Jon took up the guitar aged 12 and soon made his mark in and around London playing electric and acoustics in rock and folk bands in the 80's including Hot Banana and Three Wise Fools.

In the mid 80's he switched to a more organic grassroots approach to his music, developing a modal, acoustic style of playing guitar in drop D and DADGAD tunings. He moved to Ireland, settling in Dingle, County Kerry in the early 90's and began playing with local musicians including fiddler Mark Crichard, with whom he later went on to record Music from Ireland and other Atlantic Shores in 2003. Jon continued to develop his style of accompaniment and also moved onto bouzouki, playing with some of the greats in Irish traditional music including Mary and Michael Black, Seamus and Brendan Begley, Vinnie Kilduff, Frankie Gavin, Kila, Sliabh Notes, Steve Cooney, Liam O'Connor, singer Eilish Kennedy, Eoin Duignan and the "Sessions from the Hearth" artists.

In more recent years he has been playing latinjazz and soulfunk music in drop D tuning using a loop pedal to set up soundscapes. This project, known as Pacific Bespoke, is with Irish electronica musician Alan Gleeson - a mix of tropical grooves, roots, reggae, funk and house beats. See www.myspace.com/pacificbespoke.

His innovative approach (the left-handed Da Vinci mind!?) led him to develop a guitar with a 2nd pick-up allowing him to create the sound of guitar and bass simultaneously. Most recently he has composed brand new bouzouki duets inspired by open air sessions up the Conor Pass outside Dingle which alongside other original classical, folk and jazz influenced pieces on bouzouki and tenor ukulele, have just been released on his new cd, Twigs of the Neem Tree. He has toured Europe and New Zealand extensively and his compositions have been accepted by New York-based Pump Audio who supply the film and TV companies with soundtrack material. His Bealtaine track is currently playing to celebrated Antarctic photographer Greg Murphy's multimedia show. TV appearances include LWT's "This is Your Life", RTE's "Open House" and "Nationwide", TG4's "Feilte", "Sibin" and "Ardan" and a recent documentary on Mary Black produced by Hummingbird Productions for RTE television and for DVD release. His film score credits include "Connomara" (2000) and TG4's "Scoil leis an gCaid", "Ni Beatha go Bás" (1999). His session work includes "Geantrai" (2000), "Sessions from the Hearth" (1999), Eoin Duignan's "Ancient Rite" (2000) and Lumina (2004), Tony Small's " Galway " (2001) and Eilís Kennedy's "A Time to Sail" (2001) and "One Sweet Kiss" (2005). He produced the "Geantrai" album in 1999, Áine Ui Laithe and Eilin Ni Chearna's new cd, "Mná an Oileáin", featuring music from the Blasket Islands . In August 2003 Jon recorded bouzouki and guitar for Benny O'Carroll's new "Dance It Yourself " dvd, the first Irish traditional album to be recorded in 5:1 surround sound.





Jon and Seamus Begley in concert in Wellington, March 2006.