Music of Ireland
From 1784, the musician and collector Edward Bunting was thirty years a lodger with the McCrackens. Mary Ann and Harry attended the Harpist Festival Bunting staged for the benefit of the Belfast Charitable Society in July 1792. In 1808 Mary Ann became a founding member of the Belfast Harp Society and continued to support Bunting. She acted as his unofficial secretary and contributed anonymously to the second volume of his work "The Ancient Music of Ireland" in 1809.