By Paddy McCarthy
I just did the most fascinating interview with one of the greatest musicians. He is a living Irish Legend and is none other than Phil Coulter. Here is a man that could sit back and enjoy life and just let the world go by, as he has done everything that has to be done as a musician. But no, that is not Phil Coulter. He still loves what he does. He gives advice and guidance and is still performing and just as popular as ever in the music world.
Before I get into the history of Phil, I remember when he performed in such venues as Carnegie Hall in New York. He packed many a place and I was fortunate to be there for some of them. Let me tell yea, it was only magic when he performed.
He did mention one other particular venue in New York that he performed in and that was The Irish Repertory Theatre. Phil said he had the warmest memories of this. The venue was so unique in size and was beautiful to perform in. His wife Geraldine Brannigan also performed there. And guess what? I was there too.
He made one very nice comment regarding Ciaran O’Reilly, Producing Director of the Irish Rep. He said he had come not come across a more genuine man. I can tell you that he could not say enough about Ciaran, about his professionalism and how he made it so easy to perform, and comfortable for them; now wasn’t that nice.
Getting back to my questions to Phil I asked how hard was it for him to get into the social media space and to reach his fans during the ongoing pandemic? Here is what he said: “When Covid hit, the music business fell off the edge of a cliff. Gigs were cancelled, tours were pulled, recording sessions were abandoned. When the stark reality hit home, I figured I had two options. Either to sit in a corner feeling sorry for myself, complaining about the lockdown and blaming everybody from the government to the Chinese…or I could get creative and reinvent myself!”
I then asked whether he’d found that social media enhances the chemistry between you and your fans? He again said that “for the past few months I have seized the social media bull by the horns. In order to keep a profile with my followers I have embraced the technology, live streaming on my Facebook page every Saturday from my ‘Lockdown Lounge’ that was the room in his house and posting a couple of new tracks every week. The response has been a revelation.”
I asked him how hard is it to get that “rush” when performing without a crowd in front of you? He spoke again like a true professional and said “I am looking into the camera just as if I am looking in the camara when I am doing a television show.”
“We have had over one million reactions. For example, when I posted a short ‘Town I Loved So Well’ tribute to my friend John Hume It notched up 150,000 views.”
Now where would yea get it? Only from a true Legend Phil Coulter. I talked about a few things that I knew he could answer without a blink.
How has the process of collaborative song-writing changed in this era of lockdowns? How’s the planning going for the live events in October? Tell us more about Ryan Hennessy and Jimmy Rainsford. I was not hurrying him only I did not want to miss a question as I am still flabbergasted talking to him.
This was his reply: “To take all this to the next level we have planned three shows, on October 1st, 2nd and 3rd in the Venue Theatre, Ratoath, Co. Meath. The shows, called “Up Close and Personal” will be in front of a restricted socially distant audience, ten tables of four.
“On the third night we are live streaming the concert across the globe.
“In an attempt to re-imagine our live performances this old dog has had to learn a few new tricks! In the same spirit I have been active on the songwriting front, writing with two of the hottest young talents around, Ryan Hennessy and Jimmy Rainsford from Picture This. It’s never too late for a fresh challenge!”
Now what more could I ask for as he was so pleasant to me and we also a had a few laughs about the old days in New York that I am not going to tell you about; it was all good fun with friends of both Phil and myself that are now gone, RIP.
The two lads that Phil was talking about from Picture This originate from Athy, County Kildare, Ireland. The band consists of many people including Ryan Hennessy (vocals), Jimmy Rainsford (drums), well you can read about them in the Music page.
Now for a history on Philip Coulter is an Irish musician, songwriter and record producer from Derry, Northern Ireland. He was awarded the Gold Badge from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors in October 2009. He has amassed 23 platinum discs, 39 gold discs, 52 silver discs, two Grand Prix Eurovision awards; five Ivor Novello Awards, which includes Songwriter of the Year; three American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers awards; a Grammy Nomination; a Meteor Award, a National Entertainment Award and a Rose d’or d’Antibes. He is one of the biggest record sellers in his native land.
