Duke Special is an artist aptly named. Dynamic, musically ambitious & bracingly eccentric, with his inimitable style and lush musicality. Hailing from Belfast with a sound that is self-confessed “hobo-chic”, Duke Special – AKA the endlessly inventive Peter Wilson – is once heard, never forgotten, and we are delighted to announce that he has just confirmed that his latest tour will include the very intimate Sean Hollywood Arts Centre, Newry.

Blissfully at home in his own alluring genre of beautifully bruised romanticism, Duke Special inhabits a world unlike any other – a world filled with vaudevilleesque sensibility, sing-a-longs and addictive melodies. “My sound is a bit vagabondy, but pure and soulful too” he explains.

Duke Special‘s critically-acclaimed 2006 album ‘Songs From The Deep Forest’ achieved platinum status in Ireland and received plaudits across the board. His 2008 follow-up, ‘I Never Thought This Day Would Come’ was recorded between Wapping, London, Champaign, Illinois and Culleybackey, Northern Ireland, and was produced by long-time collaborator Paul Pilot and mixed by Nick Terry. This was a more immediate and visceral collection than its predecessor, with many moments of beauty and hope juxtaposed with a dark, brooding edge – the trademark twist of the Duke. It was an album for sleepwalkers, skeletons and gravediggers, for those who have fallen so far down they can taste the soil between their teeth.

Duke Special’s immense creative talents have seen him involved in projects as diverse as writing the theme tune for Sesame Tree (the Northern Ireland edition of Sesame Street where he also got to sing with The Muppets) to writing the music for and appearing in Deborah Warner’s critically acclaimed 2009 production of Bertolt Brecht’s Mother Courage and Her Children at London’s National Theatre, starring Fiona Shaw in the lead role.

Joining Duke Special is Portadown-born singer and composer Katharine Phillippa. Already making sounds to swoon to, with the debut “Fallen” EP from the Queen’s University student full of sparse, graceful, elegantly pitched wonder. There’s a beautiful mimimal soulfulness to her “For the One I Love” track which augers well for what’s to come, and she is definitely one to watch out for in 2013.

Tickets at £14/12 conc are on-sale now from Carlin Records, Sean Hollywood Arts Centre and from the following link:

---