Dear all,
It’s just a shade over two weeks til I return to Canada! Exciting stuff. Working with Meaghan Blanchard on two previous tours was an absolute joy and it will be great to collaborate with her once again. We were paired up by English Folk, Dance and Song Society and Music PEI to work together out in Canada in September 2013 then Meaghan came over here in November last year. The giglist is as follows:
| 11 Jun 2015 08:00 pm |
with Meaghan Blanchard | House Concert, Dieppe, NB, Canada |
| 12 Jun 2015 08:00 pm |
with Meaghan Blanchard | House Concert, Sackville, NB, Canada |
| 13 Jun 2015 08:00 pm |
with Meaghan Blanchard | House Concert, Dartmouth, NS, Canada |
| 16 Jun 2015 08:00 pm |
with Meaghan Blanchard | Company House, Halifax, NS, Canada |
| 17 Jun 2015 08:00 pm |
with Meaghan Blanchard | Roots and Soul Room, Frederiction, NB, Canada |
| 18 Jun 2015 08:00 pm |
with Meaghan Blanchard | Magnolia Cafe, Saint John, NB, Canada |
| 19 Jun 2015 – 21 Jun 2015 07:30 pm |
Solo | Small Halls Festival, PEI, Canada |
So exciting stuff! Norway, France, Belgium, Germany, USA and Denmark also await before the end of the year. Dashed exhausting really! Exciting times of course though. My I’m using some very short sentences today.
Anyway a couple of gigs to tell you about. First up UFQ were at Alexander’s in Chester which was a whole load of fun at a really cracking venue full of very lovely people. I did manage to break two strings in one gig which was a first and playing about 80% of a very long and complicated tune set on a guitar with a string missing was kind of interesting but hopefully I got away with it. Fortunately the other string didn’t break til the last note of the gig….then came Fishguard Folk Festival and this year we made it! Last year’s missing of that gig was one of the most horrendous days ever and the feeling of missing a gig was really not a nice one. So it was great we made it…
It was however a bit of a surprise when after the opening act had finished we came on and my guitar was no longer plugged into anything therefore when I changed from banjo to guitar mid track nothing came out. Still Joe was on hand to balance his fiddle and bow on his chin while the guitar problem was sorted! Lovely audience anyway just as I remember from my solo gig there a few years ago. Joe and Paloma drove back to Birmingham after the gig to get back to their lovely baby daughter but Tom and I stayed in a hotel near the town. This was fine and we’d checked in during the afternoon and all was well. Tom was in room 9 and I was in room 2…
Then we got back from the gig at around 11 and decided it might be nice to have a little drink or two and a chat about the gig as is customary when we stay in hotels. So we parked up outside Tom’s room and he turned the lock and opened the door…and was then a little surprised that the door appeared to collide with a person who emitted a rather startled noise. She like us was somewhat surprised. Anyway, she came to the door and said ‘what are you doing here, I’m in room 9, look, and showed us her key’. Tom did the same. The hotel had rather wisely moved us all since we checked in…but didn’t tell anyone. So it turned out Tom and I were now in rooms 1 and 5 respectively. It was quite eventful.