WATCH: Sean Quigley and Karli Gerbrandt perform Hope Again, about friend and musician Joshua Bentley, 18, who was killed in Winnipeg in January.
WINNIPEG – Sean Quigley, who shot to fame with his YouTube rendition of Little Drummer Boy, has co-written a new song in honour of a slain friend.
Fellow musician Joshua Bentley, 18, was assaulted on the Osborne Street Bridge on Jan. 24 and later died in hospital.
“We met through musical friends,” Quigley, 19, said about Bentley. “We always supported each other musically.”
Quigley and Karli Gerbrandt, 21, who are engaged and together form the band Bold As Lions, wrote and perform the song Hope Again, about their emotions following Bentley’s death.
“The hope that’s in our eyes covered up the scars that you left when you left him there,” they sing together.
The video, which opens with a news report about Bentley’s killing, has been viewed more than 4,400 times since it was posted on YouTube in late April.
“You just don’t think that that’s every going to happen to someone you know,” Gerbrandt said about the killing.
“It really caught everyone off guard because he was such a bubbly, likeable guy,” said Quigley. “It definitely made everyone think about their lives.
“He was one of those people who, honestly, would never hurt a fly.”
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The video features a series of emotions passing over the faces of people who knew Bentley: sadness, anger, and at the end, hope. As Bentley’s friends break into smiles, Quigley and Gerbrandt, whose Christianity is evident in their music, sing they’ll “see him again.”
Bentley’s mother has been part of the process of creating the song and the video, the pair said.
“She’s so proud of us,” Gerbrandt said. “It’s been great to have a relationship with her.”
The pair will release a full-length album in June and plan to dedicate the associated concert to Bentley.
Quigley’s 2011 rendition of Little Drummer Boy, performed when he was just 16, has been viewed almost 2.8 million times on YouTube.
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Sean Quigley performs his 2011 YouTube hit Little Drummer Boy.
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