Gerry Leonard: The Irish man who taught Bowie to say 'Tiocfaidh ár lá'
Gerry Leonard will perform at the Dublin Bowie Festival. (Photo by Chris McKay/Getty Images)
Dublin-born guitarist Gerry Leonard returns to the city of his birth in February for a special performance with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra along with two fellow Bowie alumni, Mark Plati and Sterling Campbell. The show is part of this year's annual Dublin Bowie Festival and has been in the making for several years.
A version of the show was broadcast on RTÉ One during the pandemic but now fans near and far have the opportunity to be part of a live audience. "It's going to be dynamite," says Leonard down the line shortly before Christmas, his enthusiasm tangible at a very early hour of the day in New York. "It's something we've been trying to do for many years; it's almost alarming. When the pandemic hit, we turned it into a television show, it was all anyone could do. The concert orchestra had approached me about doing a set of Bowie songs and I immediately thought it was a great idea."
With connections to other alumni in New York, Leonard set about contacting musicians handpicked by Bowie and re-connected one of the most notable rhythm sections from his later career. "We have this beautiful hybrid of a rock band with an orchestra and some really great guest vocalists. We're finally getting to do this!"
Leonard was first introduced into the Bowie universe by Plati who co-produced his 1997 album Earthling. Plati, whose various roles would later include musical director and guitarist with Bowie, was producing the Toy album (canned from an official release until 2021) when the Dubliner was invited to record. The new century brought massive shifts for Bowie with the birth of his daughter Lexi in the summer of 2000, and his mother would also be laid to rest the following April. It was around that time he would begin work on Heathen, the album that would be released in 2002.
"It seemed like another tumultuous time for David and I think he got some of his frustration out on that record," says Leonard. "I had come on board with Toy, the next thing we heard David was coming down the mountain with Heathen. I got involved and played on a bunch of tracks when I met him during those sessions. He was in full-on David work mode, when you listen to the material there's a huge depth to that record that he hadn't touched on before with some beautiful songs; lyrically they are like mini-novels."
The Clontarf-born guitarist cut his teeth playing in bands from the age of 12. "Hopefully I got better through my teens and early 20s!" he adds of his time developing. "I was steeped in the culture of bands during punk and new-wave. One minute I was learning epic solos from progressive rock albums and then there was none of that; no bending strings or anything."
During a stint at Lombard Sound Studios (later renamed Westland Studios), he would experience working with a variety of Irish luminaries. "I was very passionate about recording and recording techniques, I was working as a tape operator and this was pre-Windmill Lane. Phil Lynott came in and produced some stuff, it was a very creative time,” he recalls.
After signing to Island Records during the late 1980s as one half of Hinterland, with Donal Coghlan, and then touring and releasing an album, Leonard moved to New York in late 1993. While there, he reinvented himself with the solo project Spooky Ghost.
"There are so many amazing players and musicians of a high pedigree, Spooky Ghost was my way of figuring out my own identity in a much stronger way and asking 'How do I express myself…What am I good at?’. It became a distillation of my style when playing live shows and releasing some records. At that time, it was more unusual for people to make records on an independent basis, it was more of a niche thing but it served me well. David came to a solo show and saw me play and that was one of his auditions for me if you like. It turned out to be a really important thing in my career.”
Bowie described Leonard's album The Light Machine as "the most beautiful and moving piece of work I have possessed in a long time". Says Leonard: "I was being creative as a guitar player as opposed to a band member. I had established myself with people like Laurie Anderson and Suzanne Vega. David called me up and asked if I would play on a couple of songs. He would bring you in to do what you did and trust your sense of creativity rather than micro-manage. We hit it off and that relationship began to grow over the years".
The guitarist would receive a co-writing credit on Bowie's penultimate album The Next Day, with ‘I'll Take You There’ and ‘Boss Of Me’.
Bowie’s 25th long-player arrived after a long period of silence during which the star had largely disappeared from public view for almost a decade. ‘Love Is Lost’, one of the album's most arresting tracks, found Bowie looking for inspiration from his late Spiders From Mars guitarist Mick Ronson.
Leonard recalls those sessions: "He had pictures of the house [Haddon Hall] where he lived and rehearsed during the early 1970s. In one photograph, Mick's guitar was set up with a 100-watt Marshal amp and eight-by-ten cabinet. Someone had come across a new version of the Tone Bender pedal that Ronson used and we brought that in. It was so loud I had to hide behind a chair! At the time I was listening to a lot of Peter Green and we came up with this part based on all of that. Someone had one idea and that would lead to another. I loved that song and the guitar parts David came up with on the demo, he told me just to make it my own. He called me up and said: 'Just bring your favourite guitar.' It was a special track; very powerful."
It was during Bowie's performance at the Point Theatre in Dublin, at the end of ‘Rebel Rebel’, that he gave out the call “Tiocfaidh ár lá!”, the ‘Our day will come’ phrase usually associated with the IRA. Leonard suggests Bowie had a fondness for the lively audiences on this island and in Scotland. “He deliberately picked Dublin for the live recording of the Reality tour [which turned out to be Bowie's last]. David loved the participatory element and he got that especially during the performance of ‘Life On Mars’ when the whole of the Point is singing with just him and the piano."
Bowie also conferred with his musical director that night for the phrase used at the start of the set. "He was mining me for a few Irish phrases so I conferred with my brother-in-law who had a good Christian Brothers education. We came up with a few but ‘Tiocfaidh ár lá’ was the one he went for. I cautioned him that it had some deeper meaning but he was very mischievous; he opened the show with it and made a pretty good impression."
Bowie's birthday and the eighth anniversary of his death will be honoured in New York on January 8 and 10, respectively. Leonard will appear with various alumni at The Sound And Vision of David Bowie before heading back to Dublin. "It's a busy time, I'm playing a series of live shows in tribute to David at the Cutting Room. We're also putting a show together for Sinéad O'Connor and we will probably include a tribute to Shane [MacGowan] for that as well. I've been recording the soundtrack for an Irish film coming out next year and I'm also working on a new Suzanne Vega record. There's a lot going on, New York is such a great melting pot of musicians; I have a full deck."
- RTÉ Concert Orchestra perform the songs of David Bowie with Gerry Leonard, Mark Plati and Sterling Campbell at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre on February 9 and 10 as part of the Dublin Bowie Festival 2024. See https://www.dublinbowiefestival.ie/
