Well... 2019 has gotten off to an amazing start. Firstly, Tamworth Country Music Festival kicked us off in January and how can you possible have a bad year when it starts like that? I had my first official red carpet appearance at the Golden Guitar Awards, played all bar one day of the festival at a number of amazing venues and met a whole lot of new fans and faces around peel st... Except for the horse that sent me running a few times as it walked around Peel St, due to my being anaphylactic to them, they were all very welcome encounters. This brings me to an important point. I have moved back home to the coast, purely because i was getting very sensitive to the horse exposure and beginning to react to horse on peoples clothes. It causes my throat to swell and airways to close up so it is safer and a lot less scary on the coast. But of course, singing country music means I will continue to be out and about in Country towns. I would like to just ask you all to be aware of this and if you do have horses of your own, make sure you get changed before coming to say hi :) Otherwise I do have an Epipen in my bag... though I would very much rather not use it. In January, I also had a birthday and ran the Rally for Ric benefit concert to raise money to assist a very good friend of mine through her, and her familys, battle with a brain tumour. It was an amazing event where 800 people turned up from all walks of life and together we have raised over $55,000. Ontop of this the local builders were able to build an extension onto the families home to accommodate a wheelchair friendly bathroom, access ramps and a walk in robe. Talk about Pay It Forward...what a great example.
The next very exciting, life altering thing that 2019 brought my way was my wedding! I got Married in March and went on a week long honeymoon to Fiji. I am so lucky to have someone who supports and loves me day in and day out. The whole wedding day was just perfect and I am still getting used to hearing 'my wife' and saying 'my husband'. But I love it.
In March, I also had the pleasure of supporting Wendy Matthews for the second time when she toured through Laurieton. This was such a great night and I truly hope I get the opportunity to do that again and again.
In April, Aaron and I headed over to Nashville with my producer Matt Fell to record the first 5 songs that will go on my second album. This was an incredible experience brought about by a mystery box that was given to me as payment for a private function I played at in Inverell. You may remember, I was given two return tickets to Nashville! Well, we have finally gotten to put them to good use. The recording experience in Nashville was incredible. The session musicians over there are just amazing and seeing the songs grow from little acoustic tunes to fully fledged musical beauties infront of me was amazing.
That brings us up to last week. I headed south to Newcastle where I had the pleasure of playing at the Scullion Sessions with Matt Scullion himself and Anna Smyrk at the Stag & Hunter. This was followed by a day of co writing with Matt and a trip to the Blue Mountains to write with Drew McAlister. I returned home in time to play at the Kew Country Music Festival yesterday. It was the first time this festival has been held and it had a great turn out. I can' t wait to see what its first birthday next year will bring!
That about sums up my year so far. Its not much in words but Gee its been jam packed with some really invaluable moments. I hope that life is treating you well and 2019 has so far been as friendly to you as it has to me.
Until the next update, stay safe, happy and healthy. Come and say hi whenever possible and I look forward to sharing the new songs with you very soon.
Love and Lyrics as always
Emm