Live Music Sarah McQuaid

Born in Spain to a Spanish father and American mother, Sarah grew up in Chicago, touring the US and Canada as a member of The Chicago Childrens Choir. In the mid-1990s she made her way to Ireland, where her authorship of The Irish DADGAD Guitar Book led to invitations to write regular music columns and reviews for Hot Press magazine and Dublins Evening Herald. Following her move in 2007 (with her Irish husband and their two children) to Cornwall, she swiftly struck up a friendship with a fellow mum outside the gates of their childrens school. That fellow mum turned out to be Zo Pollock, writer and performer of 1991 UK Top 5 single Sunshine On A Rainy Day. The pair soon found themselves co-writing songs for an album released in 2008 under the band name Mama, lauded by MOJOs Colin Irwin as a pleasingly maverick mix and by The Irish Times as Janis Joplins freewheeling spirit crossed with Joni Mitchell's lyrical density. I owe Zo a massive debt of gratitude for getting me into songwriting in a serious way, says Sarah. Prior to that Id thought of myself basically as a folksinger who happened to write an occasional song, but through working with Zo I not only learned a hell of a lot about the craft of songwriting, but also just the fact of someone of her calibre wanting to co-write with me was what finally gave me the confidence to start focusing on my own original material. And of course, if it werent for Zo Id never have met Martin Martin Stansbury, a longtime collaborator and former bandmate of Zos who produced and engineered the Mama album, then became Sarahs manager and sound engineer, accompanying her on all her tours worldwide since 2009. Sarah will be singing and promoting her live album, The St Buryan Sessions, recorded live in lockdown in the beautiful medieval church of St Buryan, just over a mile from Sarahs home.