DONNA MARIE SONGS

LONGER BIO

Donna Marie, a singer-songwriter hailing from the North-West of England. Her songwriting style mixes musical genres that have inspired her as a musician, deeply rooted in ‘story telling’.

Her first paid gig when she was 14, playing piano in a local bar and has never looked back. Her first recording experience was as a young teenager, scrolling through the yellow pages and spotted a local studio. She got the bus and travelled to the studio to have a look around and to her surprise Ruby Turner was recording vocals for her then latest album.

Many years and 1000s of gigs later Donna competed not only 2 year diploma course in Music Technology, she also earned BSC(hons) MTAS (Music Technology & Audio Systems. During her time at university she dabbled in writing toppling vocals and recording songs in the EDM scene under the alias D.M.O. and even though this was fun and commercially successful it’s not where her heart was in music and so she brought together a band of musicians to perform her roots/country tinged songs. The line up included Pete Mason on Lead guitar (Man head/THR33) Greg Morgan on drums (Dare) Mon Duncalf on bass as well as Donna playing rhythm guitar. One of their first gigs was supporting Scottish songstress Amy MacDonald. 

Inevitably after a very busy few years Donna and the band took a break. It wasn’t until 2015 when local musical musician friends THE LANCASHIRE HOTPOTS gently persuaded her to work with their producer John Kettle (MERRY HELL), who Donna had actually worked with briefly some years before when she was in a band called Glass Child.

Producer John and Donna set to work on an EP which hit number 5 in the UK country music iTunes Charts. From there Donna was approached by US Drummer/Producer Justin Johnson to provide keyboard, guitar and backing vocals for UK based Country artist ThorneHill who embarked on a slew of UK country festivals and what would be Donna’s first ever tour.  Donna became the go to musician to play in various bands which in itself was no mean feet as Donna cannot read music and learns each instrument and song entirely by ear. It was during a show in Liverpool She was spotted by Dominic Halpin and Stuart Littlewood who was scouting for a keyboard player and vocalist for their new project. Donna was offered the role instantly in ‘A COUNTRY NIGHT IN NASHVILLE’. They have toured up and down the UK since 2017 and played sell out shows in some of the UKs most prestigious venues including The Royal Albert Hall in the heart of London.

2019 Producer/Youtuber George ‘Jazzman’ Holiday reached out to Donna, after seeing some of her own musical performances on YouTube to collaborate on his MADE ON THE ROAD sessions. They met in merseyside and they wrote a song together “That’s alright with me”. As time was tight Donna took the basic demo away and worked on the instrumentation and later sent that back to George to put his spin on things. This was later released when his album finally came out in March 2021 after a technical delay caused by the pandemic.

During Lockdown she formed a collective of songwriters called “The Songs & Stories Collective with Tennessee Twin and Sarah Yeo. The Collective played a series of online shows each Sunday during Lockdown, inviting guests from as far as Nashville and LA to perform and talk about the song writing process, challenging each other with weekly song writing topics.

She also formed Alt -Country rock/Blues duo DOVE TIES with Patrick Jordan after working with him on his solo material for a few years where they have released several songs together.

2022 also saw Donna playing a number of solo shows including supporting THE BLUE ROSE CODE at the Liverpool Philharmonic Music Rooms, a mini tour with THE SONGS & STORIES COLLECTIVE and The West Country Music festival where she played 3 times, once solo, then in Sarah Yeo’s band as a supporting musician and finally closing the evening at the courtyard sessions ( a mellow acoustic set with THE SONGS & STORIES COLLECTIVE) complete with marshmallows and fire pits.

2023 will see the release of a body of work that was recorded and produced by herself during lockdown. She also plans of recording with a band and creating a new body of work to be released later in the year.

“I've been performing for a very long time including festivals & everywhere between. Many have been SOLO but mostly as a supporting musician as a band member. I have a lot to offer in terms of performance but getting back to performing my own material is where my heart belongs and I think my years of experience will help to deliver a captivating performance”.