Jonny Quinn was my first manager .....We met on a music course in Belfast and went to London for industry experience. One day it was sunny and as a group we went out for a row on boats, in Hyde Park. Jonny and I ended up in the same boat - and with our first conversation we started working together. Before the course started, I was only playing the harp, for 6 months. I was writing new songs every week and playing them at Astronaut Dale Amon's open mic night in the Duke of York. After that first chat with Jonny on the boat, I was making an Album!
Everything was possible, everything was unknown and everything was an adventure.
A nicer person you could not meet. He was ahead of his time. Jonny was designing a brand and website on the cusp of the internet, he created "Generation X". I remember him telling me about the concept of emails. (as we were preparing to snail mail out the handwritten press release for the first gigs). We were printing posters and pasting them around Belfast. He payed for the first posters from his pocket. A few months ago,.a friend sent me a photo of one of my old posters, still on the walls of iconic venue, Connellys of Leap, Cork. The first marketing (pre danger) was "The Harpist Who Is Hip"!
I loved the Belfast of those days. It was so vibrant and the music scene was wild. Watercress, Peter Wilson (Duke Special) The Disraeli Gears, Ian Archer, So many good heads. Also Hoolie, Edgar, Harper and Balie. The first ever TV episode of Across the Line and random gigs in Belfast North Street Arcade.
Jonny was so supportive, when I first started in Music. It's crazy to look back on those early days and realise that I didn't own a camera and I don't have any photos.
One day Jonny bought me massive wind chimes he had something to tell me. He was leaving Belfast and couldn't be my manager anymore. He had to leave to go follow his dreams and play drums for a new band called Snowpatrol! Before he left he secured a record deal and management for me, with Freerange Records. With freerange I went on to tour Europe and play the Albert Hall and make my first album "According to Ursula Burns".
Jonny took the boat over to Join the rest of the band in Glasgow and made their first album Songs for Polar Bears..... as they say, the rest is history.......... They literally made it, in such a big way! It was his destiny.
All the best to Snowpatrol with their new directions.
Tne constant in life ......... is change
Thank you for the music! What rock stars you all are!
All my love to all of them for following their dreams and doing it like TOTAL BOSS LEGENDS..........
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