22nd February - Return to Cambridge

After a period of rehearsal and holidays, it was good to be back on the road as na-mara. Although we have a support slot coming up in Cambridge in the not too distant future, we took no persuading to accept the invitation to come and join the regular singers night at the Cambridge Folk Club. We are always very well received and looked after there -so the hours trip is always made very worthwhile.

As we have come to expect at Cambridge, there was a full night of highly talented performers (Andrew Noyes from Coupe de Gras, Cruel Folk, the Ooze Brothers, The Free Range Chickens and many more) and I'm pleased to report that we acquitted ourselves well and the first public outing of our new song Solo Por Tres Meses was very warmly and sympathetically received.

Things will start to pick up gig-wise. We are at Reading Folk Club next Sunday - which will be a welcome return to another very friendly club. The full details of future na-mara bookings are on our My Space site at www.myspace.com/namaramusic

But we also remain very active with our great friends in Tam Lin. Barn dances, a forthcoming folk club booking in Birmingham and even a 'ho-down' last weekend are keeping the callouses hard on the fingers and the eye-lids heavy in the morning. All great fun.

In the studio, January 20th

Bookings-wise, January is relatively quiet and Rob and I have been concentrating on moving some new material forwards. Our good friend Bob Kidby, who we have known for many years, kindly offered to act as recording technician for the day - rather than be the superb jazz guitarist he is - and record some of our new material. We also asked our friend Tony Garritty to come and help us out on a few tracks with the bodhran. Many thanks to Bob and Tony for al they did to help us; we are over the moon with the output.

The plan is to take the material from what was a very productive and fun day with Bob and Tony and, with some other material recorded last summer in St Albans, put together a small promotional EP which we can send to clubs and give to friends. Our good friends at Rightback Records are going to do the artwork. The material is also being put on our myspace site at www.myspace.com/namaramusic for those who would like an immediate listen.