Category: Review

Fearghas Kelly has written a wonderful piece on an encounter he had with Michael at a gig in Paisley back in 2008. He has kindly agreed for us to use it here. You can read it at Fearghas's blog website 

Michael Marra is one of Mary Ann Kennedy's guests on her BBC Radio 3 programme World on 3 being broadcast at midnight on 31 December 2010. 

Check out more information on the programme at BBC website

BBC 1 Scotland are repeatingt the 2002  "A Cottier Saturday Night"  as their Burns
Night programme on Monday 25 January 2010 at 07.30pm. The show is hosted by Michael Marra and features Eddi Reader, Rod Paterson and Christine Hansen. A cracking thirty minutes it is too!

If you are out at a Burns Supper on Monday night you will be able to view the programme on the BBC iplayer at -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00qcj2x/A_Burns_Night_Celebration/

or download it to your PC.

Over the next couple of weeks the website will be undergoing quite a few changes in design and media delivery.  In the meantime, visitors might notice disruptions in audio and video streaming and we'd like to apologize in advance if any of you are affected by our 'Spring Cleaning'!

The new Family History Centre, at the city's Central Library, brings together the services of the Dundee registrar's office, city archivist, the local history library and the burials administration section.


Local musician and songwriter Michael Marra performed the opening ceremony yesterday and was presented with his own family tree, which dates back seven generations to the middle of the 18th century. 

This portrait of Michael's grandmother, Bridget Keating, photographed when she was a young woman was found whilst researching his family tree.

A spokesman for the local authority said: "More than a decade ago Dundee City Council was the first local authority in Scotland to introduce a family history service, when the genealogy unit at the city's registrar's office established an informal partnership with the city archivist, the local history library and the burials administration section. Qualified staff from Dundee registrar's office will be available to offer advice and to undertake research, provide a family tree and a comprehensive report detailing each entry that is traced."

In most cases the registrar will be able to trace each branch of a family back to the late 17th century and issue authenticated certificates of any Scottish birth, death, civil partnership or marriage record.

Extract from article appearing in Aberdeen Press and Journal

For those Marra fans who were disappointed when Michael had to cancel his appearance in January 2007with BBC Scotland's Symphony Orchestra, the gig's back on - and it's free

 Sunday 10 June

City Halls, Glasgow, 3.00pm

Live broadcast on BBC Radio Scotland

Scotland's Music '07

Presented for BBC Radio Scotland by Mary Ann Kennedy

MacCunn Land of the Mountain and the Flood
Trad. Catriona Watt - 2006 BBC Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician of the Year (with BBC SSO)
Sir John Blackwood McEwen Viola Concerto

______________________________________________________________________________

James MacMillan Exsultet (BBC SSO brass and percussion)
Trad. Catriona Watt (unaccompanied set)
Edward McGuire Hall of Memories
Trad. Michael Marra (to include Green Grow the Rushes, Mother Glasgow, Schenectady Calling Peerie Willie Johnson)
Martyn Bennett, arr. Lawson Liberation from 'Grit' with Michael Marra, Catriona Watt and the BBC SSO

Scott Dickinson, viola
Catriona Watt, singer
Michael Marra, singer
Stefan Solyom, conductor

TICKETS: FREE (unreserved seating)

Box Office: 0141-353-8000 - and at City Halls before the programme starts, subject to availability

Saint Andrew has three gigs coming up. The first is at the Out of the Woods Acoustic Music Club , Broughty Ferry  on Sunday 07 December with support from Rod Paterson and Frank Smith .(this gig is now SOLD OUT !!! &nbsp The second is on the 09 December at 08:00 pm  at  The Leith Folk Club, The Village, Edinburgh -  This gig has now SOLD OUT!!!! But nae worries a extra gig has been arranged for the next night, the 10th. S aint Andrew will be performing with his band The Rare Wee Helps ( Michael Marra and Kevin Murray) So get yourself along there and witness the phenomenon that is Saint Andrew. It'll Be Rare T' Hear 'Em Lehv again. Saint Andrew has also just been booked to appear at next year's Celtic Connections.

Welcome to the OFFICIAL Michael Marra Website. Feel free to explore the site. There are over 900 pages of information plus over 400 songs which we give an airing on a rotational basis. You can find song information and listen to some music tracks in the MUSIC section, contact the Artist, or buy your favorite Michael Marra CDs, Downloadable Albums, and Individual MP3 Downloads which are now available to buy from The OFFICIAL Michael Marra Digital Store!

