Albeit holidays and illness meant numbers were a little below their usual average, Rob and I had a lovely evening at the Maidenhead Folk Club yesterday evening.  Those who had managed to make it along were very welcoming and fully engaged with what we were playing, joining in robustly with choruses from the very start of the evening

The club meets in a comfortable side room in the well appointed New Inn in Taplow.  Excellent floor spots were provided during the evening by Mark Ashworth, Arthur and Margaret and we had everything from some of Mark’s poignant self-penned compositions to fine renditions of Sovay Sovay and Johnny has gone for a Soldier.

I’m pleased to report that logistics all worked out well  - apart from me having the wrong post code for the venue.  It took me a little time to work this out on my arrival in the town but on the positive side I now have a decent working knowledge of Maidenhead Town Centre.

Very many thanks to Mary and to the committee at Maidenhead Folk Club for the invitation to perform at the club once again.  It was a real pleasure.  We wish the club every success and look forward to hearing how their biannual song competition goes next year.

It was very nice indeed to return to the excellent NAF Club last night.

We arrived nice and early at the Star and Garter pub in Silsoe near Bedford which hosts the club. This was partly because the M1 behaved itself but mostly because, for some reason, I had a start time in my head for the club that was 30 minutes earlier than was the case.

Anyway, the bar staff let us into the club room, and we had plenty of time to tune up and to chat with friends who had kindly travelled over from the Baldock and Letchworth Folk and Blues Club to come and support us.

It was nice to then catch up with club organiser, Ned Lawton, and hear about how NAF Club was faring and what he has been up to musically since his previous band, the three-piece Ragged Staff, made their decision not to continue.  I’ll leave it to Ned to tell the world what he is up to but, watch out, it certainly sounds an exciting project.

The NAF Club is held in a room upstairs at the Star and Garter and provides for an intimate atmosphere, especially with the array of night lights that are illuminated as evening falls. 

The club room filled up quickly as the allotted start time of 8.15pm approached and floor singers provided a nice balance of country and western, Americana, a bit of 19702 pop-folk. At the start of the second half, Mike Nacey, also formerly of Ragged Staff, provided a delightful short instrumental set on his new electric tenor guitar.

It was satisfying to hear audience members joining in with the choruses and enjoying the quieter pieces in both of our two sets and the feedback from audience members at the end of the show was pleasantly supportive.

Many thanks to Ned Lawton for the invitation to perform again at the NAF Club and we wish him, his new musical venture and, of course, the NAF Club itself every success in the future.  

What a tremendous night it was at the Waveney Folk Club in Lowestoft yesterday. The welcome we received from club organisers and audience members alike and the support for what we do were as pleasing as they were outstanding.

With it being the last Friday of a half-term holiday, we set off good and early to make sure we were in Lowestoft in plenty of time for the club starting at 8.00pm.  We arrived in the town around 6.00pm-ish and, after a bite to eat in a lovely pub overlooking the Oulton Broad (The Wherry), we drove the short distance to the Gunton Village Community Hall where the club is held every alternate Friday.

Club organiser, Peter, was already busy at 7.15pm transforming the hall into a convivial folk club setting.  In this he was building on the work of caretaker Ann who had been in that morning and set the tables and chairs out.  Peter’s warm greeting made us feel at home immediately and Ann couldn’t have been more helpful in organising things so that we could effect an easy transfer of gear into the venue.

As the room was beginning to fill up, MC for the evening, Mel, arrived with Wendy who was looking after the drinks and snacks for the evening.  Again, they gave us the most wonderful of welcomes.

Mel started the evening promptly at 8.00pm performing an excellent introductory song.  This presaged nearly an hour of top club talent providing the floorspots.  We had everything from Black is the Colour through to Lord Randall.  We had a seriously good short set from two-thirds of local folk trio Tin River and, joy of joys, club member Graham performed with his hurdy gurdy.  I love the hurdy gurdy, so this was a real treat for me.

We then went on to perform our first set and found the now reasonably full room, laid out in café style with (LED) candles on tables, very content to support us in our choruses.  The banter through the evening was great and we quickly developed a lovely rapport with the audience.

