Band History
January '03 - April '03 / 'Songs for Luca' Begins
Dave works on putting together the Songs for Luca album, including remixing the IONA track 'Beijing' from the first album and sourcing a great live version of 'Matthew - The Man' from a live IONA show in Japan. Present and former IONA members also contribute tracks.
Dave works on putting together the Songs for Luca album, including remixing the IONA track 'Beijing' from the first album and sourcing a great live version of 'Matthew - The Man' from a live IONA show in Japan. Present and former IONA members also contribute tracks.
March '03 / Joanne Records for 'Veil'
Despite being almost eight months pregnant, Jo manages to record some stunning vocal performances for Dave's solo album, although she has to do it sitting down and with plenty of rests in between takes! April Troy's second solo album 'In Pursuit of Illision' is released on his own Lantern Records label.
May '03 / Ethan Hogg Born
Jo's second son Ethan is born. The 'Songs for Luca' 2 cd album is released to help Dave and Debbie fund their Son-Rise programme for Luca and also to eventually help pay for Luca, Dave and Debbie to attend the Son-Rise 'Intensive' course at the Autism Treatment Centre in the USA. All the artists involved kindly donate tracks for free and even the artwork, mastering and manufacturing are donated!
June '03 / Luca Removed from School
Dave and his wife Debbie make the decision to take their 5 year old autistic son Luca out of school straight away so that they can devote more time to his home-based Son-Rise program
July '03 / First 3 Album Rights
The band get the rights back for their first 3 album releases (Iona, The Book Of Kells and Beyond These Shores) and plan to re-release them on their own Open Sky label later in the year.
September '03 / Iona Featured on 'Celtic Circle 2'
The reworked version of the track 'Iona' from the band's first album appears on a compilation album released by the mainstream giants BMG Records titled 'Celtic Circle 2'. The 2 cd, 40 track album also features tracks by a whole host of well known artists, including Clannad, Jeff Beck, The Corrs, Mike Oldfield, Sinead O'Connor, Van Morrison, Loreena McKinnett, The Chieftans, Davy Spillane etc, etc. Two IONA tracks - 'Treasure' and 'The Island' (reworked version) are also featured on another compilation album released by The World Wide Music Group, entitled 'The Celtic Worship Collection'. Other artists also featured on this album include Eden's Bridge, Jeff Johnson and Robin Mark. Troy's latest solo album 'In Pursuit of Illusion' enters the 'Out of this World' top 10 for 'progressive and symphonic rock' albums on the Dutch web site www.progwereld.org
October '03
Troy and Dave play their first ever gigs and a duo at venues in the UK. The set includes solo album material, traditional folk tunes and IONA tracks and the concerts are very well received. Included in the set are tracks like 'Conscious', the opening track from Troy's 'Illusion' - quite a challenge for the boys to play it live as the album version features a whole cast of musicians including the York Cantores Choir!
November '03 / 'In Pursuit of Illusion' Reviews
Troy's latest solo album 'In Pursuit of Illusion' has been getting some good reviews and is now available in many mainstream music shops thanks to a distribution deal with the Discovery record label. Meanwhile Troy and Dave play a few more UK dates, one of which (at The Studio, Hartlepool) is recorded in their purpose build recording facility. Iona's first 3 albums are re-released on 'Open Sky' - in conjunction with Voiceprint. The albums feature great new artwork, courtesy of Chris Sands, some of which is derived from the IONA box set artwork.
Also during the year Kingsway release their 'New Irish Hymns 2' on which Joanne is one of the featured vocalists, along with Margaret Becker and Kirsty Getty.
Also during the year Kingsway release their 'New Irish Hymns 2' on which Joanne is one of the featured vocalists, along with Margaret Becker and Kirsty Getty.
January '04 / Other News
Midway through the year, the band manage to secure the rights back to their four most recent albums ('Journey Into The Morn', 'Heaven's Bright Sun', 'Woven Cord' and 'Open Sky'). These are to be relaunched in 2005 on the bands 'Open Sky' label and will include brand new artwork for 'Journey Into The Morn'. Meanwhile a distribution deal is secured with ICC records for distribution into Christian retail outlets.
