Carosel are singer songwriter Michelle Phelan & Guitarist/instrumentalist Pete McGrane.

The full story:

Pete caught the travelling bug, so off he went travelling around the world, sometimes in a sailing boat… sometimes not. He met some other musicians who introduced him to the flamenco guitar, and headed back to Europe to live in Andalucía in the south of Spain; where he shared accommodation with flamenco masters and learnt straight from them of the ways and means around a Spanish guitar. After his studies in classical and Spanish guitar playing, he travelled to Ireland and started to play live gigs and that’s where he met Michelle.

Michelle has a warm, rich and crystal clear vocal delivery style in a similar effect of FEIST & Karen Carpenter. She met Pete at a gig. After Pete heard Michelle sing, he got her up onstage and performed an impromptu song with her at one of his gigs. (A rendition of Al Green’s ‘Let’s Stay Together’). It went really well. That was reason enough for him to start a band with her.  Thus: CAROSEL was formed.  The enthusiastic reaction of the audience encouraged them to continue working together and since then they have notched up some memorable gigs and TV appearances, including the Late Late Show, Oxegen Festival, Electric Picnic and the main stage at the Cork Jazz Festival 2007, 2008 & 2009.

Michelle and Pete began writing songs for the album at the end of 2007 while on retreat in the south of France. When the first demo tracks from the album filtered out from the studio, interest in the band grew rapidly with comparisons being made to Feist and Regina Spektor. A few years later and after much travelling, whilst writing and putting together their debut album, and Kaleidoscope was released in February 2009 on Reekus Records. The opening track, ‘Easy as it Flows’ has already made the soundtrack of hit Canadian television series ‘The Best Years’. And they have received rave reviews in most of Ireland National broadsheets, music magazines and Regional press (Irish Times, The Star, Irish Mirror, Evening Herald, Hotpress + more)

The News of the World has described the album as ‘a joy’.

The sunny uplifting music on Kaleidoscope is just what is needed this time of the year – the extremely positive early comments on the music have name-checked Burt Bacharach, Nouvelle Vague and Jack Johnson while Michelle’s “warm, but crystal clear vocals’” have been likened to Feist, Dionne Warwick and Karen Carpenter. Carosel’s music is generally influenced by Michelle’s love of 60’s music and Pete’s background in flamenco guitar. The album is available from all good shops and leading digital sites.

Currently living in Paris, Pete and Michelle are working on new material for their second album due out early 2011.