Emily Barker gig

Hello again. What a busy week! Glad it's nearly Easter as I'm looking forward to a week in France that I'm hoping will be warm!

My new band 

On Sunday evening I supported Emily Barker at the Prince Albert in Stroud and it was definitely one of my favourite gigs I've ever done. All of the bands long rehearsals over the last couple of weeks had been leading up to that night and so as you would expect we were all quite excited yet slightly nervous to perform on stage together for the first time. So, when arriving for the sound check at half five to discover there wasn't enough space for us on the stage for all our guitars, amps and various bags of things that probably weren't necessary needed (eg. my a bag full of bananas and Jaffa cakes just in case I was hungry) we weren't sure what to do next! We made do though and with a help from Miles managed to fit Jack's amp under the keyboard and my bag of food was carefully hidden away under the stage! It was quite funny really as in my previous blog I mentioned how lucky it was we were small and could fit on the same stage. Aha clearly not the case on Sunday!

View from the Albert

The gig itself though was just brilliant. I really enjoyed it and the band had a good time too. The audience were really attentive and it was so busy that I had people sitting just past my microphone. I have to say though that the best part of that evening was watching Emily Barker and Gill Sandell's set for it was so moving. It took you to real highs and lows and one song you'd be tapping your feet along, just wishing you knew all the words to join in and the next minute you'd feel almost taken aback with the reality of the stories she told. I did like the stories Emily told the audience and the imagery the songs created. I think that's probably why my favourite song from her Album 'Dear River' is Letters. That wasn't my favourite song from her set though. I can't remember what my favourite song she played was called but it was the last but one and a new one so I'm now waiting for that to be recorded! Emily Barker is releasing another Album in a few weeks time called 'Toerag sessions' so watch out for that!


Yesterday we had a little Ragged moon road trip to Hereford. We were travelling to the Hereford college for the blind to do a video session for 3 of my songs. It took a couple of hours to do and was a really interesting and fun experience. The students who were helping with this did a really good job getting some great footage and gave me lots of helpful advice. It felt strange watching myself back though and I hadn't realised quite how serious I look when I sing! It was in a lovely chapel building with really cool lights, grand pianos and large cameras. I'm very excited to see how the videos turn out when they are finished!

Video shoot

The journey there and back was quite eventful. We all went in the one car and were stuck behind a tractor on the way there making us rather late! I was extremely hungry on the way back and didn't have the bag full of bananas and Jaffa cakes that time unfortunately! We stopped off at a petrol garage grabbing lots of chocolate, sandwiches and cups of coffee which we enjoyed back in the car watching the sun set over hilly Gloucestershire...

Sophronie

Photo from car