After their acclaimed sold-out headline performances at Cork Jazz Festival and Wexford Spiegeltent, Ireland’s King Of Swing, Luke Thomas and Saturday’s singer Una Healy along with The Swing Cats reunite.
The pair are kicking off their Fly Me To The Moon tour on November 22nd in Galway before wrapping up on December 11th in Dublin.
Ahead of the tour, we sat down with the duo to find out what to expect from the show and why AI will never replace real music.
Tell us about your upcoming tour, Fly Me to the Moon.
Una: It’s starting on Saturday! So it’s all kicking off in Monroes in Galway this Saturday. That’s our first show. Then we’re going to be in Cork and Limerick, and then finishing in Dublin on the 11th of December. So it’s going to be very festive and just all kinds of fun songs to get people enjoying themselves and getting ready for Christmas, and literally ready for Christmas because we’ve got a single coming out as well called I’m Ready for Christmas.
Luke: It’s something we were kind of toying with the idea of the Christmas song anyway, for last year as well. And this song, we’re just looking online at different options. And to go with an old classic, you’re always going to be competing with, be it Ella Fitzgerald or Brenda Lee, Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree. All these people, Dean Martin, you’re never going to kind of improve on what they’ve done. So we looked at a modern song to put our own kind of twist on it. So that’s where Ready for Christmas came from. And it’s kind of vintage pop, I suppose, the phrase we’re using a lot.
U: It’s coming out on the 28th of November.
Just in time for Christmas!
L: Yeah, just in time. And the Fly Me to the Moon Tour is just the best of all things, swing music, big band, Bublé and all that kind of stuff, mixed with the best kind of classic country, up-tempo, fun kind of stuff. Una and my band, The Swing Cats, work very well. We didn’t realise how well it was going to work. And this is our third year, our third Christmas doing a gig together.
Wow! Three Christmases – you really are a dream team!
U: We started off in the Sugar Club, we did the Cork Jazz Festival together and we did a few more gigs around. We work very well together and I’m like a new addition to Luke and The Swing Cats, so there’s a whole different flavour to it!
L: Absolutely. Una brings out the guitar and she plays a couple of songs as well with the guitar!
How did this union come about?
U: Luke actually contacted me, I’ve known him and met him over the years, on the circuit. He just came to me with an idea saying he’d seen the likes of Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett team up for shows. He said he saw pop and swing coming together. I’ve been in a girl band for years, still a singer, songwriter, writing my own music. So I thought why not give it a go and see? Before The Saturdays, I used to sing in little jazz bars and clubs all around Dublin for years and in corporate bands. So it’s not alien to me at all.
L: I was obviously delighted that Una had said yes. It was a natural fit. Everyone’s just really enjoying it. You can see that coming through from the musicians, from Una, to myself, which is great. And the audience as well. We’re singing songs that everyone knows. They’re their songs. The people who come to the shows, it’s their songs. It’s some of the greatest songs ever written. So we’re just performing them and it turns into a great atmosphere.
Where does the inspiration for your shows come from?
U: We like to mix it up. Obviously, Luke and The Swing Cats’ style and then what I’ve done work with The Saturdays and my own music – I sing country, I love country music. So we blend the two, of what we do individually and we have new music as well. We’re not always both on the stage, either. We definitely like to mix things up every night.
L: There you go. People are always surprised after the show. ‘Oh, I didn’t expect that. That was great.’ Fly Me to the Moon, the name of the tour and the Great American Songbook and all that is quite a broad statement. So we just want to make sure, because people are aware of the show and they might be kind of on the fence. But we promise you’re in for a great night!
There’s a lot of energy in the show!
U: I love the fact that it’s a full live band. There are no backing tracks. It’s all just live, live music. All the guys on stage are so talented. It’s just an amazing show and I love working with these really brilliant musicians.
L: With the live band, the music actually comes to life a bit more. The show can grow and grow. It’s a case of feeling it out, what the audience likes, what they might not respond to as much, and giving them more of what they do respond to. It’s exciting as well to see people’s reaction.
Luke, did you grow up listening to big band music?
L: No! 20 years ago, I was doing pop music. I won a Meteor Award for pop music. I would have been out at the time of Samantha Mumba and people like that. I fell into swing music by mistake, and I’m glad I’m in it now. It was my lane. It was my vehicle to get to where I needed to be. But only in the second half of my life, if you want to say that, have I been into swing music. It has definitely honed my skills and my craft.
Una, do you have a song that you’ll never get sick of performing?
U: Can’t Take My Eyes Off You. We do that towards the end, and you just see the reaction with the crowd and how they participate, that’s such a good feeling for everyone, for the musicians on stage, for ourselves and the people in the audience.
You mention the energy, you must be buzzing to get out on stage!
U: Yeah, and also anything can go wrong as well. One time, Luke went on stage and his mic wasn’t turned on! [Laughs]
L: I ran on stage at Cork Jazz Festival, and it was disgraceful!
U: People understand! That’s what could happen in a live show because it’s different every night. We also mix it up, it’s not like we have a set list, but sometimes we don’t always stick exactly to that because it depends on how the atmosphere is.
L: Myself and Una would keep good communication on stage and if we need to pull or shake a couple of songs, we will.
It must be lovely to have that energy to feed off each other on stage!
U: It’s way more fun, like you can’t compare. Being on your own is one thing, but it’s just different. You can vibe off each other and have the craic! I think the more the merrier!
L: It’s great! We get more in sync as we go along. Sometimes you don’t know where you’re going to land, and it’s going to be down to the crowd. That’s really kind of exhilarating, it’s a great place to be.
You’ve mentioned a lot of different genres: country, big band, pop. Do you have a musical inspiration?
U: It’s hard to name just one person, depending on the type of music. But as a songwriter myself, I was always very inspired by Sheryl Crow. My uncle Declan [Nerney] would have been a huge inspiration to me musically. And I love music. Like, it’s not just one. Do you know what I actually absolutely love as well? And no one really knows this about me, but dance music. I love dance music. 90s dance is my favourite – I had every single compilation under the sun.
L: I’d be drawn to more performers, like old performers like Elvis and James Brown, that kind of artist. Frank Sinatra. So old classic performers would be my biggest inspiration.
You really channel those classic performers on tour!
U: I mentioned the other day when we did The Miriam Show as well, Where the Hell is my Husband by Raye. If you listen to the music in
that and even the way she performs, it’s very old school. That’s what’s coming around, that’s what people want. They want
what’s real again. Now you see AI trying to take over, but it will never happen though, because you cannot replace the human on stage, especially when it comes to performing. Whatever about the recording, when it comes to the live shows – these are evenings out that people will remember, so live music is very special. I would really encourage anyone to come, we wont let them down. We promise we will put on a great show and that you’ll go away smiling!
Ireland’s King Of Swing Luke Thomas & Saturday’s singer Una Healy along with The Swing Cats bring ‘FLY ME TO THE MOON a celebration of the Great American Songbook’ on tour including a headline Ambassador Theatre, Dublin show on Thursday, December 11th 2025. Find your tickets here.