Phil Coulter is one of Northern Ireland’s artistic greats

Phil Coulter famously wrote ‘The Town I Love So Well’ about his native Londonderry.

Now that town — or city, to be more precise — has given the musician the freedom of it.

The honour was unanimously agreed by Derry City and Strabane District Coucil, and deservedly so.

Coulter is one of Northern Ireland’s artistic giants.

He burst on to the international music scene in his mid 20s when the track he wrote ‘Puppet on a String’ won the 1967 Eurovision song contest, performed by Sandie Shaw.

The very next year he had written another number one hit, ‘Congratulations’, for Cliff Richard.

And ever since then, Coulter — who turned 80 recently — has been a household name in this Province, and highly respected in musical circles around the world.

Earlier this year, Coulter gave an interview to this newspaper in which he reflected on a career which has seen him collaborate with stars from the Bay City Rollers to Jerry Lee Lewis, from the Rolling Stones to the Dubliners.

Few people could make the comment he did: “When I was sitting in my youth in a terrace house listening to Elvis Presley singing Hound Dog did I ever think in a million years that The King would one day sing something I had written? No.”

Coulter, whose father was a Catholic member of the RUC, attended St Columb’s College grammar school, which has a impressive list of alumni including two other creative giants Seamus Heaney and Brian Friel, and other distinguished old boys ranging from the footballer Michael O’Neill to the politician John Hume and the physicist Ray Flannery.

Coulter has not retired on becoming an octogenarian and is still performing, in a career that has won him 23 platinum discs, 39 gold discs and 52 silver discs.

He has worked with both Van Morrison and James Galway and joins them in the list of NI’s all-time greats.

Always proud of the Maiden City, it now has given him its highest form of recognition.

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