Luke Hurley

Who is Luke Hurley?

Luke Hurley is an independent New Zealand guitarist and singer-songwriter, who works mostly outside the confines of the music industry. He was born in Kenya, and later moved with his family to Gore in Southland, New Zealand when aged 12. He achieved a degree of early success on student radio with the song "Mona Lisa" in the early 1980s at University of Otago in Dunedin.

Growing up in Kenya and Zanzibar exposed Luke to Arabic, African and Indian styles of music which have influenced him to this day. Mississippi John Hurt was also an influence. Luke's current style of playing has also been described as "Indian tabla meets Irish rock". Another comparison with singer-songwriters might be with Bruce Cockburn and Ron Sexsmith who are also prolific but outside the commercial mainstream.

His song "Albatross" is one of many much loved show stoppers in his 25+ years worth of repertoire. His idiosyncratic but perceptive songs are admired by many and in demand for recording by other artists such as Tracie De Jong who has recorded his "Fait Accompli" song.

He is now based in Auckland, and has toured with artists such as Michelle Shocked and Marianne Faithfull but is more likely to be found at fringe festivals or even busking. He has self recorded the equivalent of about 8 albums since the early 1980s. The most recent, High Risk features 17 songs recorded at some of Aucklands best sound studios. It was engineered by Steve Garden and mastered by Chris Chetland at Kog Studio. The album was reviewed by Liz Barry who said it "...captivates the listener with gentle melodies, exquisite guitar technique and simple yet sometimes complex rhythms."