Following a ten minute break in proceedings, club member Andy did a ‘hot spot’ feature.  This is a nice idea where a club regular gets the opportunity to perform a slightly longer set.  We all appreciate it can take a couple of numbers to get into one’s stride when performing and just doing one or two songs or tunes can make it hard for club floorsingers to really show what they can do.  This longer time slot allowed Andy to show a good range of his material which stretched from Matty Groves to Billie Holiday’s Electric Chair.  A really nice set.

We then assumed the floor for our second set which was, again, enhanced by the acoustics in the room.  Albeit a modern building without any noticeable acoustic enhancements, somehow the room provides the most wonderful natural reverb, great for encouraging performers and great for people around the room all of whom, front or back, can hear the acoustic instruments really well.

The second set went as well as the first and we were delighted to respond positively to audience calls for an encore.  After the show, we had the most lovely feedback and, if CD sales are a measure of such, it was clear that the audience enjoyed what we had done.

Finally, after chatting with a number of club members, it was time to pack up for the long journey home.  Caretaker Ann was there right to the last minute, still smiling and joking, making sure we got away OK.  After a gig like that, the two and half hours back to St Albans passed very quickly.

Thanks to Peter Hood for his invitation to perform at the Waveney Folk Club and to Ann, Mel, Wendy, Jim, Graham, Andy, Tin River and all the other performers for making it such a memorable evening.  We very much hope to make our return to the club at some time in the future.

Rob and I greatly enjoyed our trip to visit Trevor Kreuger’s Epping Music Club for the first time last night.  We were providing support for the rightly revered singer-songwriter Reg Meuross and we also had the pleasure of sharing the stage with an opening set from the very talented Linda Em.

The Epping Music Club has recently moved to the Barn at the Black Lion pub on Epping High Street from its former venue at the nearby St. John Church.  The venue is a compact space but with enough room to pack in a good sized crowd.  Naturally, Reg’s pulling power meant that the room was pretty much full to capacity by the time Linda Em took to the stage.  Accompanied by Ian Montague, Linda sang a number of her own powerful and heartfelt songs.  She is a wonderful talent and had the audience enthralled from the very beginning.

We then took to the stage for a 35 minute slot.  This time, we started with Sisters and Brothers, our call to folk singers to remember their geography as well as their history. We have increasingly been using this song as a final number for our sets but using it as an opener certainly took on the audience momentum that Linda had earlier built up.

In a set that comprised mostly our own penned material, we found room for one of our trademark translations (in If I Had but One True Love) and a set of dance tunes.  From the raucous calls for an encore and subsequent CD sales, I’m pleased to report that the audience clearly enjoyed what we’d done.  A special mention at this point for Ian Montague who, in addition to providing excellent guitar accompaniment for Linda Em, did an excellent job for us on the sound desk.

Our part played, we then sat down to enjoy Reg Meuross.  In the unlikely event that you have not been along to see Reg perform, he writes the most insightful and thoughtful songs about the widest range of subjects, personal and political, serious and funny.  He sings beautifully and, last night at least, accompanied himself on a wonderful vintage, all mahogany, Martin guitar.  Thoroughly enjoyable.

We certainly wish Trevor, Ian, Jane and the whole team at Epping Music Club the very best for the future.  They have a great new venue and an excellent forthcoming programme and we hope the good people of the area continue to support the club and, of course, that we get a chance to make a return to the club at some stage in the future.

It is always a delight to perform at the St Neots Folk Club.  The welcome is warm, the choruses are loud, the banter is funny and the music is consistently good.

So, on a splendid sunny evening, we loaded up the car and set off.  The A1 behaved itself on our way up to St Neots and we allowed us to arrive in plenty of time to catch up on all the club news with Roger, Patti and other club volunteers and to hear a bit more about the forthcoming St Neots Folk Festival – which sounds like a great line up.

As the clock neared the start time of 8.00pm, the clubroom in the Priory Centre filled up and by the time Roger Pitt kicked the evening off, the room was nearly full.  After Roger had sung a couple of May-related songs, Rob and I were pressed into service early providing a 12-bar blues backing for a talented harmonica player visiting the club for the first time.

We then played our first set, introducing a few of our new songs and tunes which, I am pleased to report, seemed to go down very well.  The St Neots audience love a good chorus and they were clearly in fine voice picking up the new choruses very quickly.

