Emily’s gig at Berkelouw Books in Eumundi on Friday 18 March, featuring songs and poetry readings from her latest collection ‘Words With Wings’, has sold out. We will be booking another poetry and song date at Berkelouw for later in the year. If you missed out on tickets this time, please join Emily’s mailing list and she will let you know about future dates.
At the start of last year, my old friend Franz Novotny asked if I could contribute some content to an online Buddhist radio station he was setting up. I decided to make a series of half-hour programmes to tell some of the stories behind the songs on my five studio albums.
Many months later, after managing to overcome all the technical hurdles and wade through all the red tape, Diamond Sky Radio was up and running and on Christmas Day, the first of my five programmes, called ‘Songs and Stories’, was broadcast.
You can hear me talking about how I started writing songs, my stagefright, being cured of fibromyalgia, why I became a Buddhist, what happened the first time I was sectioned, how I write songs, falling in love in the Australian bush, living in a recycled shack, becoming a cheesemaker, how I met Don McLean, the story behind the making of ‘Believer’, writing ‘Woke Up’ for Greenpeace, why I published ‘Start Over Again’, my lifelong passion for Bach and Bob Marley, the miscarriage that inspired ‘Banks of the Acheron’, overcoming writer’s block, and surviving life on the bipolar rollercoaster all these years.
And in between the talking, I play the tracks I’ve chosen from each album.
Here is a link to all the programmes so you can listen again if you missed them. I hope you enjoy them.
https://emilymaguire.com/songs-and-stories/
xx
Emily’s series of programmes ‘Songs and Stories’ recently broadcast on Buddhist radio station Diamond Sky Radio are now all available to listen again. Click here to play the five episodes of Emily telling the stories behind the songs on her five studio albums.
Tickets are now on sale for Emily’s tour of south Queensland in April/May 2022. She will be performing as a duo with her husband and bass player Christian Dunham at six halls across the region. Details and booking links for all these shows can be found on her gigs page.
I could not let this day go by without expressing my gratitude for the life of Thich Nhat Hanh and the incredible blessing that he was for so many people.
Tickets are now on sale for Emily’s gig at Berkelouw Books in Eumundi on Friday 18 March to celebrate the publication of her latest poetry collection ‘Words With Wings’. The intimate evening will include poetry readings from the book and acoustic songs on guitar and double-bass. There will be a short Q&A at the end. Click here for more information.
Places are very limited so please book early to avoid disappointment. Tickets are $20/$15 concessions. All tickets will be refunded in the event of a cancellation due to Covid.
I am really looking forward to singing my songs and reading poems from my new book ‘Words With Wings’ at the wonderful Berkelouw bookshop in Eumundi on Friday 18 March.
When my last poetry book ‘Meditation Mind’ came out in 2018, my husband Christian and I toured bookshops and Buddhist centres in the UK, performing a mix of songs and poetry readings. It worked so well and we loved doing it so I’m delighted that Berkelouw Books in Eumundi have agreed to host an evening to celebrate the publication of ‘Words With Wings’.
This will be an intimate gig with places limited due to the space so please book soon if you would like to be there. There will be a short Q&A at the end. Tickets are $20/$15 concessions. All tickets will be refunded in the event of a cancellation due to Covid. Please click here if you would like more information about the event.
I can’t write songs at the moment. I sit at my keyboard, play a chord and nothing inspires me. But that’s ok, it’ll come back. I’ve had writer’s block enough times to know it is impermanent like everything else. So I’ve started writing poems again, one a day after my morning meditation practice.
This morning it is stormy here in the Australian bush, the wind blowing the rain sideways. We’ve had so much rain the grass grows tall and so green it hurts your eyes to look at it. In the evenings the wallabies come to graze. They don’t seem to mind us.
The start of January is always a difficult time for me after the high of Christmas (yes I am like a small child). It’s hard to get going again, to get focused. But I have a new album to finish that is five years in the making and now at last we can see the end in sight. I have a new book to publish and an album of instrumental cello music to record. And a tour of south-east Queensland to promote.
All these are my reasons for being, reasons to stave off the black dog snapping at my heels. We are all stressed, we are all anxious about what will happen next. I hope 2022 will see the end of the pandemic and I will be able to travel to see my family again for the first time in over 2 years. I miss them more than they know.
But my life is here, in the bush, with the trees and the wallabies and the mist that comes creeping down the Obi Obi valley at dawn. I know why I am here and what it is I must do. To sing songs to people, to compose music, to write poems, to play my part in this crazy world we live in. Hope is a potent elixir. So I sit at my keyboard, play a chord and wait for inspiration to come…
Yesterday I went to Caboolture Hospital and sang some of my songs for patients and staff in their mental health facilities. Also performing were the Mindfulness Poet Brendan O’Shea, Cardie Boydell who did an incredible rendition of Nina Simone’s ‘Feeling Good’, Cecelia Scahill who organised the event and sang backing vocals and singer-songwriter Kaycee Morgan who is a peer support worker there and has the most beautiful voice.
I am passionate about the benefits of music for mental health and I used to do a lot of gigs in mental health hospitals in the UK. I hope I will be able to do more here in Australia.
In other news, I am delighted to be performing on New Year’s Eve at Bushtime, the wonderful summer camp organised by Woodfordia who run Woodford Folk Festival on the same site. I’ll be on the Troubadour stage with Christian at 4pm. The perfect way to see out the year. Tickets are on sale now.
Hope all’s well in your world.
xx
Emily is playing Bushtime, an inspired camping holiday held on a 500-acre parkland, run by the people behind Woodford Folk Festival. Emily will be performing with her husband Christian on the Troubadour stage at 4pm on Friday 31st December. Tickets for the summer camp are on sale now.