David Harley Words & Music & Pictures &…

When I was a hopeful young singer-songwriter living in the South East in the 1970s, I spent a lot of time in folk clubs in Berkshire, Hampshire and Surrey. (Especially the one I helped to run for a while, at South Hill Park in Bracknell. It seems there still is a Bracknell Folk club, though it’s now at Bagshot, apparently.)

There were some fine acts who often visited the Home Counties in those days – there still are, of course, but I’m not there to see them! – some of them sadly gone (Bill Caddick, Vin Garbutt), some still around but no longer touring.

One singer whose charm and grace I remember with much affection is Miriam Backhouse (now Miriam Erasmus), a frequent visitor to the area with a wide repertoire ranging from Baron of Brackley and The Recruited Collier to Jeremy Taylor’s Nasty Spider and a spine-tingling version of Steve Goodman’s Ballad of Penny Evans. Since she moved to South Africa, we’ve seen less of her in the UK, but she still visits quite regularly, and her next tour is scheduled for June to October 2024, with another promised for 2025. I’m crossing my fingers in the hope that someone will book her for a venue near enough for me to get to, this time, as I haven’t seen her in person since those days in Bracknell!

You can contact her for her freshly-minted 2024 press kit on her Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/MiriamBackhouseErasmus – and check out her YouTube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/@miriamerasmusbackhouseoffi230/featured

You could even check out her ‘Gypsy Without A Road’ CD at https://www.motherearthmusic.co.uk/project/miriam-backhouse/ – it’s rather good!