Shar Baby in the UK – end of tour

Shar-Baby Newport returns to the U.S. today after a successful first tour of the U.K. In the last few weeks she and her husband Jim have met, and I quote, “a whole lotta wonderful people out there” and they have both asked us to thank everybody for making them feel so welcome and for listening to Shar’s music.

Everyone at Digitdoc Records would like to thank Shar for coming over and treating us to some real blues. It has also been our great pleasure and privilege to know Shar and Jim on a personal basis – two of the nicest, most honest people we would ever care to meet.

Many thanks to all the guest musicians who joined Shar on stage, including:

– Dave Thomas and his band at the East Harling Blues Festival
– Johnny Sharp and John Sharp snr. on board the Resnova, Dartmouth
– Keith Warmington at The Lansdown, Bristol
– Johnny Hewitt at The Goin’ Up The Country Blues & Roots Club, Wrexham, Appleton Thorn Village Hall, Appleton, Warrington and Brooks Blues Bar, Putney Heath, London
– Peter Price at Appleton Thorn Village Hall, Appleton, Warrington
– Jim Crawford at The Palladium Club, Bideford
– “Chicago” Mike Wiedrich, Richie Gould and Chris D’Avoine at The Coronation Tap, Bristol

A very special thanks to John Turner who accompanied Shar at The Marina Hotel, Dartmouth, and great respect to Maggie Thomas for asking Shar to come up and play during her set.

A very special thanks also to Tony Stephenson for his recording and subsequent mixing of several numbers from The Lansdown and The Coronation Tap, Bristol.

And last but not least, huge thanks go to our very own Steve Payne for accompanying Shar throughout the majority of the tour.

We are all looking forward to 2011 when we hope Shar will return to the U.K. for another tour. We’ll keep you all posted on that one. In the meantime, here are a few memories of her visit…