TV special to highlight music professionals
“Every day your phone and your calendar are telling you where you should be and where you're not.”
The words of Mitchelstown music mogul, and founder of the hugely successful music festival Indiependence, Shane Dunne.
Shane is one of the many brains behind the upcoming national TV music event ‘Songs from an Empty Room’.
The show, which airs on Saturday night on RTÉ2, will feature performances from a host of homegrown talent broadcast live from a selection of famous venues around the country, one of which being Cork’s very own Cyprus Avenue.
The aim of the event is to generate awareness for those working in the live events industry whose livelihoods have been severely affected by Covid-19.
One of the charities to benefit from the event is Minding Creative Minds (MCM), a free wellbeing and support programme for event industry professionals and contractors, which provides free counselling services, in addition to free financial, legal and career advice for events industry personnel.
Speaking to the Cork Independent, Shane says he approached Minding Creative Minds and asked them if they could expand their remit to cover everybody working in the music industry, rather than just the artists.
“Musicians are just one part of it. But this show is really about the riggers, the truck drivers, the sound engineers, the mechanical engineers. I could go on,” explains Shane. “If we do a show in Croke Park and we have four artists on the stage, it's taken 2,000 staff to put them there.
“It's a huge industry that employs about 35,000 people in Ireland and is worth €3.5 billion a year to the economy.”
‘Songs from an Empty Room’, which airs from 8.30-10.45pm on Saturday night, will be hosted by RTÉ 2FM’s Jenny Greene and Eoghan McDermott and will feature music from Aimée, Denise Chaila, Eve Belle, Fia Moon, Gavin James, Jafaris, James Vincent McMorrow, Lisa McHugh, Lyra, Mother DJs, Noel Hogan (The Cranberries) with Picture This, Sorcha Richardson, Soulé, The Academic, The Blizzards, The Coronas, and The Stunning. Audiences at home will be directed to the event’s official website where they can show support by donating via text or through the initiative’s GoFundMe Page.