New music inspired by Titanic to be launched at event to showcase Northern Ireland’s music industry

An event designed to showcase Northern Ireland’s music industry will feature the launch of an ode to the Titanic by one of the UK’s most in-demand artists.
J Willgoose (centre) from Public Service Broadcasting will be in Belfast next week to launch the bands EP about the TitanicJ Willgoose (centre) from Public Service Broadcasting will be in Belfast next week to launch the bands EP about the Titanic
J Willgoose (centre) from Public Service Broadcasting will be in Belfast next week to launch the bands EP about the Titanic

Output Belfast – which takes place on February 21 – will also see NI singer and new Mencap ambassador Cormac Neeson perform a song written about his life-changing experience of bringing up a child with Down’s Syndrome.

Across Belfast’s Metropolitan Arts Centre and Oh Yeah Centre, around 75 national and international music industry speakers will present seminars, panels and workshops that cover key tracks and trends in the 2019 music industry.

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The conference will close with a Q and A entitled ‘The boat that rocked – Public Service Broadcasting and the White Star Liner EP’.

New Mencap ambassador Cormac Neeson with the charity's NI director Margaret Kelly. Photo by Aaron McCrackenNew Mencap ambassador Cormac Neeson with the charity's NI director Margaret Kelly. Photo by Aaron McCracken
New Mencap ambassador Cormac Neeson with the charity's NI director Margaret Kelly. Photo by Aaron McCracken

It will tell the story of Public Service Broadcasting’s extraordinary suite of music on the Titanic, which the London band – whose current album got to number four in the UK chart – first performed as a part of BBC 6 Music’s Titanic slipway concert last May.

With archive, clips and movies the band’s J Willgoose will unpack how they approached the commission, what the music was meant to say, and the processes involved in creating and then performing the repertoire based around the globally iconic ship’s fateful voyage.

A year ago, as work on the EP was under way, J Willgoose told the News Letter: “As an outsider coming over from London there’s lot of things I can’t understand but at the same time wandering around down by the shipyards you can’t help but feel that sense of history.

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“It was interesting to look into the history and learn how important Belfast had been as an industrial hub. A lot of people over in mainland Britain are a bit ignorant of it, so it’s nice to be doing something that highlights that.”

Other session highlights include a discussion on the music used in the two biggest Irish comedies of the last decade – Derry Girls and Young Offenders, a session on co-writing radio hits featuring co-writers for One Direction and Ella Eyre, Radiohead’s booking agency ‘13 Artists’ participating on a panel on how to pitch music to agents, the youngest ever winner of the BBC young folk musician award Jarlath Henderson, and sessions from AVA Festival on new talent programmes.

The conference will take place from 10am to 5pm and is free to attend.

Sign-up is open on www.outputbelfast.com

In the evening, the spotlight will turn onto Northern Ireland home grown talent, with a series of free showcases taking place across venues in Belfast’s Cathedral Quarter.

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Acts playing this year include NI Music Prize winners The Wood Burning Savages, Ciaran Lavery, who has over 90,000,000 streams on Spotify, Hotpress ‘Hot For 2019’ nominee Rebekah Fitch, and Cormac Neeson, singer of The Answer, who recently released his debut solo album to critical acclaim.

Cormac has also announced a relationship with Mencap NI that will see him become an ambassador for the learning disability charity and will see Mencap fully support his new forthcoming single Broken Wing and album White Feather.

In 2014, Cormac’s son Dabhóg was born three months prematurely and with Down’s Syndrome.

The impact of that life-changing experience had such a lasting and profound effect that Neeson sought solace in penning an autobiographical and emotional account of his inner thoughts and what it’s like to bring up a child with disability.

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Commenting on the track, he said: “I’ve never written a song like Broken Wing before. Even though I’ve heard it hundreds of times now, I still get emotional every time I sing it back because of just how relevant the lyric is to my life and my family’s life. It’s my hope that maybe when people hear this song they can relate to the message. I can’t speak highly enough of the Mencap Children’s Centre who have provided invaluable support and advice to us and played a major role in my son’s development”

Cormac’s son Dabhóg attended the Mencap Children’s Centre in Belfast when he was two years old. The centre is a unique specialist learning environment for children with a learning disability, autism and developmental delay, which is run in partnership with the Belfast Health Trust. The charity also provides programmes and family support services to help parents and carers of young children with a learning disability.

A documentary and music video for Broken Wing will be released in the lead up to World Down’s Syndrome Day on March 21.

Cormac will be playing 39 Gordon Street at 8.15pm as part of Output Belfast.