Rob and I have been having great fun over the late summer drafting and recording a series of podcasts about our music. Doing this has brought back a host of great memories from our travels. We have now devised a format for each episode. We begin with a generic opening piece common to all episodes. We then play a verse or two of the subject song as a 'teaser'. This is followed by a 15-to-20-minute chat covering the background to the song; how and why we arranged it the way we did, what instruments and in what tunings we are playing them on the track, etc. Each episode will conclude with the song being played the whole way through.
We have now recorded and composed two podcast episodes. These relate to our songs Nellie Torrence and Jeannie Waldie and Nancy from London; one self-composed, one traditional. Further, we have now identified all the headings and broad scripting notes for us to “riff” around for three more songs, Only for Three Months, Sisters & Brothers and Companions de la Marjolene, plus the same for a very different podcast on how we go about arranging our instrumental tracks.
Given other time commitments, our preference is to get the six podcasts recorded in advance and then release them one per week, rather than release an initial episode and feel under pressure to produce and broadcast subsequent episodes to a set timetable.
On other matters, our webmaster, Derek Wheeler, has been doing sterling work over the summer on developing a new website for Na-Mara. Indeed, we hope you are reading this blogpost on the new site and trust you like what he has done. We certainly do.
Finally, we are expecting to receive the four mastered tracks for our new EP, The Roses and the Busy Bee, to be delivered soon. Exciting times.