From u.tv Sept 2015
Co Antrim farmer Alex Walker had a near fatal incident when mixing slurry in February 2001.
Mixing slurry can be a particularly dangerous job for farmers as slurry gas – which contains extremely poisonous hydrogen sulphide – is released very quickly, and in large quantities, as soon as the mixing starts.
Filed under Feature, Interview, Published work, Uncategorized
I had a great Easter break this year by driving just over an hour away from Belfast and onto Northern Ireland’s dramatic north coast.
I had been a few times before but never really ventured to explore the area fully, mostly due to me being a fairly reluctant driver back then.
However, I must say getting to Ballycastle and driving the Causeway coastal routes is so easy, everything is well sign-posted and pretty simple to find.
Me and my partner Ryan looked for pet-friendly accommodation, which can be a difficult process as disappointingly there isn’t that much out there. However we found Paddy’s Barn on Airbnb, which is about four miles outside of Ballycastle town. It was a lovely small cottage and Amelia was very impressed with it.
After unpacking we decided to check out Ballintoy Harbour, which is a beautiful hidden fishing harbour at the end of a steep winding road. It has also been used as a filming location for Game of Thrones, which I’m admit I’ve never watched, but I was reliably informed that it looks pretty much the same apart from the cottage which now serves as a café.
In the evening I decided to go back to one institution I already knew about. Morton’s Fish and Chips, an unassuming little shop in the car park at Ballycastle Harbour, beside the Rathlin Ferry Terminal.
Featured in Mid Ulster Mail and Derry Post September 2015
After years performing on the sidelines, Draperstown songstress Celine Murphy will take centre stage when launches her solo career in her first gig at Glasgowbury’s Cornstore next month [SEPTEMBER].
The 26-year-old trained classical pianist has always had a passion for music, she is constantly songwriting and has featured previously in Derry singer Paddy Nash’s band, as well as other folk bands.
But as she explained, it took a while before she decided to put her work out there as a solo artist.
“This is the first time I’ve decided to start sharing my own music,” she said.
“I had been writing but hadn’t been playing it for anyone except my own enjoyment. I had a passion for it for years and then I just decided to go for it.
“I have loads of material, it’s about promoting that and getting it out for people to hear it. I never joined social media until last month, I always had an aversion to social media, it was a kind of a running joke with my friends and family.
“I suppose it’s just a balance, not all singer-songwriters are all outgoing extroverts, it’s just about being comfortable and saying ‘this is me’.”
Last month she released ‘Kind to Me’, recorded by Lisburn producer, Michael Mormecha of Mojo Fury fame.
“I went to start recording with Mike but with the view to having other singers, I thought I really want to get my music out there and maybe what I could do is explore recording other artists, other singers, and that’s why I went down and met Mike.
“But It just didn’t feel right, I just kept coming back to the conclusion that I needed to do it myself. I wanted to do it myself and I just needed to take that wee leap of faith.”
The song is a hauntingly sad song with a beautiful mix of piano and strings and Celine’s perfect vocals. Her sound has progressed through her classical training with influences of pop, Irish and folk.
“I don’t know how important it is to put a name on it either, I suppose it just comes from a really natural progression over many many years, people say they don’t know where to put it and that’s a good thing,” Celine added.
“My music started from a really young age, I actually have a twin sister, called Angela and Angela and I, we both started learning music at the same age, only she learned the violin and I learned piano.
“I think throughout my teen years, that was probably where my sound developed, finding my own style and playing piano and Angela playing violin and I started to really love that string and piano sound with vocal harmonies.”
Celine said she is in the unique position of having a lot of material to choose from as she has spent so much time songwriting.
She said: “I can tell you there are songs that aren’t quite as sad as that, there are songs that are more up tempo, but they are really personal stories and all of them are based on my own life experiences. They are all really honest.”
The video for Kind to Me was put together at the Glasgowbury Cornstore hub, by filmmaker Tiarnan Larkin and dancer Caitríona Groogan, both from Draperstown.
“Paddy and Stella [Glasgow] got a video meeting together for us all, there was going to be some of the students from the Cornstore there learning and watching it being made,seeing how it was done to open it up as a learning opportunity for young people,” Celine explained.
“I went on to do the video with the dancer Caitríona, that was a total dream for me. I always had in my minds eye that it would have a female dancer but you don’t think that you’ll be able to get a dancer and make such a beautiful video with your first single.
“She was so beautiful and her dance was so incredible. I just got really lucky that three of us bonded so well together and Caitríona got the emotion of that song, she got it straight away.”
It was only fitting then that Celine’s first solo billing would be at a gig in Glasgowbury’s Cornstore Loft.
