Red Shoes formed in 1983 in Birmingham and at  their core consist of husband and wife Carolyn  and Mark Evans. They  have worked with Clive Gregson (Gregson/Collister), in fact Clive used material written by Red Shoes to ‘audition’  Christine  back at their beginning.  She  passed muster,  by the way.  Clive played the  guitar solo  on the band’s recording of Jumper Of Love.    

Red Shoes released  two singles during  the 80’s:  All Fall Down on the band’s own label, which received airplay in the USA and was much admired by Howie Klein (later to become president of Reprise).  The second single was By The Time It Gets Dark, written by Sandy Denny and released on Island’s  Mooncrest label.  “A Spine-shivering version, drawing praise and production interest from legendary Fairport producer Joe Boyd”,  wrote  Mike Davies, in What’s On.   By The Time It Gets Dark received airplay on Radio 1 and also in The USA and Canada

Flashing forward now to the 2000’s, Red Shoes’ demos of new material drew the interest of Fairport Convention  bassist  Dave Pegg who went on  to produce the band’s three album sets; “Ring Around The Land”   “All The  Good Friends” and “It Isn’t Over Yet”  with Fairport covering Red Shoes’  original song  Celtic Moon  on their  Festival Bell  album and performing same on stage at the legendary Cropredy.    These albums drew guest  appearances from  Dave Pegg, Dave Swarbrick, Ric Sanders, Chris Leslie,   Joe Brown and ELO’s Bev Bevan.   

The band has since gone  on to become a folk festival favourite in it’s own right:   performing most recently at The New Forest Folk Festival  (2021), The South Downs Folk Festival (2021)  Banbury (2022) and Cropredy Fringe (2022).  

The original 1983 bass player Derek Eynon rejoined, late in 2019… straight into lockdown!   He takes on live bass duties and harmony vocals almost like he’d never been away (for twenty years).        

Accolades:

The  Angels want to hear these Red Shoes  -  Maverick

Many years ago I had the good fortune to see Sandy Denny fronting Fairport Convention on several occasions. Red Shoes’ Carolyn Evans has the same kind of strong but fragile voice  - Blues Matters

A live favourite on the Folk Club, Theatre and Festival circuit, with Carolyn’s vocals drawing comparisons with Sandy Denny –  South Downs Folk Festival Website

Sandy Denny-era Fairports and the contemporary American country-folk of Lucinda Williams sewn together neatly in these well crafted songs – Shindig.

“It Isn’t Over Yet”  double album, featuring  Dave Pegg, Ric Sanders and the legendary Joe Brown.  Awarded “Band Album of 2017” by FolkWords and hailed as “A Classic!” by FATEA Magazine.     

Currently performing as a guitar based trio with original bassist Derek Eynon, Red Shoes have shared stages with  Strawbs, Fotheringay, Iain Matthews, Pentangle, Show of Hands, Steve Knightley, Richard Digance and Paul Young. 

ALBUMS AVAILABLE ON SPOTIFY  :