Keith Harkin

Keith Harkin plays The SSE Arena on Thursday 29 October, opening for Westlife as they mark their 25th anniversary. It's a homecoming of sorts: Harkin is a singer-songwriter from Derry City, and he's spent the last fifteen years performing on stages far from home.

He's played for President Obama at the White House, Sir Richard Branson on Necker Island, the Secretary of State at the Pentagon, and Mohamed Ali at Celebrity Fight Night. He's also performed for the Boston Celtics at The Garden. That's a fair bit of ground to cover before coming back to Belfast.

Before he went solo, he was the lead singer of Celtic Thunder, the Irish group that put out more than fifteen number-one records worldwide and sold over a million CDs, along with several PBS specials. From there, he caught the attention of Grammy-winning producer David Foster, who signed him as the first artist on the new Verve Records. His first solo album with Foster and Verve reached number one on the Billboard charts in both Canada and the US.

He writes all his own material, and all four of his solo albums have ranked in the top ten in Canada and the US. He'll be taking the stage at The SSE Arena at 6:30 pm on Thursday 29 October, opening for Westlife's 25th anniversary world tour.