Professor Bob Halligan Jr. is a songwriter who’s worked with some of the biggest rock stars in the country including Kiss, Judas Priest and Blue Oyster Cult.

Halligan, a professor in the Bandier program and the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, has been writing songs for 47 years and playing piano and guitar since he was a child.

When Halligan completed his senior year at Hamilton College, he was under the impression that he would be getting a “real job” that involved wearing a suit and tie. He had no plans to be a musician, though, until a band member from his group at the time asked him if he wanted to.

“Sometimes, an outside person sees you more clearly than you do,” Halligan said. “His saying that to me made me realize that music was all I cared about.”

Music is what got Halligan through his high school and his college years, he said. During his adolescence, Halligan’s main influence in his family was his cousin, Dick Halligan, who was a founding member of the famous psychedelic rock band Blood, Sweat and Tears.

“Writing music was a social lubricant,” Halligan said. “It was a way of having more of a life than I could have had as a skinny, acne-faced, nervous teenager.”

Halligan grew up worshipping The Beatles, Stevie Wonder and The Rolling Stones. He said he spent a lot of his time listening to all styles of music on the radio. Doing this encouraged him not to invest all his time into one genre. He said he loves everyone from Aaron Copland to Mumford & Sons.

The songwriter has gone full circle as he was raised in Syracuse and is back here to teach. In between that time, Halligan lived in Nashville and the greater New York City area for 20 years to develop his music career.

Halligan has been an SU employee for eight and a half years, and has been involved with Bandier since its launch in 2008. He teaches a wide variety of music-related classes such as songwriting, music business and music underscoring.

When Halligan is not teaching, he’s either producing records or is serving as the frontman of his celtic rock/pop band, Ceili Rain. Halligan is the only original member of his 20-year-old group, but his other five band mates have been in Ceili Rain for the past six years.

Ceili Rain has released nine studio albums and one live album. Halligan has released two solo albums in the early 90s.

The band focuses on producing Christian-influenced messages through their material.

Halligan was given the opportunity to perform Ceili Rain’s song “Stomp” for 60,000 people in Italy at a Papal event this past June. It was here that he was fortunate enough to meet his idol, Pope Francis.

“People always ask me where the pope stands on my list of people I’d like to meet, and I said he was the list,” he said.

He cried uncontrollably for about four minutes, he added.

Pope Francis is not the only celebrity that Halligan has been able to interact with. He has performed and recorded with famous artists such as Billy Joel, Joan Jett and Michael McDonald of the Doobie Brothers.
Combining his experiences in the music industry into his Bandier curriculum is no problem for Halligan.

“In songwriting class, it’s easy,” he said. “If the student plays something that he or she wrote, I can play it back for them on the spot and show them what they need to change.”

Most recently, Halligan has written songs for The Sonics’ and Sam Butler’s latest albums.

Halligan encourages people who are interested in entering the performing or music industry to go for it.

“Do what you love,” Halligan said. “Work on the things you care about or you won’t do well because you won’t care about what you’re doing.”

Published on September 29, 2015 at 9:58 pm

Contact: rcplaut@syr.edu