Phil was born in Derry, Northern Ireland during the height of the Second World War, where his father (from Strangford, County Down) was one of a minority of Catholic policemen in the Royal Ulster Constabulary. His mother was from Belfast. He was the fourth child with two older brothers and a sister and one younger sister, each born with a year’s difference between them, in a two-up two-down terraced house.
Coulter’s father, also called Phil, encouraged music in the house. He played the fiddle whilst his wife played the upright piano. The younger Coulter recalls this piano, made by Challen, as “the most important piece of furniture in the house
“I always stayed away from the fiddle, having inflicted enough pain on my family with the piano,” he laughed. Coulter confesses that he came close to abandoning the piano at an early age.
“The truth is I hated the piano at first. I’d love to say I was a natural but I wasn’t. I hated playing it and I hated my music teacher. My father, who was a canny man, told me, ‘We have to scrimp and save to pay for these lessons, you might as well give them up. It wasn’t long before I gravitated back to the piano, trying to play the songs that I was listening to on the radio. I always wondered what my left hand was supposed to be doing though. But after two or three years at St. Columb’s College I began thinking of the piano as an extension of myself.”
One of Coulter’s most popular songs, ‘The Town I Loved So Well’, deals with the embattled city of his youth, filled with “that damned barbed wire” during the Troubles.
He started his first band at Queen’s University, playing early rock and roll music despite studying classical music. He was also founder of the Glee Club, which staged music events for the university. By 1964, his final year at university, he’d already written a couple of hit songs in Ireland and moved to London, where his first job was as an arranger/songwriter with a music publisher in Denmark Street.
From here he was hired to work with acts including Billy Connolly, Van Morrison, Jerry Lee Lewis and Tom Jones. He wrote ‘Foolin’ Time’ (1963), a hit for the Capitol Showband. Other songs he contributed to around that time included his arrangement of ‘Terry’ (1964), a UK No. 4 hit for Twinkle, plus co-writing ‘I Can Only Give You Everything’, which was originally recorded by Them.
In 1965, he met Bill Martin and the two became established as a successful songwriting team that lasted more than ten years (Martin for the lyrics, Coulter for the melody). They wrote Sandie Shaw’s 1967 Eurovision-winning entry, ‘Puppet on a String’, which became an international hit which was covered more than a 100 times.
The following year their song ‘Congratulations’, sung by Cliff Richard, came second in the Eurovision Song Contest. In 2008 a Spanish documentary alleged that Cliff Richard had been robbed of victory after General Francisco Franco fixed the vote. The person who made the claim in the documentary, José María Íñigo, said later that his words had been taken out of context.
Seven years after ‘Congratulations’, another Coulter song, ‘Toi’, co-written with Pierre Cour, was performed as the Luxembourg entry by Coulter’s future wife Geraldine in Stockholm. Coulter conducted the orchestra for the song, which came fifth.
Coulter and Martin also wrote ‘Shine It On’, which finished third in the 1978 heat of A Song for Europe, performed by the Glaswegian performer Christian.
Between 1967 and 1976, they had four No. 1 hits in the UK: ‘Puppet on a String’, ‘Congratulations’, ‘Back Home’ and ‘Forever and Ever’. There were also numerous Top 10 hits including the Bay City Rollers’ ‘Shang-A-Lang’, ‘Fancy Pants’ by the glam rock band Kenny, ‘Requiem’ by the Scottish pop group Slik, and ‘Surround Yourself with Sorrow’ by Cilla Black.
In 1975, Martin and Coulter were joint recipients of an Ivor Novello Award for ‘Songwriter of the Year’.
The Bay City Rollers had a No. 1 hit in 1976 in the US Billboard Hot 100 chart with ‘Saturday Night’, a song that was not released as a single in the UK. There were three No. 1 hits in the US for the songwriters, the other two (which were chart-toppers on the Billboard Hot Country Songs and the Adult Contemporary listings respectively) being ‘Thanks’, performed by Bill Anderson and ‘My Boy’, sung by Elvis Presley. They also contributed incidental music to the 1967 Spider-Man television series, and Coulter also wrote the score to the 1978 film version of The Water Babies.