After the break, fellow ‘Boro lad’ Stuart began the second half with a quartet of tunes and songs, supporting himself with ukulele.  His focus on a couple of hearty London tales dovetailed nicely into our opening the second half with our version of Billy Don’t You Weep for Me, which we have recently reintroduced into our set.

Again, our second half seemed to go well and were able to again introduce yet further new material to the St Neots audience.

After the show, we spent some time chatting with members of the audience before turning for home.  It being the first true late night gig of our Summer season, it seemed only fitting to have our first full closure of the A1 and the resultant first magic mystery tour of nether Hertfordshire before reaching our beds.  But, after such a pleasant gig, we didn’t care a jot.

Many thanks to the Committee at St Neots Folk Club for the invitation to perform once more at their lovely club and for looking after us so well when we were there.  We would like to wish them every success with the forthcoming St Neots Folk Festival.

It is always a pleasure to play the Cambridge Folk Club.  The club has been supportive of our music from the very start and many of the club’s organisers have become good friends over time.

So, after a blisteringly hot day, it was great to get in the car and travel over to The Golden Hind PH in Cambridge where the club meets.  The journey was remarkably easy for a Friday night on the A1 and we arrived in plenty of time to the sight of a pleasingly crowded pub, with scores of early evening revellers outside enjoying the unusually warm April evening.

Upstairs, inside the pub, the club room was a hive of activity.  We were sharing the evening with Americana band, Paul McClure and the Local Heroes and, as we arrived we were treated to a first listen to our support slot for the evening, John Parker and Cliff Ward, as they were doing their sound check.

John and Cliff will be very familiar to many folk aficionados as individual members of The Willows and Nizlopi respectively.  They are very fine musicians indeed and they kicked the evening off in style with a powerful set of their own compositions.  We wish them all the very best for the future and feel sure that their new venture together will prove highly popular and successful.

After a 15 minute break for a stage swap over, Paul McClure and the Local Heroes then came on.  Paul told uthe audience that, depending on where and when he is playing, he can call on a sizeable number of fellow musicians to act as his Local Heroes. This night he was performing in a trio alongside a pianist and a backing singer. Paul is a very fine songwriter and provided those present with a number of finely written songs, punctuated with his very own brand of dry humour.

No-one knows our repertoire better than the Cambridge Folk Club and it was nice to be able to perform a number of our new set additions for their members.  From the lovely feedback we had at the end of the show, they seemed to go down well.  All very encouraging.

Many thanks to Marion, Robin, Andy, Jim and all our pals at Cambridge Folk Club for their invitation to perform once again at the club and also for their continuing support for our music.

We have always enjoyed our trips to perform at The Maltings Theatre in St. Albans.  It is a well-equipped and intimate venue where one can create a real atmosphere and, being our hometown, it also guarantees that we will see lots of our local supporters in the audience.  As such, it was with delight that we accepted a recent invitation from Folk at The Maltings organisers, Alison MacFarlane and Bill Redway to perform the April folk concert at the theatre.   Our support for the evening was to be provided by 2017 New Roots finalist, Megan Wisdom, who had travelled over from Suffolk, and local singer Sue Farthing, wonderfully supported by Clive Carey on guitar and Mike on banjo.

With the venue being so close to home we were able to travel there easily, arriving good and early and in plenty of time to chat with the organisers and catch up with the other musicians while setting ourselves up for the concert.

Megan started the evening off with a set of beautiful songs accompanied by table accordion which had the audience entranced.  Megan has an excellent folk future ahead of her.  If you get the chance, go and see her perform.

Rob and I then went on to perform our first half hour set to take the evening up to the break.  Given our familiarity with the venue and in the presence of an audience peppered with friendly faces, we immediately fell into a groove and played a good first set.

After the break, Sue, Clive and Mike provided a varied and accomplished set, delivered with skill and considerable wit and they soon got the audience joining in heartily. We returned to the stage for a final 45-minute set, and the choruses were supported heartily once more. 

We have been working up some new material over the winter period and this was a good opportunity to give it a first run out.  We included a couple of new tune sets in the second half.  The first was a French-Canadian tune followed by one of Rob’s compositions, The Locksmith Reel.  The second was a set comprising an An Dro, a Bouree and finishing with a Muineira (de Boal). 

