It was such a joy to find myself back at the wonderful Gaunts House near Wimborne at the weekend.  I’ve played there a couple of times before and every time wish I could stay longer.  The huge house and gardens are used for spiritual retreats and the peaceful atmosphere and lovely people who run it make it a very special place indeed.  Jody and I performed in their beautiful ballroom.  Thanks to everyone who came to hear us play.  I hope to come back there next year.  Thanks to Mike Watts you can now watch one of the songs I sang  (‘About Everything’ from my album ‘A Light To Follow’) on my YouTube channel.  Click here to see it.

I’m looking forward to another London gig next month (Sunday 22 June), this time returning to Twickfolk in Twickenham where I’ve played before.  Tickets are on sale now.  If you can make it, it would be great to see you there.

Thanks to everyone who came to my gig in the basement bar of Green Note in Camden last week and to Folk & Roots for promoting my second sold-out London show.  I’m now going to be playing the main room at Green Note in November this year – tickets are on sale now.

Photo: Mike Watts

Bath is starting to feel like south-east Queensland – the sun shining every day.  But here it’s spring not autumn, and I see the blossom on the trees and hear the wood pigeon outside my window every morning.  I am so glad to be here.  Considering the months in 2023 when that wasn’t the case, I’m feeling particularly blessed right now.

The avalanche of songs I was writing in January has stopped but I’ve been touring with my friend Jody, singing and playing and meeting such lovely people.  There are so many times when things have been hard and I’ve wondered why I do this work but then I get messages that mean the world to me, like the beautiful poem I received this morning from someone who saw me in Wiveliscombe at the weekend.  He made my day.

So slowly but surely I’m starting to rebuild my confidence and am really looking forward to the public gigs and private house concerts I’ll be doing in the next few months.  Thanks so much to Louise in Exeter and Ian in Wiveliscombe for hosting us last weekend.  If you would like me to come and perform in your living room or local village hall, please get in touch.

I’m doing public gigs in Birmingham then Bradford-on-Avon next week, followed by Camden in London the week after.  If you’re free and in the area, it would be great to meet you too.

I hope the sun is shining where you are and all’s well in your world.

xx

I had such a great time singing my songs unplugged in the basement of a hairdressers in Soho last week with Jody doing a fantastic opening set.  Organised by Folk & Roots in the tradition of unplugged folk gigs, the room was packed.  I’m looking forward to my next London gig in Camden at Green Note (check my gigs page for the ticket link).

Thanks to everyone who came to my gig at Sandy Hill Arts last night – I had such a great time and a huge relief as you can probably tell from this stream-of-consciousness poem I wrote the week before about my performance anxiety…

If I was a bit wiser
I would say hold onto
Yourself, there is
No need for the
Knife, the rope,
Such crisis, such
Catastrophising and
Yet on the night
I find I’m standing
Tall and when I
Open my mouth
A sweeter sound
Comes out and perhaps
None of those faces
Watching me are
Seeing the survivor
The angst, the anxiety
That leaves me
Crippled, strung up
Like a Christmas turkey
Unable to think
Clearly, see clearly
Understand that
In the grand scheme
Of things, singing
Songs is not life-
Threatening, it is
What it is
A moment of clarity
The chance to uplift
Comfort and inspire
A moment to realise
My own courage
No guns, no bombs
Just me and a guitar.

Yesterday I went swimming for the first time since my kidney operation at the beginning of December.  I only managed 10 lengths but it was bliss.  I’ll have a scan in June to find out if the operation has been a success.

The rest and recovery time went okay and I had a lovely Christmas with a friend at home and then on New Year’s Eve I had no internet so I decided to try writing a song (I had only written one song since my arrival from Australia in April 2023).  I have now written 25 new songs in the 3 weeks since then.  It feels like the glacier inside has turned into a waterfall.

I’ve started doing my singing practice again and am getting ready for my gigs which are starting next month with a public concert at Sandy Hill Arts, Corfe Castle in Dorset (22 Feb).  I’ll be touring with my neighbour and friend, the fantastic singer-songwriter and acoustic guitarist Jody Prewett.

I’m now booked up until July, mostly with private house concerts, but please check my website gigs page to see what public gigs I’m doing and please spread the word if you have friends locally.  And if you know a friend with a living room that can fit 10 people or more, or a retirement community who might enjoy my songs or even that you might be willing to help me host a gig at your local village hall, please do get in touch and we can make a date for later this year.

