Summer magic and Autumn plans
The summer always comes and goes way too fast. Thankfully we got a bit of an Indian summer which will hopefully keep us going for another while.
It was a summer full of fun shows, festivals, weddings and the launch of Lillie’s Live Lounge.
Our dream of opening up an original music showcase came true and the first two nights were a great success.
First up in July we had Danny Groenland, a neo-soul act based in Dublin. Danny is a singer, songwriter & flautist, making music for the feet and for the mind. His songs blend a love of melody from The Beatles, social themes from Marvin Gaye & Curtis Mayfield and an obsession with all things D'Angelo. I am a big fan of Danny’s music and have been singing BVs with him for many years. He was top of mind when we started planning our shows as I’ve wanted to bring him to Sligo for some time now.
I opened up the show with a couple of soulful tunes with Johnny Taylor which was such a treat for me as I hadn’t sang with him in so long. Johnny played keys on our first single “Don’t You Ever Leave” and he is just a phenomenal player.
After that Danny played a full and lively set as a 7 piece band with guitar, bass, drums, keys and 2 BVs (including myself). He played a mix of old and new material from his upcoming album and a couple of great covers including Bob Marley’s “So Much Trouble in the World”. It was an amazing night . Check out his music here
Danny G at Lillies Live Lounge
Next up in August we had the brilliant Jargon, supported by Amy O’Hara, two brilliant local acts. It was completely sold out. Jargon are a highly talented multi-instrumentalist acoustic quartet, who have returned and reformed after years apart. They are known for their interpretations and original songs in Ragtime, Blues, Folk and Bluegrass styles. Formed by Charlie McGettigan in 1973, and reformed in the eighties, they followed Clannad and Pumpkinhead in winning the prestigious Letterkenny Folk Festival and subsequently released three singles.
They won the crowd over from the first song, not hard to do when you’re local legends, but still I always think it’s a brave move to play acoustically and to put yourself out there to such an intimate crowd, no matter what experience you have.
I believe the intimate audience is the most intimidating one. It can also be the most rewarding but it brings up a different kind of nerves for me as there’s no where to hide.
If you missed this gig you can catch them on their tour. See their dates here
Jargon at Lillie's Live Lounge
Next up, on the 26th of September we have the amazing Chief Keegan, an instrumental funk band from Dublin. The quartet of keyboardist Luke Dunford, guitarist Mark Dudley, bassist Alan Elliott, and drummer Cian Hanley have quickly established itself on the Irish music scene and have brought their "feel-good music” to festivals such as Electric Picnic, Cork Jazz Festival, and the Bray Jazz Festival as well as touring relentlessly throughout Ireland and Northern Ireland.
We were lucky to play with Luke a few years back when we did an Otis Redding Tribute night in the Bello Bar, pre Chief Keegan. He is a phenomenal and highly sought afterb keys player and I have no doubt the band are going to blow everyone away on the later this month.
Some tickets are still available here
If you are a band who would like to play fill out the form here
Or if there is any band you would love to see play please get in touch here
Two other stand out gigs for us this summer were the Ladie’s Night in Lillies and performing at the Summer Festival in August.
At the start of the summer Jamie, from Lillie’s asked me to help him to organise a ladie’s night as part of the Lilliepallooza Festival in July. There are actually so many brilliant female performers in Sligo that it’s hard to narrow down but I went to work on gathering as many female acts as I could. I managed to get a whopper 11 female acts (myself included) !
The acts that performed were the following - me, Joy Feehily, Jane Feehily, Cathy Jordan, Brídín, Aileen Masterson, Aileen Concannon, Siobhán O’Farrell, Annette Rafter, Niamh Keaveney and Coolaney Gospel Choir!
Plus an honourable mention to Kevin, Eoin Troy, Brendan Tierney and James McManus who helped to back us up !
It was a brilliant night, but I hadn’t thought about the fact I was going to have to host the event myself so I had a last minute panic about making sure all went smoothly ! Thank God everything went off without a hitch and it was great fun! It’s so amazing to have a group of brilliant women performing. It’s definitely something we will consider doing again and possibly as a semi regular event. So if you are a female performer and would like to perform at the next ladies night get in touch
You will also get a chance to see some of these amazing musicians perform soon at the next Kieran Quinn Theme Nights. There are still some tickets available here
In August we were delighted to have the opportunity to play on the Friday of the Sligo Summer Festival as a full band. We played an hour set from 18.45 which included a couple of new tunes we hadn’t tried in front of an audience yet and a couple of fun covers.
There was a great crowd of mixed ages and we absolutely loved playing on a big stage again.
I think my happiest performance place is on a big stage. I just feel so free and comfortable, having space to move around and express myself. More of that please. It was so fun and the glorious sunshine helped us to all be in great sprits.
The new and improved Queen Maeve’s Square is a brilliant place for live music. I look forward to going to and performing at many events in the future there.
Here’s a few stills from the gig, most of which were taken by Kapture Photography.
We will also have a couple of live videos coming soon taken by the amazing Sarah Ploss. Watch this space.
On the last weekend of August, we flew to Lisbon to attend an amazing music festival called Meo Kalorama. We had been looking to go to see Jungle live somewhere in Europe and we found the festival which also happened to have Raye as a headliner so we booked it immediately.
These two acts are big inspirations for us at the moment, one for production and the other for performance and songwriting. I can confirm they are both amazing live and it was well worth the trip ! Festivals are such great events especially when the sun is shining. The great thing about a European festival is you don’t have to worry about the weather ! Some other highlights from the weekend were Sam Smith, Death Cab For Cutie, Gossip and Ana Moura.
It was such a brilliant weekend of music and a perfect way to end the summer on a high, feeling inspired and motivated for the last third of 2024.