ALL AUDIO, VIDEO, IMAGES AND TEXT ON THIS SITE ARE PROTECTED BY COPYRIGHT - Content of this site is for personal use only and must not be copied, stored or saved to any device.

"Indisputedly the finest song-writer in Scotland. His musical vision is extremely wide, melding 50's pop, church music, Dr. John and a Randy Newmanesque eye for beauty in the commonplace" The List.

more...
Have a read of these from a mixture of music critics, fans and ordinary punters who have witnessed Michael's performance and have been moved to write about it. Courtesy of



Time was when it would have been unkind to review a Marra record next to Randy Newman, long thought to be the Dundonian's dominating influence.

In this instance it is unkind, albeit to Newman, even if he is constrained by working on a soundtrack. This is Michael Marra's most robust work to date, while retaining much of the previous pop diarist's charm in the shape of "Frida Kahlo's Visit to the Taybridge Bar" and "Bob Dylan's Visit to Embra". He moves comfortably into the gentler slopes of Tom Wait's terrain in "The Butterfly Flaps its Wings", which also embodies some of the powerful discordant jazz themes lurking here and there.

The title, not atypically, is but half the story, coming from the wonderfully titled closing track "Scribbled Down Drunk (But Posted Sober)".
review of Michael Marra : "Posted Sober" (Inner City Sound Recordings) chosen as his Album of the Week for 7 January 2001 by Scotland on Sunday reviewer Colin Somerville.


[size=14]OTHER PRESS CLIPS AND REVIEWS:[/size]

...Marra has been compared to Tom Waits - but he doesn't sing in the Yankee drawl that's universal in rock - and with Randy Newman for his acute powers of observation on life. But in truth he's unique - and that's a word we're not often allowed to use in this paper..
Shetland Times


...If The Moon Can Be Believed is a truly original production that boasts a number of brilliantly written songs written by the renowned Dundee artiste, writer and musician, Michael Marra ...
The Courier and Advertiser


... he rocks, he's smart, and his tunes walk a razor's edge of wit.
A man with piercing eyes, MARRA looks into the soul, his songs as big as life, his characters scarred and inadequate, his images irksome ...
Folk Roots

MARRA ... a.k.a. the Randy Newman of The North ... astonishing talent for lyrics
... a first-class writer who avoids all the trappings of MOR sterility ...
Blue Juice

... a poet in blue-suede shoes ...
The List

... the only reason I did a Scots album was to annoy the London boys
... has been described as a Scottish Jacques Brel ...
TLN Magazine

... a 25-year-over-night sensation(!) when Deacon Blue and Hue and Cry discovered MARRA and invited him to tour internationally ...
Dirty Linen, USA

... (another) one of Scotland's best-kept secrets ... lyrically rooted in Scotland, its culture, history and literature, but MARRA cannot be pigeoned-holed with a "folkie" image; his musical palette is too varied for that; a love of jazz and sophisticated pop is always to the fore ... a poet's ear for detail and a nimble wit; given an incident MARRA will depict it from an angle that illustrates most effectively the daftness and vanity of humankind ... how can a man who turns the unlikely subject of King George III's return to sanity into a neat, easy-going boogie-woogie, go unrecognised? ...
Mojo

... expelled from school amongst the high-rises of Dundee's Lochee at 14 as a tearaway
... gigged a bit around Dundee in the 1960s
... played with "legendary" 1970s rock-band Skeets Bolivar (remember them?)
... London ... Polydor Records ... management disputes ... home
... later/eventually 1985 solo album, Gaels Blue, on own label ... filled with a glittering array of songs
... MARRA's music is soaked in the Scottish experience, strained through a gauze of ragtime blues-piano and shot with filaments of traditional folk and American voices
... a ghost-white MARRA sits at piano and microphone, delivering caustic visions of the Scottish past and wickedly funny
and sometimes achingly poignant, parables of the present in vocals from a Woodbined voice
... fans include Barbara Dickson, Deacon Blue, Pate Kane of Hue and Cry, Gary Clark (ex-Danny Wilson lead singer), Billy Connolly, and Eddie Reader
... covers by Kiki Dee, Maddy Prior, June Tabor, Leo Sayer,Frankie Miller, Rab Noakes and Fairport Convention
... worked as MD on John Byrne's BBC TV series, Your Cheating Heart ...
Scotland on Sunday