On-line concerts coming up…
Jez’s second on-line concert starts at 8.30pm , this coming Thursday, July 9th, on his Facebook page. He’s also been asked to contribute pre-recorded concert sets for Sidmouth Folk Festival and Whitby Folk Festival, and will then be doing a full two-set gig on line for Oxford Folk festival, scheduled for September 16th at 8pm… Meanwhile, he somewhat obliquely referred to his current recording exploits in a Twitter post last week. It sounds like recording sessions are happening right now, following Musicians Union guidance about studio restrictions as UK lock-down rules are loosening… A somewhat unexpected cover-version has shown up, from a band called Jury Service, who are based in Canada. It’s a version of a song called THE DARWIN WALK, which Jez wrote for the Shrewsbury Festival Darwin Project more than a decade ago. The song was not included on the Darwin Project CD that was released at the time, though it did show up in the now-deleted DVD of the concert, as the encore. Jez apparently wrote a verse and chorus to the song, then asked all the other participants in the project to contribute a verse of their own to match the one that he’d done. The result was a big success, and there was quite a lot of disappointment when the song was left off the CD. Publishing problems were cited at the time. It now seems that this Canadian band has reworked the song with Jez’s original verse and some new ones of their own. More details on that when we get them… Jez still has some UK dates scheduled for September, though it’s doubtful whether they will actually take place. Some promoters have asked him to hold on to these dates until clarification of restrictions in the UK. His concerts that were lined up in America in October are pretty well definitely not going ahead… There’s been mention of Jez’s 2004 DVD release, “Sight Rhymes” being available again. It’s long been sold-out, but was a big seller in its day. It seems that some copies have emerged from America, mainly in the NTSC format, though a few in PAL format have also turned up. Drop us a line if you’re interested in purchasing one, but be quick… There’s another great review of Jez’s second novel, “The Corly Croons”, this time in the Princeton Libraries Review. A follow-up adventure for Mr. Piper is earnestly requested!