Songwise,  we introduced our new song, The Sirens’ Call, about the tragic consequences of gambling addiction into the set for a first time.  We have also now finalised a preferred arrangement for our rarely performed song about the plight of refugees across time and space called, simply, The Poor Refugee. I’m pleased to report that all of this new material was delivered well, and it was very pleasing to receive positive feedback from audience members about it after the concert had finished – indeed, one or two were a little disappointed they couldn’t yet buy an album with the new tracks on. 

Many thanks to Alison and Bill for the invitation to again perform at Folk at the Maltings and for looking after us so well throughout the evening.  Similarly, thanks to all those who came along to see us.  We would like to give our best wishes to Megan Wisdom and the Sue Farthing Trio and very much hope we will bump into them on the club and festival circuit over the coming season.

Back in July 2017, Rob and I were pleased to receive an invitation to perform in the prestigious Brunel University, Lunchtime Concert series.  This is a series of classical, jazz, folk and other types of music, organised by members of the Music Department at Brunel University and open to students, staff and members of the local community.  Past invitees to this community-oriented concert series have included, amongst others, the wonderful Bob Fox and, more recently, the highly respected guitarist, Laura Snowden.

The concerts take place between 1.10 and 1.40pm in a pleasant and airy room set up theatre style for the performance.  We were given the option to arrive early to set up and rehearse - something we were keen to do.  On arrival on campus, we were met by Sam Cave, a lecturer in guitar at the University's School of Arts and himself a past performer in the series.  Sam settled us in nicely before going off to do some teaching, leaving Rob and me some time to get ourselves used to the performance space.

When we emerged from the ‘Green Room’, we were delighted to see we had an audience of c 40-50 people.  We had put together a set list that showcased the full range of what we do and the provision of a audience programme with explanatory notes for each song and tune set helped us do this efficiently in the time available.

At the end of the set, an enthusiastic audience very kindly called on us for an encore which we were, naturally, happy to provide and, following that, a good number of audience members approached us personally to tell us how much they had enjoyed the set and ask questions about our songs and instruments.

Many thanks to Sam, Sarah and Michael at Brunel University for the original invitation to perform and for looking after us so well during our time at the university.  Our nice early finish meant we were both back home before the afternoon rush hour and in time for an afternoon cuppa.  We hope that one day, we might return to Brunel University.  Until then, we wish them well with their 2018/19 concert series which will start in the autumn. 

Sadly, the fund-raising event at the Watford Folk Club had to be postponed last Friday as the Beast from the East wrestled with Storm Emma and dumped snow and ice all over this part of Hertfordshire. We will tell everyone once we know the re-arranged date for the fund raiser and hope that you can get along and support a wonderful folk club providing a great service to music in the Watford area.

On a happier note, Rob and I were able to make it to the Banjo Mandolin Guitar Federation’s Festival in Worthing on Saturday and Sunday where we provided a workshop (expertly led by Rob), performed a concert and became involved as adjudicators in some of the many competitions being held at the Festival. 

We met up with some really talented and friendly people at the Festival and heard some great music at what was a wonderfully inclusive event. There was classical, jazz, folk from a variety of traditions, bluegrass and many other forms of music on show, all being played to a very high standard, plus a significant number of interesting workshops going on. Those attending were catching up with old friends, making new ones and generally having a wonderful time. 

Many thanks to Nicki, Sandra, Barbara and all the BMG Committee more generally for the invitation to participate in the Festival and we look forward to working with the BMG again at some future date. Thanks also to Rose who very kindly put us up in her lovely town house in Brighton. Much appreciated!

Rob and I both love Scotland.  As such, when the chance arose for us to play a series of gigs north of the border, we were absolutely delighted to accept. That the tour would also entail two gigs with our great friends in Scottish-Spanish folk collective Gallo Rojo made the prospect doubly delicious.

So, on a sunny Thursday lunchtime (5^th October 2017) we set off.  To break the drive north, we arranged with club organiser Rahel Guzelian at the Topic Folk Club in Bradford, to join club members in one of the club’s occasional singaround sessions.  This also meant we could stay overnight with family and renew our links with the Topic Folk Club where we had performed twelve months earlier and, excitingly, we will be headlining in September 2018.

The singaround at the Topic was great fun.  As one might expect of an historic club like the Topic, there is a lot of talent across a wide range of folk music and it was a personal joy for me that my brother also came along and performed a couple of songs.

