DORIE JACKSON

Well, I loved Tony Hart and was totally positive that becoming an artist was the thing for me. I had won a competition at infants school having painted a kingfisher, and my mother informed me some years later that at the prize ceremony I was kissed by Matthew Kelly-Ugh, the shame! Anyway, I sent in another picture to the gallery on Heartbeat but it never made it on telly, I was crushed. My father (saxophonist for Van Der Graaf Generator) was a struggling musician (at that time) and ended up working at my junior school where he wrote most of the songs for assembly. He got me to demo the songs on tape the night before and the next day the whole school would learn the melody from my tape. I don't think I had a terribly attractive voice in those days, but I could sing loud and hold a tune. Whilst all this carried on I found I had a penchant for acting, and thus became completely obsessed with this as a new career, right up until I fronted a band at Uni and the general consensus was that I was far more skilled at singing. I quit, and began my pursuit of music.

From writing songs in 'soon to be knocked down' houses, to pub gigs and more singing for my Dad. I ended up singing backing vocals in a friends band, they had a manager and we were doing showcases, I thought I had made it. Their manger took me aside one day and told me of an artist he worked with, Francis Dunnery who was looking for a new backing vocalist, he thought I would be perfect. I went along to the audition over prepared, I had learnt the cd back to front and although it went well, I truly thought after, that I had blown it. The following week, having heard nothing, the phone rang and it was Francis calling to say that we started rehearsals in the morning and the gig was 4 days away. The first performance was at the Cropredy Festival in 2001, it was absolutely chucking it down with rain which did nothing for my appearance, I had mud up to my knees and was completely stunned by the whole experience. However, it seemed to be a success and I was asked to do subsequent tours and Francis and I formed a firm friendship and began writing together.

In the interim, Francis introduced me to many great musicians and writers, one of which was Chris Difford. Francis was producing Chris's first solo record 'I Didn't Get Where I Am' and he brought me in to do backing vocals. Holding the first real album with my recorded voice on it was exhilarating, but I had little time to peruse the record shops boasting loudly in the 'D' section, we went straight into rehearsals. As a trio, we worked well together and went out on tour to support Elvis Costello, Jools Holland and Chris Rea. Chris, in turn introduced me to more than a fair share of other musicians, and I was invited on his songwriting weeks which I still attend. I thoroughly enjoy singing with Chris and have done so now for nearly 6 years, we still continue to tour with incredible pedal steel player Melvin Duffy.

Still singing for Francis, he soon got me in on John and Wayne's debut record 'Nearly Killed Keith.' John is Francis's nephew and Wayne, his best friend, we hit it off immediately and have had some cracking times on tour supporting artists Paul Young, Belinda Carlisle, Homespun, Marti Pellow, Merrill Osmond, Rita Coolidge and Vonda Shepperd.

Whilst attending my first Difford songwriting week I met William Topley, we became great friends and formed a strong alliance and he asked me to come and sing on his album 'Sea Fever'. I joined him on some acoustic tours with guitarist Luke Brighty and most recently sang on his new record 'All in the Downs.'

On tours and in broken moments over the years Francis and I began sifting through our songs we had written together. We finally sat down and started recording four years ago and our efforts resulted in my debut solo album, The Courting Ground. My record is a deeply truthful affair, it's about unrequited love, physical insecurity and growing up with less than full faith in yourself. It is about me, but I don't think is alienating to anothers perspective. Should you want to decide that one for yourself the album is now available from aquariannation.com, itunes, E-music and Amazon...

Discography