playing in Ireland

Taurus's birthday's

Where I'm playing this week:
Tottenham Court Road Tube on Friday the 25th at 10pm
Leister Square Tube on Saturday at 2pm

This is a special week for me, its a Taurus birthday week when both my sister Jacqui and my mum Toni were born. First of all i would like to sing happy birthday to my sister Jacqui whose birthday it is today. She has been an amazing support, and loving sister and friend to me all my life. So Happy Birthday sis.

You know I would like to tell you a bit about my mum, as she was the kind of person who never told anyone about herself she always let others talk. Its been eighteen years now since she passed away but i still think of her almost every day. When Mum was there, everyone always felt so special in her presence, because she really listened to what people had to say and she always responded with compassion, with something very beautiful and positive.

My mum had a beautiful voice, it was kind of operatic and when I was a young teenager I have to admit I was a little embarassed about it because it was so loud you could hear it right across the cut-away (NZ expression for field separating two streets). She also loved poetry and she collected poems she loved. One of my most fond memories was when she would sing my sisters and I to sleep at night. I still remember the songs she sang, they were devotional, in this case they were Christain songs, she also sang traditional African American spirituals, Like "Hush Little Baby dont you cry". This is where my spiritual life began, and my love for devotional music.
She passed away with cancer, but she never left me, she has remained with me in the form of song and sculpture and a feeling of what it means to love deeply, keeping the family together, I mean both small and universal family. She was my first guru, my first love, and my first friend on this earth. Here's a poem she wrote

To watch the sky smiling on the lone but not lonely soul
To give thanks for such peace so hard to find
and so little time these days to enjoy
I pray that I will alway be free,
free to think, to feel and to speak and to love

Toni