Derek Ryan Biography

The roll call of success for the multi-talented Irish man is long and much deserved – with number one albums, millions of streams, sell-out shows in Ireland, UK and further afield, with a fistfuls of Awards to his name.

It’s been a long road for the Garryhill, County Carlow born artist who first developed his life-long love for music when as a four-year-old, Derek’s parents bought him a drum kit one Christmas. That childhood passion was further nurtured when his dad brought him to Fleadh Cheoils (Irish music festivals) with young Derek truly proving ‘I Got Rhythm’ – winning two All-Ireland titles in bodhran and ceili drumming. Tunes from his mum’s favourite country music radio shows – with songs by favourites including Garth Brooks, Alan Jackson and George Strait – also engrained themselves deeply in a young Derek’s heart.

It was pop which first drew a blond-haired, fresh-faced 17-year-old teenage Derek into the music business. He followed in the chart busting footsteps of Irish boybands, Boyzone and Westlife – as part of new Celtic teen pop phenomenon, D-Side in 2001. Managed by Kim Glover – the same woman responsible for Dublin born UK chart toppers, B*Witched and TV superstars, Ant & Dec in their singing years – Derek enjoyed three UK top ten hits with D-Side.

The Irish pop pin-ups were also big in Japan – scoring a number one single in the Land of the Rising Sun. But when the pop bubble burst, determined Derek picked himself up and started following his Irish and American-inspired country music dreams. Working as a solo artist from 2006, he spent three years honing his craft around the club and bar circuit in London while studying at the same time to be an Accountant.

He returned to Ireland in 2009 with the intention of completing his course and exams in Carlow. But the pull of his guitar and writing songs – rather than counting numbers on a calculator – proved more attractive and paid supreme dividends. Early self-validating song writing success came in prestigious competitions such as A Song For Carlow and The International Song Of Peace. And when a song he had written in a bolt of creativity in his London bedsit in less than half an hour, ‘God’s Plan’ became a 2010 smash hit in Ireland… it was ‘D-Day’ for Derek’s career from then on as the song has now received millions of streams, views and industry wide artists recording their own cover versions.

Dozens of artists have since recorded ‘Derek Ryan songs’, including Daniel O’Donnell, Foster & Allen, Philomena Begley, Susan McCann and many more, underlining the industry wide admiration for Derek’s credible song writing talents. Since then, with a combination of terrific talent, admirable determination and a continuous desire to do better, Derek Ryan’s career has kept on reaching progressively greater heights.

After an ecstatically received Australian tour and an ‘Oz-only compilation album’: Let Me Introduce Myself in 2015, Derek’s dreams of major country music stardom looked set to come true too, outside of Ireland.

Balancing huge demand from dancehall and concert theatre audiences with his constant desire to create new music, Derek has released countless albums – ‘A Mother’s Son’ (2010); ‘Made Of Gold’ (2011); ‘Dreamers And Believers’ (2012); ‘Country Soul’ (2013) and two Irish Number One chart toppers – ‘The Simple Things’ (2014) and ‘One Good Night’ (2015). Derek released his seventh and eighth album simultaneously, ‘Happy Man’ and ‘This is Me’ (2016), ‘Perfect Days’ (a vinyl-only album), ‘The Fire’ (2017). His tenth studio album was aptly named ‘TEN’ (2018). ‘The Hits’ followed (released late 2019), which featured a 21-track collection album of Derek’s biggest songs and fan-favourite classic hits that showcased the then 10 year career for the Carlow man, highlighting the songs that have made Derek Ryan one of Ireland’s best-selling country singer/songwriters. Derek also released a LIVE album in early 2019 featuring 24 tracks recorded live during his sold-out Scottish Tour at his concert in the Eden Court Theatre, Inverness, Scotland.

Since then, Derek has gone on to record and release three more albums – The Road To Christmas (2020), Soft Ground (2021) and Pure & Simple (2022) with popular songs featured such as ‘Wherever You’re Going’, ‘Thank God for the Farmers’ and ‘The Cows On The Hill’ which became instant hits for Derek and which are now some of his fan-favourites today.