THERE was an important “folk moment” last week, when the new album by Eliza Carthy, entitled Big Machine, effortlessly made its way into the national album charts, a rare thing these days. Eliza, brought up in Robin Hood’s Bay, was until recently an artistic director at Gateshead’s Sage. Congratulations to her and her Wayward Band, and try and catch them in concert if you can.

Also this past week, nominees for the upcoming BBC Folk Awards were announced, but disappointingly, there are no North-East performers included, despite the wealth of talent and vibrant music scene that we have up here. The awards ceremony itself is on April 5, and will be broadcast on Radio 2 and via the “red button” TV channels.

It’s a busy week around the local venues, as ever, with a difficult choice tomorrow night between Northumbrian music at Morpeth Town Hall, with Alistair Anderson and the Border Directors, popular duo Megson at Gateshead’s Sage, and an all-star night at Sedgefield Cricket Club, featuring Broadband, Pipedream, Ray Thom, John Weighill, Bert Draycott and the John Wrightson Band.

An exciting new band called Nightfall, made up of graduates from the Newcastle Folk Degree Course, play locally at South Shields Customs House on Sunday and at Stockton’s Sun Inn on Monday, and this weekend sees us bring our month-long Pitmen Poets tour to an end, with shows at Hexham’s Queens Hall on Saturday and at Gateshead’s Sage on Sunday.

Thanks to everyone who has supported us over the last few weeks, and though it will be a long while before we get together again, watch out for all four of us doing our own thing around the local scene in the future.