By Logan Johnson.
The winner of the Oh Yeah Music Centre’s Uncharted Sounds project has been announced as Jacob Taylor, but who is the man behind the scholarship? I caught up with music producer Aaron Milligan at his new studio in East Belfast to find out more about this exciting initiative, aimed at supporting upcoming artists and helping them progress in their music careers.
Aaron Milligan is a 26 year-old musician and music producer, who became inspired to launch a scholarship for early career artists after realising that many unsigned acts could not afford to record their music professionally. “After the pandemic, many artists were struggling financially, after years of disruption to their income. It can be difficult to earn enough money to get by, never mind paying for studio time, engineering, mixing and mastering of tracks,” he explains. This is why Milligan launched Uncharted Sounds, a scholarship project that provided emerging artists with an opportunity to have their single professionally recorded in his East Belfast space, Two For Joy Studios.
“I teamed up with the Oh Yeah Music Centre to promote the project, and they helped me form a panel of industry experts. We advertised online, asking artists to send in their demos. We were expecting to receive a few submissions, but we ended up getting over 100 entries. The panel and I then whittled this down to a list of finalists, and 14 year-old singer-songwriter Jacob Taylor ended up being the winner!” Aaron will be welcoming Jacob to his studio in the coming weeks to record his first ever single, and the panel will also assist with marketing, photography and social media content to help Jacob launch his fledgling career. With almost a decade of experience releasing music and gigging across the UK, Aaron is keen to give back to his community and help a new generation of musicians find success.
‘I started Uncharted Sounds because we needed a platform for young musicians, and hopefully it will continue to grow.” Aaron’s passion for local music is infectious. His excitement and optimism about the power of music and the potential of upcoming acts is the first thing I noticed as I entered the door of his studio. I was lucky enough to be given a sneak peek of some of the demos he has created and it’s safe to say the future of the Northern Ireland music scene is in safe hands.
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