I hope all’s well in your world.

xx

Feeling rather daunted by the prospect of 3 robots cutting up my left kidney in Southmead Hospital at 8.30 tomorrow morning, I am instead focusing on the absolute delight of rediscovering comic duo Flanders and Swann.

My grandparents had their seminal live recording ‘At The Drop Of A Hat’.  Donald Swann wrote the music and played the piano, while Michael Flanders (who was in a wheelchair due to polio) wrote the lyrics and was the compere.

I remembered them the other day while having Sunday lunch in Bath with the famous (and infamous) producer/composer/arranger/engineer David Lord who has been recording my vocals for my next album.

Of course I looked them up on Spotify and found them immediately (Spotify, all is forgiven :).  David then said he’d known Donald Swann back in the day which I have to say impressed me more than any of his other claims to fame.

Anyway if you need cheering up, check out ‘At The Drop Of A Hat’, particularly the first track ‘A Transport of Delight’, ‘The Gnu Song’, ‘Design For Living’, ‘The Reluctant Cannibal’, ‘Madeira, M’Dear’ and also ‘A Song of the Weather’ (appropriate this time of year).

Hope all’s well in your world.

xx

I love Spotify.  Listening to music on it in the past 20 months has saved my life –  literally (mainly thanks to playlists from my friend Ecki who I wrote about in my previous blog today).

But today I remembered why I also hate Spotify… I received my ‘2024 Wrapped For Artists’ email.

The summary?

28,000 streams by over 4,000 listeners in 94 countries this year.

How much money have I been paid for that?

Basically sweet FA.

Fans are always wide-eyed and horrified when I tell them that not a penny from their Spotify premium is coming my way.  Rather that the major record labels are the ones making a killing.

Fortunately I’m not making music for money.  I make music to hopefully make other people feel better, and that makes me feel better.  Worth it every time someone listens to one of my songs on Spotify.  So please keep listening, but just be wise to the BS that I’m being paid for it.

If you want to support my music apart from coming to my gigs, please head to https://emilymaguire.bandcamp.com/

xx

Having listened to these songs about a million times, I thought it was about time I told you all about the White Star Bulb Company.

The man hiding behind the White Star Bulb Company is actually one of my oldest and dearest friends Richard Ecclestone, otherwise known as Ecki, who in his day job as a professional photographer has taken nearly all the shots for my album covers and other promo material, including the one you’re looking at now on my website.

But aside from being a brilliant rock’n’roll photographer – see https://richardecclestone.com/ – Ecki writes, sings and produces the most stunning songs.

Some of you might have been lucky enough to see him open for me at The Junction in Cambridge and a few other places years ago.  He point blank refuses to play live these days (he is incredibly stubborn) so he makes incredibly beautiful albums and puts them out into the digital stratosphere where, not having the funds for pluggers and publicists, they disappear.

As he’s produced so many brilliant albums, just to help you out I’m giving you my top 6 favourite songs (all on Spotify and everywhere else), which I listen to on repeat and are actually the only songs I’ve ever wanted to cover and hopefully will next year when I’m mentally well enough to catch a train to Bury St Edmunds…

‘Rare Sun’
‘Save You’
‘Radar’
‘Under the Dust’
‘Somewhere Beneath’
‘I Can’t Sing That Song Anymore’

xx

Many of my songs are inspired by the lives of other people. Sometimes it’s people I know, sometimes it’s people I don’t.

In 2011, I saw a photograph of a woman called Melanie Reid on the cover of The Times Magazine.  She was standing up, locked into some kind of exo-skeleton, holding onto metal bars in the spinal injuries unit of a hospital in Glasgow.

The photograph and its accompanying article by Melanie moved me so deeply I immediately wanted to write about it.  I started to think of some kind of analogy and the first thing that came to mind was that of a bird inside a cage.

In the article, Melanie had mentioned very briefly her husband Dave. The second half of the song is his voice. I hope he didn’t think me too presumptuous in imagining it.

When the song was finished my manager sent it to Melanie, who gave it her blessing and so it became the title track of my fourth album. I was absolutely delighted when she called it her ‘candle in the wind moment’ in her column published on the day the album was released.

Melanie’s incredibly inspiring, moving and final ‘Spinal Column’ for The Times Magazine was published today.  She says she will continue writing.  I can’t wait to read what she writes next.

If you would like to hear the song, it’s here on my website and also on Spotify and other digital music platforms.

xx