Another in Kingsway's 'New Irish Hymns' series of albums is released. 'New Irish Hymns - Christmas' again has Joanne as one of the featured singers.
Jo sings several songs on the 'Songs of Praise' programme on BBC TV.
A very busy year for Troy includes production work and co-writing on Barbara Dixon's excellent new album 'Full Circle', concerts with Barbara and opera diva Lesley Garrett and songwriting with Midge Ure. As if that's not enough, Troy also finds time to write the music for several BBC TV programmes, including Timewatch, and play on a number of other albums, artists include Moya Brennan and US folk artist Jennifer Cutting.
BOSE, the well respected Hi-Fi company use a track from Troy's first album, 'The Unseen Stream', as part of their new advertising campaign. The piece, 'Sights' has been re-mixed in 5.1 Surround and is heard as part of the BOSE multi-media show in their plush 'in-store' theatres.
Former IONA members Nick Beggs, David Fitzgerald and Terl Bryant are all busy releasing excellent solo projects. Bass player and Chapman Stick virtuoso Nick has an album of solo Stick recitals out, titled 'The Mavrick Helmsman'.
IONA co-founder Dave Fitzgerald latest solo release is titled 'God is Love' and former IONA drummer Terl Bryant releases his first 'Psalm Drummers' cd/dvd and also a collaboration with his wife Jules.
'Over the Waters' from Dave's solo album also features on another compilation, titled 'Got Prog? The Music Street Journal Sampler CD Number 1'. Also featuring tracks by Echolyn, Erik Norlander, Lana Lane, Orphan Project and many others, this is available from www.musicstreetjournal.com or www.cafepress.com/msjmerch
Leeds based Pointed Arrow Theatre Company use the band's music in their first project Pilgrimage in which they travel along the Great North Road performing a play about the stories connected with the road, and explore British national identity as they go. A 45 min documentary film about the journey is available on DVD. See www.pointedarrow.co.uk for further details.
Another in Kingsway's 'New Irish Hymns' series of albums is released. 'New Irish Hymns - Christmas' again has Joanne as one of the featured singers.
Jo sings several songs on the 'Songs of Praise' programme on BBC TV.
A very busy year for Troy includes production work and co-writing on Barbara Dixon's excellent new album 'Full Circle', concerts with Barbara and opera diva Lesley Garrett and songwriting with Midge Ure. As if that's not enough, Troy also finds time to write the music for several BBC TV programmes, including Timewatch, and play on a number of other albums, artists include Moya Brennan and US folk artist Jennifer Cutting.
BOSE, the well respected Hi-Fi company use a track from Troy's first album, 'The Unseen Stream', as part of their new advertising campaign. The piece, 'Sights' has been re-mixed in 5.1 Surround and is heard as part of the BOSE multi-media show in their plush 'in-store' theatres.
Former IONA members Nick Beggs, David Fitzgerald and Terl Bryant are all busy releasing excellent solo projects. Bass player and Chapman Stick virtuoso Nick has an album of solo Stick recitals out, titled 'The Mavrick Helmsman'.
IONA co-founder Dave Fitzgerald latest solo release is titled 'God is Love' and former IONA drummer Terl Bryant releases his first 'Psalm Drummers' cd/dvd and also a collaboration with his wife Jules.
'Over the Waters' from Dave's solo album also features on another compilation, titled 'Got Prog? The Music Street Journal Sampler CD Number 1'. Also featuring tracks by Echolyn, Erik Norlander, Lana Lane, Orphan Project and many others, this is available from www.musicstreetjournal.com or www.cafepress.com/msjmerch
Leeds based Pointed Arrow Theatre Company use the band's music in their first project Pilgrimage in which they travel along the Great North Road performing a play about the stories connected with the road, and explore British national identity as they go. A 45 min documentary film about the journey is available on DVD. See www.pointedarrow.co.uk for further details.
January '04 / Interviews
Although it is a quiet year as far as the band are concerned, due to Joanne's maternity leave, behind the scenes requests for interviews continue to come in from various sources - mainly music web sites that are often only just discovering Iona's music and want to know more. Promotional cds are frequently sent out to radio shows across the world from the IONA office - an increasing number of these shows being streamed on the web.
