I have been writing songs since student days in Scotland in the 1970s, with occasional forays into performance, mostly playing covers, until the late 1990s, when a songwriting and performance renaissance began which shows no signs of stopping. I started to play in local folk clubs in Cambridgeshire, occasionally dropping one of my own songs anonymously into a set of covers, and gradually developed the confidence to start performing my own material exclusively.
Over the past few years I have written a lot of songs, and audience response has let me know which ones to keep and record. In addition to spots at St Neots, Cambridge, Wisbech, Baldock and Ely Folk Clubs, I have also performed three times in the Club Tent at Cambridge Folk Festival. The centrepiece of my debut CD, Unfinished Lace, features three songs known collectively as The Great War Trilogy, which have attracted a lot of attention as stand-alone songs and as a piece, in performance and from other artists.
I write songs drawn from my own experience, as my work takes me all over the world, but also songs based on historical events and periods. The Last of England, based on Ford Madox Brown's painting of that name, is about emigration from England during the 1840s, while From Detroit to Dallas is about a business trip between those two cities in the USA and Parting is the Hardest Thing is a song about leaving, coming back, leaving, coming back
Reviewers have said that my songs, guitar and style remind them of Ralph McTell, Steve Tilston, Al Stewart, Roy Harper, Michael Chapman, and Eric Bogle amongst others. August company!
Reviewers have said some nice things about the CD too - "Unfinished Lace is a sparse, intimate album where the songs are allowed to speak for themselves - just how it should be - a remarkable collection of strong, self-penned material, beautifully performed throughout with assured guitar playing and amiable, unadorned vocals" - Folking.com. "Unfinished Lace is an album that will have a widespread appeal with its lovely melodies, well-crafted and thoughtful lyrics plus some deft guitar work" - Woven Wheat Whispers.com. "Unfinished Lace - the debut collection of Stevenson's own compositions which reveals his versatility and grasp of the craft of songwriting - there's plenty here to recommend" - Rock'n'Reel magazine. "Unfinished Lace is a sublime combination of traditional English folk music and delta blues. The two styles seem to vie for position to varying degrees. It works very well, Stevenson appears to be a great guitarist as well as good songwriter." - Fatea.com
I am also working and performing in a duo with Andrew Noyes, another Cambridgeshire-based songwriter, with a mix of our respective back catalogues and new material.
Unfinished Lace is selling very well and you can find out more by emailing me at david.a.l.stevenson@btinternet.com. All the songs sampled above are on the CD. It's also available as a full album download at www.wovenwheatwhispers.co.uk with a cool review as well. There's a very good review at http://www.folking.com as well. The website is finally up, just a home page just now, but check it out at http://www.david-stevenson-music.co.uk.
Now starting to think about the follow-up CD which will have a strongly Scottish theme - no reason other than six songs are about different facets of Scotland and its history.
Unfortunately I have been quite seriously ill for over two years, so the second album project is proving rather more difficult than most!
Thanks for reading - hope you've enjoyed listening too.
