff. And I fractured my neck."

CMAT says she continued to play live, and kept head banging on-stage.

"Over the course of the entire tour, I was just fracturing it little by little," she says.

Eventually, she couldn't ignore it.

"My larynx collapsed" she says.

"It twisted and my voice box wasn't closing together, so I lost my voice for a month."

In an Instagram post at the time, CMAT told fans it had "rotated and has slightly collapsed on one side".

Or, as she also put it, her larynx was "in its flop era".

Vocal physiotherapist Nikki Franklin says it's not that unusual for singers to get injuries to their vocal organs.

"We do see this kind of repetitive strain and injury with performance," she says.

Nikki says performers doing "something quite unique for numerous shows throughout the year on repeat" can take its toll.

But she admits that CMAT's injuries are "pretty unique".

"It sounds quite extreme doesn't it?" she says.

"Singers are athletes in that small area of their neck, throat and voice box.

"We see them using their bodies in different ways and putting a lot of strain on that area."

Nikki says this can gradually lead to build-ups of tension and micro trauma until it ends with "something that breaks the camel's back"

"Or, in this case, a singer's neck."

CMAT, who only cancelled two shows before getting back to her day job, says she's "all healed" now.

She says a vocal coach "reinvigorated" her voice through a programme of physio and voice coaching.

But will she be doing anything differently now she's back on stage?

"I've cut my hair shorter. So hopefully that should help," she says.

"But I'll probably be out there rocking out tonight."

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