There was a time when getting your music “out there” meant something very physical. You had to make a CD. Or a tape, if we are going back far enough and trying not to think about how old that makes us feel. You needed something that could be held, copied, posted, handed to someone at […]

There is a strange kind of faith involved in continuing to make music when very little evidence suggests that you should. Not religious faith, necessarily. Not even confidence. Confidence would suggest that you know where it is all going, that you can see some kind of reward waiting in the distance. Most independent musicians do […]

Last Saturday night I had the immense pleasure of hosting the 5th Songwriter Evening in my local village hall. Songwriter Evening was set up to be a place devoted to listening to songwriters in a lovely building in front of an audience that came to listen, not to chat, order drinks or spend half the […]

There was a time when the phrase “home studio” sounded far grander than the reality. In my case, it meant a room in the house, a computer, Cubase, a microphone, a keyboard, a pair of headphones, some speakers and enough cables to make the back of the desk look like an unsolved crime scene. Oh, […]

No, I’m not leaving home, this is all the equipment I take to run a Songwriter Evening at the village hall 400 yards from where I live. I never realised when I decided to start Songwriter Evening that I would have to turn into removal man. All this will get loaded into my car and […]

Paul McCartney hardly needs any promotion from me, but that hasn’t stopped this album being promoted literally everywhere. There’s been wall to wall coverage of it, McCartney has popped up on podcasts, YouTube and TV shows around the world so I bet there’s very few people who have any interest in music who are unaware […]

Great songs deserve great sound — and at Songwriter Evening, sound is a vital part of the experience. The live sound is controlled by Jermaine Nelson-Williams, a graduate-trained sound engineer with more than 20 years’ experience. Jermaine brings technical skill, musical understanding and calm professionalism to every event, making sure each performance is heard clearly, […]