“It’s such an amazing venue and the work that goes on there, the people that I met there and what they were able to do, it is incredible,” she continued.
“We’re really lucky, I don’t know if I lived in a different town and it’s such a small place, I wouldn’t have the same opportunities necessarily.”
She is supporting breakthrough Irish singer-songwriters Ciaran Lavery and Marc O’Reilly in their double headliner gig on Saturday 19 September.
“The artists I’m on with look absolutely amazing, I can’t believe it,” Celine exclaimed.
“I love performing so when I’m playing my music or when I’m singing I’m at my absolute happiest so I don’t feel nerves in that way.
“There’s no point wanting to do something and then just saying ‘oh god’ and not allowing yourself to enjoy it.”
“It’s just a privilege to be playing in front of people who want to hear your music.”
It will be a test for the young woman, who hasn’t aired her songs publicly before.
“I’m really looking forward to it. It’s great, these songs that I’m playing, I’m playing them for the first time live, so I actually have no idea what people’s reaction will be to them,” Celine added.
“I’ve just been playing in my own kitchen for years and I’ve loved it but it’s not that different if you love what you do.”
Ciaran Lavery & Marc O’Reilly with support from Celine Murphy, Saturday 19 September, in Glasgowbury’s Cornstore.
Filed under Feature, Interview, Uncategorized
Archived from UTV blog 2013-07-30
When it began in 2000, Glasgowbury was small affair, held in local bars in Draperstown, but ended up on a massive scale, attracting thousands of music lovers to the mountainside site and doubling the population of the local town.
And speaking as a local, it was exciting to have a major event that was owned, organised and hosted in the countryside, where nothing on the same scale usually happens.
Memorable performances have included the likes of Red Organ Serpent Sound, Duke Special, The Undertones and Henry McCullough as well as emerging new talent including acts like the now established And So I Watch You From Afar, Fighting With Wire, The Answer, Axis Of, General Fiasco and The Wonder Villains.
It may have surprised some that after 13 years and countless performances from the best in homegrown musical talent, Glasgowbury festival bid farewell to its annual home at Eagle’s Rock almost a fortnight ago.
The festival expanded to a two-day event for the first and last time this year, with headliners And So I Watch You From Afar, The Japanese Popstars and The Answer helping to wrap up the annual showcase.
“People always used to think international was the way to go. Now look at the advertisements for the Tourist Board, the mad boy with the mad hair from the country was f***ing right.”
“We may be small but we believe we made a massive difference in our own area. For musicians, by musicians, that is the one thing that is at the heart of it,” Paddy explained.
“It wasn’t about where you’re from, what’s your background, what language you speak. It was about the music. It was about the cultural gathering of people, like-minded individuals that wanted to put on something.
“When we started off, it wasn’t just about the music, it was about everything, it was about access for the people who wanted to be stage managers, people who wanted to do lighting, corporate box office, teching, infrastructure.”
In the aftermath of the last ever festival, he hasn’t even paused to reflect, as he has far too many other plans.
His new focus is establishing an expanded creative hub in the community and he has started work in Draperstown’s Cornstore.
If Glasgowbury festival’s legacy was about homegrown music then the next stage is about inspiring the next generation.
Paddy tells me it will be a place where the continued promotion of local talent and expansion of new educational and creative enterprises will thrive.
“This is a pure grassroots up thing, this the community getting behind what we’re doing, it’s a workspace,” he explains.
“Lots of young people come to me, and they want to do their own films, they want to start photography, they want to do documentaries, or crafts.”
In the background he has always been running similar schemes, with the Rural Key workshops involving the likes of Shauna Tohill from Silhouette.
“Who would have thought that you would have a local girl from Magherafelt, having a song on a NI TV ad,” he comments.
“We’re hoping it will be a place where people can come in and ignite that self-employment, and won’t be scared and have that rural attitude of ‘I don’t know, I couldn’t do that’.”
In concluding the festival chapter, he credits volunteers and support from local people in particular as the key to the running of the event for more than a decade.
“There’s people there who have really good jobs, taking a week off work to help.
“Whenever I would say, ‘What are you doing? You could be lying in the sun’ – they would say, ‘I am so proud that people are coming into our area.’
“One of the things that hit me were the words of And So I Watch You From Afar, said after their set on Friday night. It was humbling.
“They said ‘Glasgowbury gave us the belief on a main stage, a massive stage, that we could take on other stages internationally’.”
“I don’t think it’s hit me yet,” he finally admits. “I think it will hit me when we have our party at the end, whenever I gather together all the people that set it up every year.
