Roscrea's Jack Keeshan's star continues to rise in 2023

Roscrea is well known for punching far above its weight in terms of musical talent, and local artist Jack Keeshan is making waves at a time when many musicians retreated and never returned to the stage since the Covid pandemic gripped the world

A proud Roscrea native, Jack Keeshan is not just some other young fellow with a guitar strung round his shoulder - this becomes evident when you see him perform and he has taken to the country's stages and won hearts with a very busy schedule over the last year.

His perfectly crafted songs have echoes of Bob Dylan and traces of Bob Marely flowing through them and he is a young songwriter with a very different message. His hard work during the pandemic on crafting his songs paid off as restrictions eased and he was first out of the blocks on the live performance circuit - making an appearance at Electric Picnic during the summer.

At the moment he is busy recording his second studio release titled 'Yin Yang' with Roscrea based recording engineer and producer Paul Dwyer at his Music Time studios.

"A rapper called Rapthor from Dublin is sampling one of the songs off this EP, which will also be on his album and Christy Dignam of Aslan is also going to be sampled on it. To have one of my songs sampled on a release that will also feature Christy is going to be really cool", Jack told this newspaper on Monday.

He played a sold out show in Kilkenny last month with renowned Irish legends Kìlá in famous venue John Cleere's and will return to the stage in Kilkenny this weekend for his own headline show on December 10th.

He will also be playing in the Keynon Bar in Nenagh on December 16th in support of Nenagh band Billy’s Cinema. Billy's Cinema will make their debut on the night and are made up of members of nationally famous Tipperary band 'Royal Flush'.

The Nenagh men, led by lifelong friends and bandmates Martin 'Twisty' O'Brien and John Cummins, chose Jack Keeshan for the support act at their highly anticipated debut gig after working closely with him over the past few years.

On the horizon are hopeful support slots for Lisa Hannigan and Damien Dempsey, but Jack is keeping tight-lipped about details on those 2023 shows for the moment.

Jack has already built a reputation for his ability to communicate with people through song and poetry and believes it does not matter "who someone is or whether they are rich or poor, young or old, the thing to keep at the front of our minds is that everyone has something to teach even down to someone we may believe has nothing to teach, they always do if you just listen".

Jack's positive philosophy is explored in his lyrics. Mental health is an important issue for him and he has done a lot of work through busking and working as a mental health officer during his years at college.

For more information on the talented Roscrea man you can follow his Instagram and Facebook 'JackKeeshanMusic' accounts for the latest details on upcoming concerts.