It took us a long while to honour the promise we made at the Redbourn club but we finally made it up to Barton-Le Clay in Bedfordshire, and very glad we did! Organiser Ross had suggested we go and join him at one of the regular singarounds at the Barton club. Very kindly, since we had travelled the furthest distance, he let us do a few extra numbers. We took the chance to try out some new material, which was good practice for us and generally it seemed to be enjoyed.

The atmosphere was very welcoming and friendly; the music was highly varied with a wide range of styles of music. The guy who runs the blues club in Barton Le Clay at the same venue (sorry didn't catch his name) was there and played some excellent blues material. Others played an array of interesting insturments - including a base recorder. WE even had an accordian version of Imagine.

The late night trip home allowed me to play Rob my new La Chavenee album, which was just as well since motorway works, with which we are plagued, were determined to send us north from Bedforshire in order to then go southwards home. I also got the benefit of Rob's knowledge on the composer Thomas Dowland. I am always keen to hear new and preferably calming music and Dowland is one of Rob's absolute favourites (especially if Sting isn't singing). I am a convert and it regularly now soothes the furroughed brow of this London commuter.

For me, this was a welcome return to Oxford, where I lived and worked for most of the 1980s. That said, even though I had passed it a thousand times, it was the first time I had ever been in the Port Mahon pub - and I had clearly missed out on a very friendly watering hole.

This was a fun night with a range of local singers - from Ireland and County Durham, some great unaccompanied singers and some excellent blues and traditional playing. Generally a quiet night for the club, but they were kind enough to let us finish off the evening. This is a club we would very much like to return to. The organisers were very welcoming, and guests were very complimentary about the new French material.

Tai Chi Club - Our most stretching gig yet (gerrit?)

We played for a group of Tai Chi teachers who had come together from around the world for a conference in St Albans. A very nice and welcoming group of people - very keen to party after being involved in serious study for the previous week. Along with a local choir master talking on the history of plain song, we were there to give the overseas visitors an introduction to some of the music of the British Isles and France. We did 25 minutes worth and it was very well received. Perhaps a little out of practice given the summer festivities, I seemed to get through Maid of Culmore with rubber fingers and the occasional jazz chord, but we were really motoring by the end. We did our new version of Three Bonny Ships, with Rob on Mandola, and it worked well. Our Dutch friend Joop, who was convenor for the conference, played percussion with us and 'the jive was jumpin'.

Played at the King Harry yesterday. Nice crowd involved in the sing along - a lot of local folk fans we hadn't met before which was great. Nice atmosphere too. Sadly, most 'turns' had to compete with the music from the bar next door. Even something as simple as a curtain would have made the difference. Still, probably the best range of bottled beers in a pub that I have seen for a long time - and the staff seemed very kind to everybody involved in the folk music side, so its definitely a place we will go back to.

We tried out another couple of our French Songs - The Bloody Inn (a chilling a broadly true tale of mass murder in 18th century France) and Three Bonny Ships - a French Sea Shanty, and both went down very well. This is all very encouraging for us.

Rob told me that we have got an invite to play at the Cambridge Folk Club which we are both very excited about.

After playing at the Da Capo school earlier in the year, we were asked back to play for their end of year concert. The children and adults who attend the school, which provides an exciting and innovative approach to music education - look them up - have a concert to show what they are about and what they can achieve.

The invitation allowed us to try out a lot of the music we have been working on recently - a lot of the new French songs we have been developing, plus some reworking some of material from our CD. WE also had a nice quiet room to rehearse in for a couple of hours which was a real luxury (instead of worrying about the neighbours!)

The first half of the concert was a little difficult as a lot of the children were tired and excitable from the day's work and concert, and took a little time to settle. Trying to play without amplification into that environment, meant we were somewhat drowned out. But, it was good practice for us and we enjoyed what we were doing.

When we had a break, some of the teachers from the school, superb musicians each and every one, put on a concert of Russian and Greek music. Klezma is such a wonderful music form - from the exhilarating to the heart rending.

As the audience thinned out, we were left with a group of adults and children who were more keen and able to listen and so, for our second set, we were much more able to be heard and, by all accounts, everyone enjoyed what we did. We even sold a few CDs, which is nice.

The organisers looked after us wonderfully well, feeding us up during our break - so thanks to Michell, Jane, Paco and the team for a wonderful welcome and some excellent food!

We now turning our attentions to the King Harry in St. Albans on the 5th December - so, this was an excellent workout for us.

Thursday night saw us out on the road again. This time it was just up the road from St. Albans to the Cricketers Arms in Redbourne for a singers night. Again, this was a wonderfully welcoming club and when they say singers night, they really mean it. Virtually everybody that showed up for the evening brought an instrument or two and 'did a turn'. It is amazing how much talent there is around. Redbourn is a small place and there was a lot of local talent on show. We had everything from the hammer dulcimer to sprightly elderly ladies, to poetry reading - with hats.

Rob and I did pretty much the same set as in Reading and were pleased to be invited back onto the stage to finish the evening. Usually, I don't drink until I've finished playing - the first folkie to go on a diet through not drinking - so, when we were asked back on, I had had a drop of the black stuff, but it didn't seem to impair anything. We added Willy Taylor to the set to finish with a bit of a bang.

