Nancy-
I have a special treat for y’all!. I met Marc Gunn at the
Stone Mountain Highland Games near Atlanta where the Gunn Clan of North America
was hosting its annual gathering. I am also a member of the Gunn clan
through my husband, whose grandmother was a Robinson (a sept of the Scottish Gunn clan). Marc’s latest CD, St. Patrick's Day Songs for Kids,
was released on March 1st.
Nancy-
Please tell my readers a little bit about your work.
Marc-
I play the autoharp and I call my musical style Celtic Geek. That's because I
do a lot of traditional Irish and Scottish folk songs, but I also fuse those
with science fiction and fantasy, drinking songs and even cats. I have a fun
sense of humor and I try to engage my listeners in a way that is not done with
popular music.
I'm
one of the most-prolific artists you'll ever meet, having released twenty
full-length solo CDs in the past eight years. But my record label, which
features me on all of the recordings, has over 50 albums in the catalog. I love
to perform live, but I also love to record and just create!
Creating
is a passion of mine. It's why in addition to recording all of these albums, I
also host the award-winning Irish & Celtic Music Podcast as well as
numerous other podcasts and I have a YouTube channel where I also create fun
content to share, all for free.
My
latest album St. Patrick's Day Songs
for Kids was released on March 1st. I have a four-year old
daughter, so I wanted to put together an album of songs that she would enjoy.
It features all new recordings of songs I've done over the years that are also
popular with all my fans. They're songs that are fun to sing. Feel good songs
that will make you smile whether they be traditional songs like “I'll Tell My
Ma” or “The Mermaid Song” or original songs like “Happily Ever After” (based on
the children's book The Paperbag Princess), “Irish Lilting”, “Lord of
the Pounce” (from my Irish Drinking Songs for Cat Lovers series) or “The
Leprechaun”. It's just a fun album!
Nancy-
When did you start your musical career?
Marc-
I've played music all my life. But it was in college when I first decided to
become a full-time musician and songwriter like Elvis Presley... Of course, it
wasn't until much later that I realized Elvis didn't write songs. But he was
still a BIG inspiration. In 1999, I was invited to perform at a Renaissance
Festival outside Austin, Texas. That event changed my life. I then changed from
songwriter to performer as I learned the ropes of how to put on a good stage
show. That was also when I really began to learn Irish and Scottish songs. And
of course, learning Celtic songs, I also learned how to write music when I got
back into it seriously a few years ago.
Nancy-
Did you write your own songs or musical scores?
Marc-
Of course, I started off singing traditional Celtic songs, but my goal was to
be a songwriter. Early on, I wrote mostly parodies of traditional songs. Over
the last five years, I've gotten more into writing original songs or setting
lyrics by my friend Rie Sheridan Rose
Nancy-
Do you have any rejection stories to share?
Marc-
A lot of career was defined by rejection. After I finished recording my first
bands' album, Marked By Great Size,
I was extremely passionate about shamelessly promoting my music. I sent the
album to a bunch of magazines for review, including Dirty Linen, the
biggest folk magazine out there. I hounded them for months for a review. When
the review finally came, it was a paragraph long and not very flattering. They
did not understand what we were doing at all. After that, I stopped submitting
music to the press for the most part. I decided to go it alone. It was one of
the reasons I now have a HUGE network of indie Celtic music websites online.
I
also remember talking to an Irish musician in Austin. He was purist. Since our
music was not traditional in any sense (I play an autoharp, afterall), he sat
me down to tell me exactly what “Celtic music” was.... well, at least to him. That
too was extremely pivotal to my career. Not only did I get a great satirical
song out of it called “The Leprechaun”, but I also became determined to never
judge other “Celtic” musicians because they didn't fit in his narrow definition
of Celtic music.
Nancy-
What is your professional routine like?
Marc-
Music marketing is a passion of mine. I built my entire career around it. In
fact, it was because of my skill that I was able to quit my day job in 2005 and
never look back. Sure, it's a challenge, even more so, now that I have a wife,
a four-year old and a baby on the way, but I love every minute of it.
