A BOLTON musician is celebrating the launch of her first single with a special gig in Manchester.

Janileigh Cohen is a singer and songwriter who has been hailed as a rising star with a 'magical' home-grown talent for folk.

The 23-year-old will be launching her five-track EP 'As A Child' at The Three Minute Theatre in Manchester on May 21.

Brought up in Farnworth and now living in Burnage, she only started on the 'gig' scene last year and is more used to hitting the streets to perform her music.

She said: "I feel like a baby when it comes to music, I've only been doing it a short while. I've always written songs but had never done gigs up until January last year.

"I've been busking most days, I busking in the snow the other day. I'd like to work towards not having to do that but I take it as it comes, I don't have any expectations but I love what I'm doing and wouldn't want to do anything else.

"The launch will be my first headline gig, I'm nervous but excited too. I'd like it to go well."

Janileigh's biggest influences come from contemporary folk singers of the 1960's and 70's including the likes of John Martyn, Joni Mitchell, Jackson C Frank, Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen.

As well as a singer and songwriter, the former Harper Green School pupil plays the guitar and piano and most recently she has returned to the recording studio to work on a new set of songs.

Famed English singer-songwriter Beth Orton described her as "a star in the old fashioned sense of the word" with a homegrown "soulful melancholy", while founder of Folk Radio, Alex Gallacher, praised her as "magical" with a "slight husky edge to her vocals"

He added: "If she’s not a name you all know by this time next year then there’s no justice."

Janileigh initially recorded her first EP last year under the guidance of friend Rich Williams, who discovered her through Manchester's Open Mic scene.

She is now under the guidance of Manchester-based music promotions company Papillon Promotions, which works with local unsigned acts and has described her as "very much a star in the making".

'As A Child' will be launched the Late Bar in the The Three Minute Theatre, Afflecks Arcade, Oldham Street, Manchester, On Saturday, May 21.