Andrea Magee’s 2014 South by Southwest trip stands out in the memory.
More than that, in fact, as the Belfast-raised musician and singer-songwriter’s attendance at the Austin festival changed the course of her life. Soon afterwards, she decided to make the Texan city her home base and has resided there since.
The process began when Magee and her music partner at the time, Ben Jones extended their SXSW trip by three weeks. “We got the full Austin experience outside of South By, which I feel is more magical anyway,” recalled the musician who will perform at the Craic Session at the Wolfhound Bar, Long Island City, on this Friday night and launch “Wild Woman,” her third solo album, in Austin on Saturday.
“We were taken by the fact that there was such a want for original music,” she said of Austin. “You could work as an original artist every single day if you wanted. And the community here is in such support of that, it was almost just a no-brainer.
If there had been a clincher, though, it was getting a gig with Dale Watson on the third day.
Magee, who secured a record deal on a follow-up trip, said at the time, “This is the base that we want to build from.”
Her work has included touring for three years with one of the great innovators in American music, the late Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson. That was from 2017 up to the pandemic. Subsequently, she went on tour with Hollywood A-lister Jeff Bridges.
“I’ve just been living the dream,” Magee said. “It’s different to the Disney dream. In my realistic dream, all I do is perform music, write music, and music is my everything and that is how I survive.”
Magee can remember the first time she thought in those terms.
“I was coming home from an Irish session in Donegal and I must have been about 9 or 10,” she said.
She was with her father, the family annual vacation had been extended and she had a new bodhrán.
“It was the first time I got paid — 100 punts,” she said, referring to the Irish currency through the early years of the 21st century.
She recalled thinking at this almost “spiritual” moment, “I want to do this forever.”
The bodhrán has been a constant in her music, these days blending it with Celtic soul, Americana and folk.
Magee is an enthusiastic fan of singer-songwriters, citing in particular Van Morrison, Brandi Carlile and Alanis Morissette, “Anything authentic — obviously I grew up with Paul Brady,” she said, adding to the mix the names of Eric Clapton, Foy Vance, Tina Turner and Dolly Parton.
The young musician also excelled at sports — specifically badminton and netball (which she described as essentially basketball without the dribbling), competing eventually at provincial level in the former and captain with the British Universities team in the latter, when doing her postgraduate teacher training in England. However, earlier she’d opted to drop out of her sports science degree to study music at the University of Ulster.
She then, for a time, followed her father’s career. At age 24, Magee was head of department in a London school. It was there she had another signature moment, in this instance while giving some career advice to an 18-year-old, who turned the tables on her.
“Miss, you’re not doing what you want to do,” he told her. “You’re amazing at music, we all listen to your songs.
“It was one of those moments where a dart goes through your heart,” Magee remembered. “Six months later, I jumped on that plane. I’ve given it my all for the last 12 years.”
She said, “There are compromises and sacrifices in order to do the things that you love.”
The move away from family is one.
She makes two annual trips home, one to Belfast to celebrate Christmas with “Mum and Dad, my sister and her family of three kids and her husband, and and my older sister who lives in England, but is home a lot,” and a summer vacation that bypasses the city for Donegal, where in addition to family members she can spend time with friends who’ve been close since childhood.
The necessary reconnecting and renewal, or “replugging in,” also involves organizing her own music festival, She Rises in Taos, N.M.,and running a non-profit that has her writing songs with underprivileged and special-needs children.
There are also compensations in working and living on the road with legends she revealed to be “unbelievable” people who are “good at their core.”
Magee said, “I can only live and exist with people that are truly authentic.
“My story in the music industry has been very fortunate and very blessed because I’ve only been surrounded by inspirational humans that I want to be like.”
Go to thecraicfest.com for details about Friday night’s event. For more about Andrea Magee, go to her website here.
