Antrim singer Johnny Brady is flying high these days. Fresh from being honoured with the Performer of The Year accolade at the Northern Ireland Entertainment Awards – hosted by Irish Country Sound (Farmers Journal), The Phil Mack Country Show (Sky 191) and the Armagh City Hotel – Johnny is looking forward to the New Year with fresh enthusiasm and boundless energy.

Dance With Me, the brand new album from Johnny, was released at a big launch night in the Greenvale Hotel in Cookstown last week.

“We had a brilliant night. We were joined by Jim Devine, Lee Matthews and Barry Devlin and the place was buzzing,” says Johnny.

The album hit the number one spot on the iTunes download chart for a few days after its release.

“That was brilliant news for me,” reflects Johnny. “There are 14 tracks on the album and they were recorded in three different studios and produced by Jonathon Owens in Granard, Matthew Curran in Ballyronan and Martin O’Neill in Carrickmacross.”

Johnny penned three of the songs, including the title track Dance With Me, as well as A Gift From Above and Ireland Has A Place in My Heart.

Sean and Tommy Moran from Castlerea penned Have You Reached The Bottom Yet. Another song, I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight, is featured on this album, as well as on the Midnight Boogie Band album, which was released as a fundraiser for Fighting Blindness.

He returns to Galway on 20 February for a Johnny Brady and friends dancing weekend at the Clayton Hotel.

“That is shaping up to be something special. Joining me will be Mike Denver, Phil Begley, Louise Morrissey, Brendan Quinn, Ciaran Rosney and Barry Devlin. It will be my first venture of this kind in the west. One of the last times I was in Galway, I did a parachute jump out at the airport. It was an exhilarating experience. It was a tandem jump with an expert in that field from New Zealand. I went up in a micro light plane in Carrickmore (Tyrone) lately and that was some experience too,” says Johnny.

Buoyed up by his major award at the big night at the Armagh City Hotel in November, he’s hugely positive about the future.

“Things are going really well for me in recent months. Brendan Donnelly and Linda Murphy are doing a great job as managers and it is great to have them in my corner,” states Johnny. “I did three tours of Scotland this year and more are planned for 2015. We are also booked up for the Ballymore Country Music Festival next August. We are in a good place now.”

Dance With me is available to download on iTunes, in record stores, from www.sharpemusicireland.com and at all of Johnny’s gigs.