What a show it was…
The lasting memory for many people from RTÉ’s talent show, You’re A Star, is passing through towns and villages around Ireland to find telephone poles covered in posters of contestants.
Well, that and Mickey Joe Harte.
Clip via escfan1
Personally, I was more invested in the show than most as a relation of mine made it to the live shows in the second year of the programme… yes, I’m basically famous.
Weeks were spent watching the show and topping up your phone with credit so you could send in those all important texts to try and get them through to the next round.
The show never quite reached the heights of the first series back in 2003, which saw Mickey Joe Harte take the win with his song, ‘We’ve Got The World’.
But two others made the final with him that day, Simon Casey and a young man by the name of Michael Leonard. Casey would go on to finish as runner-up in the final and Leonard had to be content with third place in the talent show.
Claiming third place in by far the most talent-packed series of the show (it ran for six seasons, amazingly) is no mean feat.
Still not ringing a bell? His song ‘I Couldn’t Love You More’ was written by a combination of Ronan Keating, Brian Kennedy and Calum MacColl and featured some very questionable lyrics including: “If loving you is a crime, then I’ll do the time”.
Clip via webuvision
Following the show’s conclusion, Leonard remained more low key compared to the others in the series, Harte stayed relatively in the public sphere while Casey now plays country music and weddings, but you have to dig a little deeper if you want to find out more about Leonard.
Well, now he’s back with this cover along with Ger O’Donnell, and it’s pretty clear that even 15 years after he sprung to relative stardom in Ireland, he hasn’t lost his musical touch.
Just in case you’re wondering, in the video, Ger is playing a “mandocello” which the internet reliably informs us can be described as being to the mandolin what the cello is to the violin.
There you have it…
Thanks to Ger O’Donnell for sending this our way, if you’ve got a story for JOE, get in touch here.
LISTEN: You Must Be Jokin’ with Aideen McQueen – Faith healers, Coolock craic and Gigging as Gaeilge