Thanks to Robert Taylor and his son Ryan for coming along and supporting us.

Thankfully it was only a short journey home to find that bowl of Crunchy Nut cornflakes and bed.

We played Reading Folk Club at the Clifton Arms in Caversham on 15th October. What a nice little club – extremely welcoming and friendly. I am pleased to say that we went down very well and they have invited us back for a full spot on 1st April next year – Hmm, interesting date – I’m pretty sure they weren’t kidding!

Topping the bill was the excellent Ed Rennie who did a great set on various melodions, and his Fylde cittern and guitar. The floor spots were highly varied and generally very good to listen to. Throughout the audience was highly appreciative.

We did four fairly quiet numbers to introduce ourselves. We warmed up with Maid of Culmore which we followed with one of burgeoning number of French songs – When I Took my Horse to Water – which received a “tres bien”. Rob was inspired on Persian Ricardo and we finished off with You Came to Me in Sunshine, written by my mate Fraser Hardman.

Joe, Mandy and young Alex, our longstanding friends from Reading came along even though they are not big fans of the genre. But Joe is the video-meister – much to his family’s dismay – and he kindly undertook to do some filming of the night. We will get this loaded up as soon as we are able and you can see us in action.

So, it was certainly a late night by the time we got home – M4/M25 and a bowl of Crunchy nut Cornflakes as a late supper reward. But we both felt pleased that we had done a good, if all too brief, session – tempered by the kind invite for us to return. It felt a good return for the hard work we are putting in at the moment. Rob is digging away at finding new tunes, we’re both enthused about the French project, and with my new birthday gift (see above) I am re-discovering a whole raft of long forgotten stuff. Very exciting. Redbourn on Thursday 19th – will report again then.

Played St Albans Folk Club tonight and were very well received. We’d spoken with organiser Alison MacFarlane a couple of weeks earlier and she’d invited us down to support the local Bedfordshire duo Life and Times. Alison played a nice mix of whistle and melodeon tunes. Life and Times, who we hadn’t met before, did a set of their contemporary songs of Bedfordshire life written in the traditional vein. They are embarked on a terrific project and we wish them well.

Given the relatively low key nature of the night, we took the opportunity to try out some new material we’ve been developing since the CD was launched. Although we started with Maid of Culmore off the album – just to get Rob’s fingers a-jiggling, we quickly moved on to a dance tune that Rob has been working on called Persian Ricardo (why does the title lend itself to a Scouse pronunciation?).

We followed up with a song we’ve taken and translated from the work of the 1970s French band Malicorne, which we are calling ‘When I Took my Horse to Water’. The reception we got encourages us both to continue with our current researches into the French traditional scene.

Then, breaking from the traditional mood of the evening, we did a song written by Paul’s mate, Fraser Hardman, when he and Paul were together at university in Scotland – in the late Jurassic period when dinosaurs roamed the land. The song is called ‘You came to me in Sunshine’ and the small but appreciative audience really loved it and talked to us a lot about it, after the performance. Indeed, a couple of tourists filmed the whole performance so, somewhere in Latin America, we could be famous by now!

Finally, we finished off with another addition to our repertoire. Taken from the Irish acapella singing trio, The Voice Squad, we did a rendition of the ballad Willy Taylor. Rob was really motoring by now and we took it at a hell of a lick, and people responded to it very well. Paul even remembered all the words.

But, the really fun part of the evening was talking with Life and Times and the audience afterwards and getting the feedback. We have had a lot of nice things said about the CD but we haven’t, to date, done a huge amount together live. The nice things said to us make us very positive about visiting the various clubs in the local area.

Risking life and limb to travel the M25 on an early Friday evening, we set off en route to deepest darkest Oxfordshire to play at Goring Unplugged. We had been told about the club by an old friend who lives in this most beautiful little town. And, like many journeys into unknown parts, there was indeed a treasure at the end of it. This is a really great little club. It meets once a month and, if you live anywhere remotely near it, you should try and find out more about it and go along.

There is lots of pressure for playing spots in this club and the standard of the musicianship is extremely high. We were honoured to be asked to end the evening - either that or the organisers just thought that it might take us until 10.30pm to actually get there.

This is an exciting and modern club. Our material was pretty much the only traditional material through the evening and was well appreciated by a sizeable audience (even though they usually get twice that number.) The music spanned everything from the superb classical arrangements of traditional tunes by the very gifted Carla Maria Zapatelli, the Texan Swing music played the learned professor Andy Baum, to some truly blistering blues played by The Smack Boys - if you see their name anywhere, you should go.

The truly great thing about the club is that they are also very accommodating to young acoustic musicians from the twon. A small group of very talented youngsters played a boisterous set and were roundly applauded for doing so.

The organisers were extremely welcoming, the venue - the Village Hall - extremely cosy, especially for a cold and wet November evening. We stuck to our recent set of a little French, a little English and a little Irish.

The only downside of the evening was, after all that fun, was setting off back around the M25. Still, Rob likes to do the driving which means that I can have a gottle of geer. (neither of us drink before playing - we must be the only folk musicians for whom playing gigs is a slimming aid.