Because
of financial restraints, I basically get two full days a week to work, Monday
and Tuesday. Those are the days I record my two main podcasts—Irish &
Celtic Music Podcast and The Celtfather. I usually take my daughter to daycare
around 7:30am. From there, I start recording The Celtfather podcast and compile
shownotes which I publish in my blog. That's my main blog content for my
website.
Around
10 am, I start work on the Irish & Celtic Music Podcast. It takes a few
hours to compile songs, write shownotes, record the show, post in the blog, and
then write the weekly newsletter, Celtic Music Magazine. That is usually my
Mondays. Tuesdays are left for finishing up everything else that needs doing,
like responding to email, creating videos, promoting to social media, and what
not.
If
I'm lucky, I also get a couple evenings a week to do work. But confess, it's
not a huge priority because I consider my family Extremely important. I don't
get enough time with my wife as it is since I also frequently have out of town
gigs, usually 2-3 weekends a month. So I like to be with her and my daughter as
much as possible.
I
confess, I'm a bit sloppy with my promotional efforts though. Routine has never
been my friend. So I've spent most of my career bouncing back and forth between
projects. When I could work 16 hour days as a single man, I got a LOT done.
Over the past few years, I've learned out important routine is. It's why I have
those podcasting days.
The
podcasts are my main means of promotion though. I have fortunately found a few
helpers with podcast promotion over the years, whenever I can find microtasks I
can easily let go and delegate. It's tough for me.
Nancy-
Having achieved your goal to be a singer/songwriter/performer, what is the most
rewarding thing?
Marc-
The things I love most about my career is creating. I love it every time I get
a new album in my hands. I unwrap it and stroke the cover, brilliantly designed
by one of my artist friends. It's an amazing feeling. However, the
most-rewarding thing for me is to hear feedback from fans who are listening and
enjoying the music that I was able to share. They do it happily. They tell
their friends. They become a part of the entire creation process.
Right
now, I'm already working on my next Kickstarter for an album called Dragons
vs. Pirates. It's an anti-Steampunk album with lyrics by Rie Sheridan
Rose. It's doing extremely well already having reached my initial goal in five
days. But what's been most exciting is seeing people get involved in the story.
This album is unlike previous ones in that I'm creating a fun story about
dragons against pirates and how I'm caught in the middle. I'm having a blast,
and judging by fan interaction, they are too.
I
love stories so I'm thrilled to see this album take off.
Nancy- What’s next
for you?
Marc-
I have three albums currently planned for the future, Dragons vs. Pirates, an
additional album of adventure and stories that is still unnamed, and Sea
Shanties for Cat Lovers. I'm
also planning to release the Dragons vs. Pirates as an eBook and
audiobook if I can figure out that world. And I have a bunch of music marketing
articles that I hope to publish as well. From there, who knows. We'll see where
my imagination takes me!
More About Marc Gunn
Cats. Irish drinking songs. Science fiction. Nowhere else but
from the bright imagination of Marc Gunn would those three elements be so
neatly integrated. Yet Gunn, sometimes called “the hardest working man in Celtic
music” around his hometown in Austin, is an accomplished musician, podcaster,
and entrepreneur . In 2014, his recording of “Rising of the Moon” won Best
Roots Traditional in Celtic Radio Music Awards. He continues to turn heads
with his instrument of choice, the autoharp.
Gunn’s activities are
not restricted to musical performance alone. In 2005, he transformed his
popular resource, the Celtic Music Magazine into a podcast. Irish & Celtic
Music Podcast helped kick off the podcast revolution by “changing your world
with Celtic music”.
Gunn combines his love
of travel with his love a music. He hosts Celtic Invasion Vacations which are
different from standard vacation tours. Gunn believes that it is the people
around you who ultimately make a vacation great. He finds one location abroad
and gathers like-minded vacationers to experience his travel motto, “Good food,
good drink, good company”.
In a town famous for
almost every musical genre except Celtic music, Marc Gunn has raised the bar
and held it high. Using the musical past and a vivid imagination bolstered with
ambition and drive, he blazes trails from terra firma to cyberspace,
encouraging others to follow.
You
can find more information
about Marc Gunn here:
Here's some videos:
Also on the CD:
Some of the songs from this live show made it on the CD
From Sci Fi Drinking Songs
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