I was thrilled to be invited, by the man himself, to go and see John Spillane in the Opera House last night. I hadn’t seen him play in quite some time and so was really looking forward to it - and he did not disappoint.

Before the man himself made an appearance we were treated to some wonderful songs from Ger Wolfe, who seemed to have gone from strength to strength since I had last seen him perform. His guitar playing was unbelievable, and his rendition of ‘Curra Road’ was, as he said himself, a wonderful welcome to the summer.

John himself has a new album out called ‘My Dark Rosaleen & the Island of Dreams’, which is available to buy on iTunes (or buy the cd on Claddagh), and his set featured a good mix of old and new songs from the ‘Hit Factory’.

I own a copy of all John’s albums (except the latest which I will purchase during the week) but there’s something about John Spillane’s music that is best experienced live.

John Spillane has an incredible stage presence, it’s not a large ego type presence - he’s an incredibly humble and self effacing man - but something changes when he walks on stage, and he immediately forms a connection with the audience which allows him to create a wonderfully intimate atmosphere, even in a large venue like the Opera House.

“Everything’s Turning to Gold Cathy” was probably the finest version of it I have heard yet, and that’s saying something as I have been to a huge number of John Spillane gigs where he has played it. “All the Ways You Wonder” always seems to have something new every time I hear it performed and this was no exception, definitely another highlight.

I was delighted to hear “When You & I Were True” had made it onto the new album, it’s an old song but isn’t on any of John’s solo albums to date, and the live version last night was beautiful. “Not My Love” from the new album also stood out, and his current single “There Was a Man” seemed a lot rockier than the recorded version, which really worked.

Overall it was an incredible night, and after playing an encore of three or four songs, John Spillane and friends left the stage to a standing ovation.

I will leave you with a music video I created for John Spillane a good number of years ago now, but which people still seem to enjoy - I discovered the other day after putting it up on my own profile that IrishMusicCentral had already put it up and it has over 6,000 views!