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"NEED WORK - WILL PLAY" (Jamie O'Brien)

I come from a London-Irish family but have spent over half my life away from the British Isles: firstly living in France, then Germany and now the US (Pennsylvania for nearly two decades and nowadays Arizona). En route, I've played a lot of music in a lot of styles with a lot of people.

Today, I draw together all the different influences and likes into an eclectic approach to celtic music: there's a touch of rockabilly, a little '60s soul, country (both rock and outlaw) and various forms of traditional music (Irish and music hall from my family, Irish and English from various friends and my latest love, Hawaiian from some wonderful musicians I've had the good fortune of meeting when in the Islands.

Looking back over four decades and more of public performance, I count a number of extraordinary experiences as part of my background: playing with Ogron (trad. English); meeting Jenny Ford (the first real professional performer I met and worked with); teaming up with singer-songwriter Ernest Hone; an eight-year collaboration with Uli Altdoerfer; coming to the States and being taken under Medicinal Purpose' wing (thank you Ryck, Henry, Carol & Bruce); a tempestuous but rewarding partnership with Cara Frankowicz; jamming with the Brennans & friends in Philly along with Jim Eagan, Laura Byrne and the JP Tuesday crowd in Baltimore; and last but not least, being included by Dan Possumato and John Walsh in Fanai, an amazing traditional Irish band.

A disasterous solo career came to a full stop in total embarrassment in 1974 - maybe I just wasn't ready; but on the bright side, as I wanted to carry on playing, it made me learn how to work with other people. Then, thanks to the wonderful and sadly missed Joe Brown (not that brilliant English musician who's down as one of my friends, but the smiling, soccer playing kid I used to coach), I started with the solo stuff after a quarter of a century. Aoife encouraged me to do it. And so did Gerry. And finally George and Nancy convinced me it was possible (and necessary). Now I love the solo work as much as the group playing and the accompanying.

Current projects include playing solo, performing with Fanai and with Shades of Green & Blue ("where celtic meets Americana") and accompanying other musicians. The Launies and Medicinal Purpose are currently on hold, but don't be surprised if they appear at a venue near you - we still practice and are ready and raring to go - it's just a question of time and geography that holds us back.