As well as writing hit singles, Coulter produced three albums with Planxty. Christy Moore wrote: “With no competition he gave us a shite contract and we signed everything away. All that said, 30 years on this album sounds good. He produced it well and … (he had) the foresight and wherewithal to record the band at a time when no one else was listening.”
Coulter produced, arranged and wrote most of Joe Dolan’s 1983 album, ‘Here and Now’. The album featured several hit singles, including the Irish Top Ten hit ‘Deeper and Deeper’ which remained a staple in Dolan’s live sets, and was also one of the last songs Dolan performed before he became ill on stage, during what turned out to be his last ever show in Abbeyleix. The album was released in South Africa as ‘Yours Faithfully’ where it went to number one within one week of release.
In 2007, Phil joined with Sharon Browne, one of the originators of the successful Celtic Woman production, to collaborate on formation of a male version of that production called Celtic Thunder. A stage production at The Helix in Dublin was released on DVD as ‘Celtic Thunder: The Show’, and it went to the top of the Amazon and Billboard World Top Albums chart in 2008.
In 1984 Coulter launched himself as an artist in his own right and began by releasing a solo instrumental album called ‘Classic Tranquility’. His follow-up, ‘Sea of Tranquility’, became the second-best selling album of all time in Ireland. It peaked at No. 46 in the UK Albums Chart, and remained in the chart for fourteen weeks. The follow-up album, ‘Phil Coulter’s Ireland’ reached No. 86 in the UK.
He moved from London back to Ireland, where he established his music publishing company on the grounds of his house in Bray, south of Dublin. Coulter’s official website notes that he has some 23 platinum records, 39 gold and 52 silver albums. He also keeps one of the walls of his office blank, “to remind me that there’s still room for a lot more.”
In the 1990s, he produced work for both Sinéad O’Connor and Boyzone. In 2001 he was nominated for a Grammy Award in the “New Age” category for his album ‘Highland Cathedral’. He continues to be a popular performer in his native country and around the world in places such as The White House and Carnegie Hall. On October 28, 2009, he was presented with a BASCA Gold Badge Award in recognition of his unique contribution to music.
Coulter’s first marriage was to Angela Coulter; their second child was born with Down’s Syndrome and died aged four. With the encouragement of Luke Kelly, he wrote the song ‘Scorn Not His Simplicity’ to help him get through the difficult time. Kelly recorded the song and it appeared on The Dubliners’ 1970 LP ‘Revolution’, becoming the definitive version, later being recorded by several artists.
In November 1998, Coulter married Brannigan in a low-key ceremony at Wicklow registry office, witnessed by their six children, Danielle, Dominique, Alexandra, Daragh, Ryan and Georgina, and 16 guests. Coulter and his wife live in Bray, County Wicklow.
Disregarding the broad international campaign against the Apartheid regime and the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela, Coulter performed in an undemocratic South Africa in May 1983 and his name was included in the register of entertainers who traveled to that country by the United Nations Center Against Apartheid, which was published in 1986.
In 2002, Coulter was encouraged by the Save the Swilly organisation to run for the Dáil to protect Lough Swilly from aquacultural destruction. After some deliberation, he concluded that work and family commitments would not allow him the time necessary to fill the political position.
Around that time, Coulter’s brother died in a drowning incident in Ireland, which also caused Phil to retreat from the music industry for some time.
He is a former president of Derry City Football Club and is known to be a supporter of the club, having attempted to help the club with its financial problems in the early 2000s. He has also helped Derry City’s local rivals, Finn Harps, in their time of need. His son Ryan plays in goal for Forward Madison FC.
In 1995, the Irish Rugby Football Union commissioned Coulter to write a politically neutral anthem for the Ireland national rugby union team, which represents both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. The result was ‘Ireland’s Call’, which is played alongside, and in some cases instead of, ‘Amhrán na bhFiann’. As well as being used by both the Ireland national rugby union team and the junior national teams, ‘Ireland’s Call’ has since also been adopted by Ireland’s national hockey, cricket and rugby league teams and by the world-renowned singing group Thunder Coulter has received honorary doctorates from the University of Ulster (1988), Dublin Institute of Technology (2006), and The Open University (2018).
Now you have an idea what this man has accomplished in his life time and let tell not finished yet.