Dominic Collins is a local comedy singer songwriter. The youngest of three children born to Joseph and Mary Collins. Dominic grew up in Ancoats and attended Corpus Christi School, of which he has some very fond memories. He met and married his wife Pat in 1980 at Corpus Christi Church. They have one son Michael.
Dominic trained in Art and had a successful art exhibition at Droylsden Library selling 49 out of 50 pictures on show! (The one unsold picture was a self portrait).
Strumming his guitar at home he practised playing and singing to himself. He then wondered if he had the nerve to sing and play in front of an audience. One evening he went to an Acoustic night at the “Blazing Rag” pub in Mossley. The compere, Darren Poyser, wouldn’t let Dominic play because the night was for singer/songwriters to play their own music! Dominic at that time was doing cover versions of hits by the popular bands like the Beatles and the Eagles.
“When I wasn’t able to perform at The Blazing Rag, I thought, right I’ll go and write three songs, so I can come here again and play. I went home and the first song I wrote was about the fact that I wasn’t allowed to sing or play on that evening! Of course I called the song You can’t play covers on acoustic nights!”
That is when it all started for Dominic, he wrote several more Nostalgic/comedy songs and started entertaining at a few clubs; “I did go back to the Blazing Rag and perform, and eventually Darren asked, ‘Is that song about me?’ When I admitted that it was, I think he was quite chuffed.” Dom favours playing at folk nights because there is a “listening” audience there!
“I went to Abram Moss and recorded twelve tracks. It was very much a DIY job and so the first cut of ‘Canadian Geese Over Ancoats Skies’ was born! I had ten CDs made, just to see how they would go. These soon sold out, so more had to be produced. The chip shop in Tib Street distributed them for me!”
Dominic manages to entertain in the evenings whilst still working as a postman at Royal Mail on his Tib Street delivery round. He has been invited to play at lots of events all over the country and is particularly proud of the fact that he has played at The Cavern Club - where The Beatles first started. “I loved playing at the Cavern Club, I got a real buzz out of it! After the gig I arrived home at 1.30am. Tried to get a bit of shut-eye, then found myself having to scrape ice off the car at 4.30am to go to work - back to reality!”
Earlier this year Dominic put an ad in the local paper stating he would do a free home gig for anyone who wanted to book him. “Well I thought, if you won’t come and see me, I’ll come and see you! Then things went a bit crazy, I did home gigs, then office gigs entertaining people in their dinner hour! I was very busy for quite a few months.”
Recently Dominic was doing a gig at The Britons Protection in Manchester, “The place was packed, there was standing room only! The next day I received an email from a group of people in Warrington, they had arrived at the gig but couldn’t get in, I felt really sorry for them, coming all that way and not getting in, so I offered to do a home gig for them and I’m glad to say they accepted”.
Dom has now released his latest album ‘dom collins - I got a cd’. “Phil Woods at GMR has been playing one of the tracks from the cd, it is the only serious song on there, called ‘A Pensioners Love Song’ it’s a little tribute song to my mam and dad, and I wasn’t going to include it, but with a bit of encouragement I did.”
The CD is available in Manchester Town Centre at Beat N Rhythm on Tib Street, The Pink Record Shop on Thomas Street and of course Tib Street Chippy!
Dominic now has a website www.domcollins.co.uk
I have both Dominic’s cds and I love them both, they are simple but brilliant at the same time, they never fail to cheer me up if I’m feeling a bit down and they tell the story of Dominic’s experiences better than I could on this page. I think the cd would make a great Christmas present!
Kathryn Bates
