I first saw Stuart Veitch perform in Aberdeen’s Beach Ballroom.
My daughter’s school had made it to the regional final of this year’s Glee Challenge.
Hundreds of parents, grandparents and siblings sat dutifully for two and a half hours through the performances of nine schools and 18 songs.
People were shifting uncomfortably in their seats, fanning themselves in the closed atmosphere, as the judges retired to decide the winner and runners-up.
The audience was drifting off, then Stuart Veitch came on stage…
We all wanted our child’s school to win, but we also wanted to go home.
Compere Ali McLaren came on stage to announce we’d be getting some entertainment while the judges deliberated.
Stuart Veitch, then 15, was introduced as a former participant in Glee Challenge who had taken his musical talent to the next level.
Watch Stuart perform Lewis Capaldi’s ‘Wish You The Best’
As the audience stretched their hamstrings and cricked their necks, the unassuming Stuart, in everyday teenage attire, walked to the front of the stage with a guitar and quietly introduced himself.
What followed was a 15-minute display of such precocious talent that the audience was frozen to their seats, eyes glued to the youngster barely older than the children who’d performed all evening.
He sang songs by Ed Sheeran and Lewis Capaldi, before finishing his short set with one he’d written himself.
Only occasionally in life do you come across gifted individuals, people with such genuine talent that you’re left affected by the experience. That’s what happened that night in the Beach Ballroom.
And that’s when I decided more people needed to know about him.
Writing songs while on study leave: ‘I can’t help it’
Having just turned 16, Stuart is right in the middle of National 5 exams as he comes to the end of S4 at Alford Academy.
I ask him how he juggles school and music on a visit to his parents’ Alford home.
“Not very well. I get very distracted by the guitar. I’m on study leave and I often find myself writing songs, I can’t help it.”
Stuart has been singing for as long as he can remember and started playing the guitar aged just eight.
His mum says he sang before he talked, and with the piano, violin and bass guitar in his musical locker, he clearly has music in his blood.
‘I started writing songs to get my feelings out… I’ve written too many to count’
And speaking of blood, Stuart tells me the inspiration to start writing songs came from being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease as a young boy.
“I was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes when I was seven, and I started writing songs as a way to get my feelings out.
“If I’d had a bad day, I’d just write songs. It was a way to process my feelings. I’ve written too many to count, I could probably write a song a day.
“I watched Ed Sheeran’s new documentary, and he said that when something bad happened, he’d just go into his room and write songs. That’s what I do.
“Most of my songs are about my own experiences, things that have happened in my life. So I wrote a song about diabetes, and another about stage fright.
“Others are messages I want to send out, like about bullying, and mental health during lockdown.”
Watch Stuart perform his new single, ‘A Long Way Home’
Lewis Capaldi and the aforementioned Ed Sheeran are Stuart’s big musical heroes, who he credits with inspiring him to pick up a guitar and write songs.
But it’s not just in his bedroom that Stuart performs. Far from it.
Performing here, there, and everywhere
As a 13-year-old he played at Taste of Grampian. And at 14 he went down to Edinburgh with his guitar to busk on the Royal Mile at the Fringe Festival during the summer holidays.
This spring has been a busy one. March saw him compete at The Next Big Thing competition in Glasgow, where he made the final.
He also won the Inverurie heat of the Emmerdale U Have Talent competition, with the final looming next month.
He then entered and won Alford Academy’s Young Musician of the Year competition.
The very next day, he released his second single, ‘A Long Way Home’, having debuted last year with ‘We Can’t Fly’.
April saw him perform at Glee at the Beach Ballroom, where I first saw him.
Named in Top 10 young songwriters in UK & Ireland
In May, Stuart performed at Inverurie Town Hall as part of the King’s Coronation celebrations.
And this month also saw him named in the Top 10 in the UK and Ireland in Song Academy’s Young Songwriter 2023 competition.
And all while studying for his exams.
Clearly, he’s not hanging around. But what’s the next step?
“Big concert venues, hopefully. Playing festivals. Having a show where people come to see me, instead of at different events, would be the dream.”
‘I just want to be a pop star, I want to sell out arenas’
One thing is clear – he wants music to be more than a hobby.
“I want it to be a job. I just want to be a pop star. I want to be selling out arenas. But that might not happen.
“But whatever I do in the future, I want it to be in music. I don’t know what I’d do without it.”
Stuart has quite a voice, which doesn’t fit with his self-confessed shyness.
“I’m very shy when it comes to speaking to people. I’m not a great speaker.
“But with singing, it’s like I’m in my own bubble. It’s just me on the stage and I don’t think about anything else.
“I’m a different person once I start singing.”
Mum: ‘He sang before he talked’
Mum Jane makes me a cup of tea while our cameraman gets things ready for Stuart to perform a few songs for us.
“He’s very lucky, he’s found his niche,” she says.
“He gets a lot of enjoyment from it and that, for his Dad and I, is the most important thing. Whether or not he goes on to sell out arenas, that’s secondary to him being happy.
“Music has been a great way for him to express his feelings.
“I think he sang before he talked, he used to do bothy ballads when he was little.”
Stuart is thinking about heading down to Glasgow once his schooling’s finished, “for the music scene”.
From Alford to…?
Our videos speak for themselves. Life has a way of throwing curveballs, but wherever life takes him, I can only assume Stuart Veitch will go far.
Stuart’s new single ‘A Long Way Home’, which is about bullying and the effect it has on people, is available now on all streaming platforms.
You can also follow him on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok.
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