May 26th – Pitmen Poets, Bad Pennies festival shows…

Jez plays solo at Chippenham Folk Festival in Wiltshire this coming Sunday, and then sticks around for a rare South of England appearance with The Pitmen Poets at the same festival on Monday. It’s the first of several UK festival shows by the quartet this summer. He then heads north to Merseyside for next weekend’s show with The Bad Pennies at Folk on the Coast at Ellesmere Port on the Wirral. Then the Poets will be doing a one-off as a three piece for the Miners Picnic at Woodhorn Museum in Northumberland on June 11th, as Billy Mitchell is unable to be with them for that show… Jez is back in the studio on June 7th for more recording for the current Radio Ballads series, “The Ballad of the Great War”. This may include more of the writing collaboration with John Tams on the opening and closing songs for the 1916 programme, due to be broadcast in November during Armistice Day weekend… Tantalising hints popped up on Twitter last week, that Jez is also writing in collaboration with Steve Tilston. Their set at Doncaster Festival last weekend didn’t include any new songs, and was more of a shared “greatest hits” set of songs, as has been the case on all their joint shows so far. Perhaps all that is to change in the near future? We’ll see… Badapple Theatre’s production of The Thankful Village has just come to a close at the end of its current tour. The six-track EP of Jez’s songs from the play, which was a huge hit with audiences across the UK,  is still available from Jez at gigs and from this website. The play itself is in great demand, and will likely be touring again next year.