I've been offered a 20 minute set at the Rose Theatre, Ormskirk, on April 30th, 2010 and have accepted. This is a concert being promoted by Friends of Folk. It'll be a good opportunity to play around five or six songs - some old and some new  - and simply to get out, play and have some CDs for sale. It's been many years since I've played 'live' on voice and acoustic guitar, and although initially unsure have decided to give it a go. So, there we are. More later...

Begun practising some new songs/pieces. One guitar piece is particularly difficult and sounds similar to a J.S. Bach Prelude. There are also four new songs which have emerged over the past few months. The tendency is to write a lot of songs, but there's no point if they're 'made'; the 'right' songs tend not to be synthetically produced.

I've begun working on a short set of songs among the countless other things going on at the moment. Thinking ahead, it's probably wise to begin now rather than waiting till the concert in the new year's a week or so away. This short set of songs will be completely new to a listener. Most of it's also new to me, as new songs keep arriving. Over the four days in London, a new instrumental piece (for acoustic guitar) was written which looks like being a sort of prelude of sorts to another new song. I never expected to be doing this (i.e. performing acoustic/voice for a performance), but have decided to go with it. It strikes me that gradually the classical side and the popular sides are gradually coalescing as a greater awareness grows of typological characteristics.   

Wednesday evening: a phone call and request. Q - 'Will you allow a track from First Things to be included on a compilation CD and play in a concert in early 2010?' A - 'I accept.' (More on the Diary at www.andrewkeeling.ukf.net)

First Things is now available from www.kennicolmusic.com

New album available from: www.kennicolmusic.com probably by the end of this week. Or send me a message if you can't get hold of a copy. Thanks.

Copies of First Things have been pressed-up and are ready for me to collect next weekend. They'll become available shortly after that with the album officially released at the end of June/early July, probably from Ken Nicol's (MVS) shop, from me direct and elsewhere. More soon.

Collected the CD test-pressings/artwork mock-ups from Jim at Sunday's Steeleye Span concert. (Really enjoyed Steeleye Span btw). Jim had prepared about six possible versions of the soon-to-be released album, which today were mailed to Roseanne in London for her take on the artwork (her department - not mine). Distancing oneself (i.e. standing outside it and putting oneself in a listener's position) has been the major education as far as this project goes. Also listening honestly to it all again. The best decision was to alter the title. It really is a case of 'first things'.