“I think the whole emotional connection, maybe I won’t do that, because it’s not over. As far as I’m concerned, Glasgowbury’s ended, the festival has ended but small but massive and all the organising that went into Glasgowbury – it’s only just begun.”
featured in COVERWest magazine. Pic: Faye Rossi
ALLIE Bradley is a singer-songwriter from Maghera, Co. Derry-Londonderry who after deciding to step her music career up a gear, has done just that with the release of her second EP this year.
The 25-year-old has always been into singing and writing music, learning how to play guitar from the age of ten.
“I began singing in choirs when I was at school and always loved performing and singing. When I was around ten I learnt how to play the guitar and from around that age I began to sing by myself singing covers and basically just experimenting with my vocals,” she says.
“I sang in competitions and got heavily involved in Irish traditional music, competing in scórs both as a solo singer and also in groups. I won the All Ireland Scór na nÓg solo singing competition when I was 16 and that gave me more confidence to embark on performing by myself. From that age I started to write my own music and compose melodies and lyrics.
Filed under Feature, Published work
A great mix of artists at work and live music, the event was a unique chance to see artists producing their work over the two-day period and enjoy the festival atmosphere.
I went to see local artist Andy Brown carrying out the impressive feat of creating a painting over the two days, not a minimal, graffiti style design but a full-detailed painting. He hadn’t given himself an easy task.
He managed to produce this over the two-day event. Very impressive!
Check out the rest of the pictures in the gallery below. Please credit with a link if you use any of them.
Ruth Ramsden (30) created Sleep: Where The Heart Is to illustrate the importance of where and how people sleep, what it says about us and to highlight how some sleep in the most undesirable conditions on the streets.
Every Pound Counts: Roisin McDonough, Arts Council Chief Executive
The Arts Council of Northern Ireland is campaigning to remind the public that as well as vital services like health and education, they should voice their opinion on cuts to funding for the Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL).
The department covers funding for a wide range of services in society, including sport, arts, libraries and museums.
Today’s news that plans to build five sports centres have been cancelled due to lack of funding is a bad sign for the department’s future.
The department faces a big loss as it only receives 1% of the government budget. 9% is to be cut from the department’s spending, which will mean a loss of £14.5 million over the four-year period.
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Filed under Feature, News, Published work
The satirical cartoonist on caricaturing Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair and the cream of the Northern Irish political crop at the Out to Lunch festival.
©Steve Bell 1977-2010 - All Rights Reserved http://www.belltoons.co.uk
Published on Culture NI
Steve Bell has been taking a satirical look at the issues of the day in his cartoons for almost 30 years now. He has produced illustrations and comic strips for many different publications, including Punch, Private Eye, Radio Times, The Spectator and The Journalist, and his comic strip If… has appeared in the Guardian since 1981. Bell has also published an impressive 28 books.
The infamous cartoonist is at the Black Box in Belfast as part of the Out To Lunch Festival, to talk about his trade and the process of capturing politicians in pen. Bell’s wit and opinionated banter keep the packed crowd enthralled and entertained, despite the projector failing, which leaves Bell having to use his laptop to show his images.
He recalls early inspiration coming from reading the Dandy, Beano and Beazer and hating the Daily Mail. Showing examples of his work, he explains that his career had been ‘based on abusing this old bat’, as cartoons of Maggie Thatcher are displayed on screen.
Filed under Feature, Published work, Review
Flickr: SearchNetMedia
In the aftermath of the tragic shooting in Arizona, politicians and the media are the focus of blame for inspiring violence.
22-year-old Jared Loughner has appeared in court today facing charges over the shooting in Arizona on Saturday.
He has not entered a plea during an initial hearing, but merely confirmed his identity and had an attorney appointed to him.
He could face life imprisonment or the death penalty if he is found guilty of killing federal judge John Roll who was shot during the incident.
Mr Loughner was held in custody and will appear again in court on 24 January.
President Barack Obama held a moment of silence yesterday for the victims of the shooting at the public meeting in Tucson.
19 people were shot, six people died including a nine-year-old girl and a federal judge. It is believed that congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was the main target for the gunman.
She is in a critical condition in hospital but it is thought she will recover.
Blame Game
The news has caused huge commotion over what was responsible for the gunman’s actions, and the extreme nature of political electioneering and rivalry in the country has been a big focus for blame.
Sarah Palin’s map which used crosshairs to ‘target’ opposition candidates to defeat in elections has been highlighted as an example of the violent manner of political competition.
Famous figures such as Jane Fonda and Michael Moore pointed the finger at Palin for listing Ms Giffords and other Democrats, telling followers to “reload” and “aim” for them.
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Filed under Feature, Published work
Portfolio and personal blog of Belfast journalist Louise Convery.
Louise in NI 
