Some people knit, do their gardens or spend hours in clothes shops. I can’t knit for toffee, manage to kill more plants than nurture, and would rather spend time and money in a book shop than buy a dress. Sorry, but that’s me.

Anyway, I do like to sing, to fiddle about on my guitar or my piano, and write songs and would much rather be doing that than anything else when not working on stories.

I’ve been writing songs since Lord knows when. Sometimes the songs are tied in with school visits and working with primary aged children. The songs can be about mini-beasts, or brick trains, about Romans or Egyptians. Anything really. While in schools I like to invite pupils to work in groups and produce more verses to a song I’ve started. It’s good fun, we all learn something new about rhyme and rhythm, and enjoy singing the song we’ve made together.

At other times the songs are just for me. They tell might tell stories, they might make a comment about life, they might be love songs. Who can tell what’s going to happen until the first draft’s finished? Not me, certainly. Maybe that’s what’s so exciting about song-writing. That unknown element.

Having other people around me who are much better musicians than I could ever be, is pretty useful. I can take my songs and ideas to them and see what happens next.

What happens next is sometimes a recording. My first album, No Deals, No Promises came out in 2007 and it was such fun going into a recording studio and having some of my words and tunes made into something to be proud of, by people who know how to make that happen. Those people, Colin Bradshaw, Tony Davis, Stuart Hardy, Jim Hornsby, Doug Morgan, Mike Swindale and Rob Tickell, are still speaking to me, so obviously, it wasn’t all bad. Anyway if you want to listen to some of that, give it a go

No Deals No Promises

The second album Terms and Conditions will be out in a few months time and that’s the result of three of us working together, to produce new songs. Writing like that can be tricky, but we’re all delighted with the end product. And still like each other. So that’s all right too. By the way the other team members are Colin Bradshaw and Tony Schofield.

We’ve got all sorts of things to complete before the album comes out, but once again, if you want to have a listen when it’s available, please do. There are more details about making that album later.

I’ve sung in a quite a few bands over the years and the current outfit is so new we’re only just going out to do gigs. We’re called Keeping Company with Celia Bryce. We’ll be playing stuff off both albums as well as songs we’ve always loved performing, and new songs by friends who are song writers. There’ll be updates on where we’ll be and when, on this page.

There’s some more info on Keeping Company, which has been put together by Colin Bradshaw, so read on.