After a hearty breakfast the next day, we set off for Scotland.  The weather was gorgeous and the journey through the Borders stunning.  We enjoyed two brief walks around Jedburgh and then Melrose.  With such jewels to hand, it would have been a sin not to enjoy them.

We then drove the last fifty or so miles to Portobello on the eastern edge of Edinburgh where we were to play that night.  We headed initially for Euan Johnston of Gallo Rojo's house where he had very kindly laid some food on for us, before we headed over to the gig venue at The Jaffle Joint on Portobello High Street. This was to be the first of two gigs on consecutive days remembering the fight against fascism in the Spanish Civil War and the story of the 4,000 young children evacuated from the Basque country to Britain in May 1937.

(It is worth mentioning at this point that the MSP for Edinburgh Eastern, Ash Denham, had lodged a motion in the Scottish Parliament on 12th September 2017 (S5M-07642) applauding the efforts of Gallo Rojo, ourselves and the Edinburgh Spanish Film Festival (ESFF – see next blogpost) in remembering the Basque children of 1937 on the 80th anniversary of their arrival in Britain and wishing us well for this concert in Portobello.  How cool is that!)

The Jaffle Joint was a lively venue that very much came alive through the evening.  Friends and followers of ours and Gallo Rojo, along with members of the Basque Children of '37 Association filled the space in the bistro to bursting point and, from a tightly packed stage, we kicked the evening off with a punchy set that covered much of our Spanish Civil War repertoire.  

The endlessly exuberant Gallo Rojo then drove the crowd to a frenzy with their powerful songs and great harmonies.  

We then finished the evening off together with both bands combining to sing the famous Spanish Civil War song, The Valley of Jarama.  

Many thanks to our great friend Dave Orem for capturing the evening for us all in pictures and film and thanks to the staff at The Jaffle Joint for their accommodation of all of our requirements through the evening.

After the gig, Rob and I left for Dave's apartment in central Edinburgh where we were kindly being put up for our time in Scotland. After the long drive and an energetic concert plus the prospect of an early start and another long drive the next day, we didn't stay up much beyond a cup of tea and a glass of whisky.

As many followers of Na-Mara may know, not long after the Basque Children arrived in Britain, they were sent onwards to a geographically dispersed set of hostels or 'colonias'.  The only colonia in Scotland was in the small east coast town of Montrose, between Dundee and Aberdeen and it was to there we headed on Saturday morning.

This was to be an important day for Rob in that his father had been one of the 24 child refugees accommodated in Mall House in Montrose exactly eighty years before.  This was his first visit to the town.

The local press had taken quite an interest in the story and Rob met with a journalist from the Dundee Courier at the house where the children were accommodated, which is still.  However, prior to that happening, following a quick phone call to a good pal of Dave’s, we were invited to an impromptu lunch of soup and bridies at Rod and Verity's house where we given the warmest of welcomes (and the best of food).  

After lunch, Rod kindly walked us all round to the house - an imposing structure of red sandstone now converted to flats, where Rob met with the reporter covering the story.  After Rob had spoken with the reporter and photos were taken, it was time for us to go on to the venue for our Montrose gig which, this time,  was to be an afternoon event.

The Neptune Bar (or ' Neppie') is a lively local music venue in the attractive town of Montrose.  Througha mix of local publicity and mentions in the International Brigade Memorial Trust and Basque Children’s Association of ’37 Newsletters, a decent number of interested listeners assembled, alongside pub regulars, to see us and Gallo Rojo perform.

Both bands pretty much ran through the same repertoire as the night before and were both pretty well received.  Being an afternoon gig meant the atmosphere in the Neppie was generally a tad quieter than in the Jaffle Joint the night before.  The upside to this was that some of the quieter songs fared a little better than the night before and, this said, we still managed to have a little impromptu dancing break out at one point and there was some excellent interaction with those who’d come along to see us.

Following the gig, the focus was on packing up and heading back to Auld Reekie for some beers and a curry – and very good they were too.

I will talk about our involvement in the Edinburgh Spanish Film Festival in my next blogpost. However, let me take this opportunity here to thank Euan Johnston for all his hard work in fixing these two gigs up for us and to the wonderful Gallo Rojo for their friendship and their outstanding performances at The Jaffle Joint in Portobello and The Neptune Bar in Montrose.  Thanks also to the staff of both those bars for being so accommodating to our needs when setting up the stages and rooms for the performances.  Thanks to Charlie Williamson for his introduction to our performance in the Neppie.

