LAST weekend’s Helmsley Folk Festival was a great success, both on the formal concert stage and in the informal music and singing sessions, and the Arts Centre proved to be the ideal place for a small event like this.

There’ll be other one-off folk concerts happening at this venue across the rest of the year, so I’ll try to keep you informed about them.

Meanwhile, things kick off locally tonight with a choice between Marie Little at Darlington Arts Centre, Wendy Arrowsmith at The Beaconsfield in Barnard Castle, and Tich Frier at Skelton’s Duke William. On Saturday, the Swaledale Outward Bound Club in Richmond present their homage to the outstanding work of local songwriter Graeme Miles, with The Songs of Ironopolis, while over at Washington’s Davy Lamp, the legendary Irish balladeer Andy Irvine makes a rare local solo appearance.

Dave Hardy returns to the region’s club scene this week, with gigs at Guisborough Rugby Club on Sunday and Darlington’s Britannia on Tuesday, while on Monday, Sarah McQuaid makes a much anticipated debut at Stockton’s Sun Inn. A few weeks ago I mentioned that I’d been treated to a preview of the BBC programme Songwriters Circle, featuring Richard Thompson, Loudon Wainwright and Suzanne Vega. Well, the show airs tomorrow on BBC 4 at 10pm, with lots of other singersongwriter features before and after it, and is well worth watching. There are three other programmes coming up in this slot in the weeks to come. Finally, the CD of the All Along the Wall project, in which I was involved earlier this year, has just been released by Fellside Records.

It’s a collection of new songs inspired by Hadrian’s Wall, written and performed by Julie Matthews, Rory MacLeod, Boo Hewardine, Ruth Notman and myself, along with poets Elvis MacGonnigal and Kate Fox. An eclectic mix, we also hope to be presenting some live shows based on the songs early next year, so watch out for that.