Biography

Mary started singing in Manchester folk clubs over forty years ago when an undergraduate at Manchester University. During the ensuing years she has built up an extensive repertoire of traditional English song, much of which is unique to her. Many of her songs are ballads which she has compiled from extant oral and literary sources. She also has many lyrical songs which she accompanies with concertina or banjo.

Although Mary was born and educated in Wales, she lived and sang for many years in the Manchester region, with a brief excursion to Hull in the early 1970s.

She ran the university folk club during most of her three years in Manchester as a student, was a member of a critics group modelled on Ewan McColl's London Critics Group and was a resident at Harry Boardman's Unicorn Folk Club from 1985 until its demise in the late 1990s.

With Harry Boardman and others she took part in a series of BBC North West radio programmes called "Ballads of Occupation" which were inspired by Ewan McColl's Radio Ballads. Mark Dowding has put the details on his website. Ballads of Occupation . If you scroll to the bottom of the page you can find out more about the recordings.

In 1988 Mary moved to West Yorkshire to join Ryburn Three Step where she was a resident singer at the folk club and often played for the longsword dance team and took part in a regular English traditional music session at the Bridge Inn, Ripponden.

From mid 2001 she has been living in East Anglia and working with Anahata on song and tune arrangements with a wider variety of instruments. Anahata accompanies her singing on cello, pipes, melodeon or Anglo concertina.

They have their own web site. Mary has been researching songs collected in Cambridgeshire and has recently produced an award-winning book.

Mary and Anahata were part of the Martyn Wyndham-Read Song Links Project, singing at the launch of Song Links 1 in Sidmouth and recorded two tracks on the Song Links 2 CD launched at Cecil Sharp House in London.

Mary and Anahata were regular visitors to The National Folk Festival at Sutton Bonington and were at the last of these in 2005.

In 2005 they were guests at several festivals:Chippenham, Holmfirth, Broadstairs and Whitby.

In 2006 they were at Cornwall and Sidmouth.

In 2007 they performed at Chippenham, Sidmouth, Dartmoor, Bideford, Whitby and Shrewsbury Festivals.

In 2008 they performed at Chester Folk Festival, Saddleworth and Shrewsbury.

In 2009 Mary worked with Chris Coe in conjunction with East Anglian Traditional Music Trust and the Cambridge Music Festival to produce a series of workshops for children in local schools based on local folksongs.

In 2010 Mary & Anahata ran a Fenland Tunes Workshop at Gleanings Rural Studies Centre, and performed at festivals at Belper, Sidmouth, Whitby and the EATMT Traditional Music Day.

In 2011 Mary & Anahata performed at festivals at Teignmouth, Chippenham, Whitby, Tenterden and the EATMT Melodeons and More Day. They also toured various venues in Canada culminating in the Mill Race Festival at Cambridge Ontario,

In 2012 Mary gave a series of lessons at Chesterton Community College in Cambridge teaching traditional Cambridgeshire song and dance to pupils in Year 8. A demonstration including a dance devised by the pupils was given at the Folk Museum in Cambridge. In addition to their many club appearances, Mary & Anahata performed this year at festivals in Ely, Folk East ( Somerleyton Hall near Lowestoft ), and Sidmouth ( with Nick & Mary's Big Band Workshop ).

Next year Mary & Anahata are planning on going back to Canada to perform at Mill Race.