My Gurus – Jo Verrent

Julie McNamara

I still remember the hairs on my arms standing on end the first time I heard Julie’s voice – and she was only sound checking. I’m a hearing aid user, had just ‘switched on’, and suddenly I heard the sound of an angel. Later, when I understood the words she sang, I fell in love all over again – powerful, necessary and often devastating.

I still listen to ‘Fly Like an Eagle’, as I’ve never found anything else that helps me get through hard times as much. Along with other heroes of the disability arts scene in the 1980s and ‘90s – Caroline Parker, Tony Heaton, Heart n Soul, the Lawnmowers – she helped me find my way into a movement, and then into the arts sector itself.

I’m delighted that the work and stories of that time are being collected by Shape’s National Disability Arts Collection and Archive, so it doesn’t disappear and so I can revisit my youth on demand!