Like many classical singers we have performed in a whole lot of churches over the years. We have always loved how these sacred buildings make acoustic music sound absolutely beautiful. I once asked Emlyn what his favourite instrument was and he said '“a church.”

In March 2020, after two years living in Nashville TN, Emlyn and I came home to Australia to visit friends and family. We were due to fly back to the US in April. I had planned to use the visit to put the finishing touches on my new opera, lined up to be staged in Nashville later that year. But then, as the pandemic spread, planes were grounded, borders closed, and we found ourselves living back home in Australia, unable to return to the US. The opera was cancelled.

After a few months perching in temporary accommodation waiting to see what would happen with the pandemic, we found and rented Jackling Cottage, a 19th-century row cottage in Goolwa. This small South Australian town sits at the very end of the River Murray’s journey, where the river widens out to meet the great Southern Ocean.

We lived there for less than two years when the owners of Jackling Cottage sold the house and the new owners didn’t want tenants. Broken-hearted, we moved to another rental. Emlyn was still successfully working for his US employers, although he did have to keep early hours to attend online meetings. We realised we could stay permanently in Australia, and began looking for our own home, where we could settle, live, and make music.

At the end of 2022, we found it: a one hundred and fifty year old church with the most glorious live acoustics in Burra, a small country town two hours drive north of Adelaide. Burra sits 10 kilometres from Goyder’s Line - where the desert of South Australia officially begins. The region is dry and dusty–as opposite from a seaside town as you can imagine.

We’ve been here for two and a half years. Long enough to discover that mice eat through plumbing, old church roofs leak, and when it’s time to change a lightbulb, we need to borrow scaffolding from a friendly tradie. But the sky is so big here, the landscape is so wide and open, and our work is flourishing. In May 2023 we produced the world’s first Farty Bard Festival right here in Burra, celebrating the sillier side of Shakespeare with 5 visiting performing arts companies, with support from wonderful local volunteers, Country Arts SA, the Burra Town Hall and the Goyder Council. We have held house concerts with local and visiting guests, recording sessions and singing workshops. I’ve run a very special Lullaby Project Australia lullaby project here, which we recorded here in the church. We’ve been busy and Burra-ites are enthusiastic about our endeavors here and we feel grateful indeed to be part of this small community.

We discovered that Emlyn’s great great great great grandfather was one of the original Cornishmen who came out to the Burra mines, lived in the dugouts and is now in Burra cemetery.

Alongside composing new music, I have settled in to the enormous task of polishing up, recording and publishing the sheet music of all my major work. Meanwhile Emlyn is exploring the possibilities of AI, in his work life and his artistic life, right on the edge of technological capability, on the edge of the desert.