THOUGH Michael Lyster suffered a serious heart attack in June, he is not about to start fretting about his health.

Bill Linnane spends a spell on Speyside and discovers how Scottish distillers have a lot to teach the booming Irish whiskey trade.

Natalie Prass broke through with a fine debut album that evoked classic ’70s singers. She’s back in Ireland to play at Body&Soul, writes Ed Power.

Becoming an actor took me by surprise.

Van Morisson’s incantations and repetitions, admonitions, yearnings and folk-music prove that people walked this earth yearning for a heaven elsewhere. Thomas McCarthy on a selection of Morisson’s lyrics.

Your daily spoiler-free guide to what to look out for on the box.

Eydie Gorme, a popular nightclub and television singer as a solo act and with her husband, Steve Lawrence, has died. She was 84.

KURT Elling plays the National Concert Hall, in Dublin, this evening, after a gruelling tour of the Netherlands, Denmark and Slovenia.

SHE’S deaf in one ear and has some tongue on her.

The splintered music world truly coalesces only one night each year, the night of the Grammy Awards, and this year was united in the triumph of recovered British soul singer Adele’s trophy haul and the tragedy of Whitney Houston’s death.

The 34th Cork Guinness festival has expanded from its core musical base, says Kieran Bohane

THE grief-stricken father of singer Amy Winehouse told her to “sleep tight” as her family and friends said their last goodbyes.

The grief-stricken father of singer Amy Winehouse told her to “sleep tight” today as her family and friends said their last goodbyes.

Amy Winehouse’s father Mitch said “goodnight” to his daughter today before her funeral ended with family and friends singing her favourite song.

Songwriter Carole King has signed a book deal, it has been revealed.

A scheduled Black Eyed Peas benefit concert in New York has been cancelled due to severe thunderstorms.

Eliza Doolittle is a huge Radiohead fan.

Swept into the most powerful political job ever held by a US woman, Nancy Pelosi embarked on a jubilant victory lap with children and grandchildren in tow and a soundtrack by Tony Bennett: I Left My Heart in San Francisco.”

Either they were both really nervous or there was some tension in the air for Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban on their first public outing as a couple.

Bruce Springsteen, Paul Simon, the Dixie Chicks, Sting and newly single Sheryl Crow paid tribute to James Taylor on Monday night in Los Angeles as the singer/songwriter was honoured with the MusiCares Person of The Year crown.

The Beatles’ Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album, an 1888 recitation of the Lord’s Prayer and the original cast recording of Oklahoma! Are to be enshrined the US’s registry of historic sound.

Elton John and lyricist Bernie Taupin have been honoured as one of the greatest songwriting partnerships of all time.

Kermit the Frog is getting a coveted spot in the Hollywood Walk of Fame next year.