The Dolan family to appear on Late Late Show

A new album celebrating one of Mullingar's greatest sons, the late great Joe Dolan, is about to be released this Friday.

The Dolan family will be live on The Late Late Show on the night with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra.

Universal Music Ireland has produced ‘Orchestrated, Vol.1’, featuring Joe's original vocals, re-recorded and accompanied by a 45-piece orchestra, as well as man of the moment, Nathan Carter who "jumped at the chance" to record ‘Make Me An Island’ as a duet.

Ben Dolan will be chatting to host Ryan Tubridy about the new record.

"It sounds fantastic. We're very happy with it," Ben told the Westmeath Examiner.

"Joe is gone nine years now, he would have been 77 on Sunday but his music is living on. It's as popular now as it ever was and I'm proud of the way he is still remembered."

Loss

"His death was an awful loss to us all, but I'm proud of the way Mullingar has remembered him," he continued. "The statue for Joe in the Market Square, the new bridge was dedicated to him... I think he would have been chuffed. I don't think he knew himself how much people thought of him."

The album shows a new side to Joe, with his voice given a bigger canvas and more colour. Classics now sound like James Bond themes.

The Burt Bacharach penned ‘The Answer to Everything’ is reinvigorated, with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra creating an exhilarating accompaniment, bringing Joe’s unmistakable vocals and the well-known track to new heights.

One of Joe’s more recent hits, The Universal, has finally been given the orchestral treatment it deserved. The song has undoubtedly become Joe’s own.

Its creators, Damon Albarn's Blur, acknowledged this when they played to a festival crowd of over 50,000 in Ireland in 2009 by dedicating it ‘to the late, great Joe Dolan’.

Another standout track is Joe’s duet with Ireland’s biggest country music star Nathan Carter. His vocals are shared with Joe’s to create a moving rendition of’Make Me An Island’.

The album also includes a previously unreleased recording of the old Irish song ‘ The Foggy Dew’– a track Joe was working on with his nephew Adrian Dolan before his untimely death.

To accompany the release, a new documentary based on Joe’s career that includes interviews with Joe’s family, his manager Seamus Casey and Albert Hammond, who famously co-wrote two of Joe’s hits, will air this Christmas.