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Frances Patricia Black (born 25 June 1960) is an Irish people singer and politician. She came to prominence in the late 1980s when she began to play with her family's traditional and contemporary Irish music band, The Black Family.
Black was elected to Seanad Éireann as an independent senator in 2016 for the Industrial and Commercial Panel.
Black teamed up with the Newry singer Kieran Goss, and the pair recorded the album Frances Black and Kieran Goss in 1992. One of the songs on the album, "Wall of Tears", was featured on the compilation album A Woman's Heart. The album went on to become the biggest-selling Irish album ever, and this, along with the subsequent tour, advanced Black's career in the music industry. Other artists on A Woman's Heart included Eleanor McEvoy, Sharon Shannon, Maura O'Connell, Dolores Keane, and her sister Mary Black, who had achieved international success by then.
Black released her second solo album, The Sky Road, in 1995. She was the recipient of the 'Best Album by a Female' award, by the IRMA. Due to her rising popularity in America, she embarked on her second solo tour there in 1995. Among Ms. Black's most successful singles are re-recordings of Acker Bilk's "Stranger on the Shore" in 1996 and 1997, the Yvonne Elliman-popularized tune "Love Me, Please". 1997 saw the release of Black's album The Smile on Your Face. It contained songs written by numerous Irish, English and American songwriters. The follow-up album was 1998's Don't Get Me Wrong, which was released in the UK under Sony Records and was her fourth solo effort. It once again cemented Ms. Black's reputation as an international performer, becoming as revered as her older sister Mary.
A compilation, The Best of Frances Black, was released in 2001 by Dara-Dolphin Records. The album included 16 tracks from her throughout her career. Her two most recent albums How High the Moon (2003) and This Love Will Carry (2006) have also sold well in Ireland and Black toured the United States in support of the recordings. Her latest compilation, The Essential Frances Black (2008), went platinum, and contained 40 of her most popular songs.
In July 2017, Black co-proposed a new bill that proposed to alter the law in Ireland to enable more refugee families to be reunited. The law proposed that "family" in Irish legal terms should include the following when reunifying refugees: grandparent, parent, brother, sister, child, grandchild, ward or guardian of the refugee.
She has called for alcohol not to be sold next to nappies in supermarkets, and the Public Health (Alcohol) Act 2018 which introduced minimum pricing on Alcohol in Ireland. In January 2018 Black proposed the Occupied Territories Bill, a private member's bill which she described as seeking "to prohibit the import and sales of goods, services and natural resources originating in illegal settlements in occupied territories".
In 2018, Black visited the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. As part of her visit to the West Bank, she travelled with Breaking the Silence, an organisation consisting of former members of the Israeli Defence Forces who are opposed to Israeli settlements there.
In April 2018, NBC's Vivian Salama, on behalf of the politician George Mitchell, personally presented the Arab American Institute Foundation (AAIF)'s Award for Individual Achievement to Black at the 20th annual Kahlil Gibran Spirit of Humanity Awards in Washington. Mitchell made a special video message in praise of Black. The award was in recognition of her work as founder of RISE Foundation and her "tireless efforts on behalf of those struggling with addiction and their families".
She was re-elected at the 2020 Seanad election, and at the 2025 Seanad election.
In March 2025, Black was named among the bookmakers' favourites as a possible candidate in the 2025 presidential election. Black said she was "open to the conversation".
Black advocates for Palestinian nationalism and supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel. In January 2018 she tabled the Occupied Territories Bill in the Seanad, to place into Irish law a ban on "trade with and economic support for illegal settlements in territories deemed occupied under international law". The Bill was not enacted before the Seanad was dissolved. A watered-down version of the Bill was included in the subsequent programme for government.
In a 2019 interview, Black cited Clare Daly as someone she admired politically.
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