Similarly thanks go to Simon Martinez and Barbara of the Basque Children’s Association of ’37 for their sterling efforts in preparing the venues appropriately for the gigs and to Mike Arnott of the IBMT in Scotland for promoting the gigs and coming along.  All very much appreciated.

Finally, thanks go to all those - whether family, friends or just interested parties - who came along to see the two performances. 

October 8^th- 9^th 2017

After the exertions of Thursday to Saturday, it was time to ease back a little on Sunday.  We had no formal playing commitments that day so we took the opportunity to go for a walk with friends alongside The Water of Leith, down to the bustling area of Stockbridge in Edinburgh, where we had lunch. Then, in the afternoon, Dave and another friend, Ross, were on hand to help us with a little photo and video shoot during an impromptu house concert.  Watch this space in the coming weeks for evidence of their hard work over the course of that afternoon.

In the evening, we took in a film at the Edinburgh Spanish Film Festival and I will draw a veil over the beers and the junk food I consumed thereafter – it was definitely not on the good food diet.

On Monday, Rob had various people to meet and, so, I took up Dave’s invitation to go and visit the school where he works and meet some of his colleagues and staff. 

However, we had our own role to play in the Edinburgh Spanish Film Festival (ESFF) that evening and, mid-afternoon, I met up with Rob on the South Bridge and we made our way over to George Square, the city heart of the University of Edinburgh.

That evening the ESFF were showing Steve Bowles’ award winning documentary film, The Guernica Children, that tells the story of the Basque child refugees from Bilbao in May 1937, narrated by Siân Phillips .  Very kindly, we had been invited by the festival organiser, to perform our two songs about the Basque child refugees at the showing of the film. We were to play Only For Three Months before the film was shown and The Silver Duro immediately afterwards.  Rob was then to join a panel with three other children of the Basque children to discuss their parents’ recollections of the evacuation and the resonances of their experience for current times. 

The film was being shown in the early evening in a lecture theatre at the University of Edinburgh’s Department of European Languages and Cultures and, by the time Rob and I arrived, Simon and Barbara of the Basque Childrens’ Association of ’37 (BCA37) and others were hard at work putting up the travelling exhibition to inform attendees of the story of the child refugees from Bilbao. 

We arrived in good time to get tuned up before the lecture theatre filled to capacity (around 90-100 people). 

The Guernica Children is a powerful and moving testimony to the Basque child refugees, highlighting the atrocities in Guernica which accelerated the tide of refugees into the city of Bilbao and eventually led to the evacuation of the children on the SS Havana to Southampton and onwards.  The dockside scenes of parting at Santurce are particularly highly charged emotionally and I would urge anyone to see the film if the opportunity arises. 

We were content to play our small role in supporting the ESFF and the BCA37 in bringing the story of the Basque children to a wider audience and the subsequent panel session involving Rob, Simon and others was both informative and thought-provoking. Thanks go to  ESFF organiser, Marian Aldaz Aréchaga for her kind invitation to participate in this element of the film festival and to thank her and her colleagues for making the evening run so smoothly.

Being an early evening showing, there was time afterwards for us to say goodbye to our friends and colleagues in Edinburgh.  I took the opportunity to meet up with some old university buddies of mine and, yes, more beers were consumed.

Rob was staying up in Scotland on the Tuesday but I was returning to St. Albans and, by 9.00am on Tuesday morning, I had said my goodbyes to friends.  An hour later I was at Waverley Station to catch the train home to St. Albans and was home in time for a cuppa, mid-afternoon.

The previous days had produced a truly memorable trip to Scotland where we met up with longstanding friends, made some new friends, played some highly enjoyable concerts with Gallo Rojo, performed at the ESFF and experienced both lovely countryside and the invigorating and beautiful city that is Edinburgh. We have so many people to thank but keeping things short especial thanks go to Dave and Chris and Gaynor for accommodating us so wonderfully on our travels and to Rahel, Euan, Charlie and Marian for facilitating our performances over four unforgettable evenings in West Yorkshire and Scotland.

We will now be turning our attention to recording duties.  Please watch this space for occasional updates as we start putting the new album together.