Mike Harding talks to Viv Hardwick about his decision to start touring again after a 15 year gap and why the national folk awards on BBC Radio 2 are so important.

IT’S taken Mike Harding 15 years to go back out on tour having opted to quit the world of two pantechnicons and a roadcrew of nine… and his first low-key date return is at Richmond’s Georgian Theatre next Saturday.

“I did a couple of gigs last September- October and I just enjoyed it so much I thought I’d go back out on the tour again. It’s a 15-year gap, but it wasn’t a conscious choice not to do any more. But we used to do 82-night tours with nine roadies and two articulated lorries and did 2,000-seater theatres and I started to go to the Himalayas, climbing and walking, and spent three months in Pakistan and Nepal. You had to sit down and plan a big tour like I was doing and I just didn’t get around to it. I said ‘I’ll have a think about it next month’ and I didn’t.

“Then, doing a couple of little local gigs it occurred to me that I didn’t need to tour with nine roadies and two lorries. I could just go out with the guitar in the back of the car and turn up to a gig with a suitcase and a box of CDs. That’s what I’m doing,” he says.

“Richmond is THE first gig because I wanted to do something in Yorkshire to start with it’s not far from my home in Settle, so I can get back on the night. It’s a lovely little theatre and the furthest North I’m going is South Shields and the furthest south is Derby. I wanted to do tiny little theatres in the North that were between 200-300 seats. I’m only doing it because I enjoy it, it’s not because the taxman is breathing down my neck. Most are in Yorkshire and Lancashire,” adds the 66-year-old, who is adamant he’ll never go back to full-scale touring. “I’ll probably do something in the autumn and another 20 nights the following spring.

I’ve never had an agent or a manager so, in the past, I did it all from a small office in Manchester. Now it’s all organised from my house. The lovely thing about being a small outfit is that you have a great atmosphere in a place to begin with. The best-designed arts centres are like old theatres. On my last big tour I said ‘no leisure centres’ because they still smell of sweat and French chalk and the dressing room is a locker room. The architects should be taken out and flogged to death with a sweaty sock full of diarrhoea.”

I ask him about his long-running radio show on BBC Radio2.

“It’s probably one of the most exciting times to be involved in folk music because all the old timers like Dave Bell are still around and their albums are available. Then there’s this new stuff from people like Kate Rusby and Emily Smith and it’s just fantastic.

“We’re just working on a show now and I’ve got 16 tracks down and about another 30 that I want to play.

It feels like I’m holding back the wall of a dam because there’s so much great music to play. People prefer songs to instrumentals so I make it a rule never to play more than two instrumental pieces in a programme,”

he says.

His Wednesday evening BBC Radio 2 show is still flying the flag for folk music at a time when other stations are struggling to support the genre.

“I can’t believe that Radio Derby has dumped its folk programme after years of fabulous shows. I think that people at the top still don’t understand how popular folk music is.

There are people on tour, going round and selling out. People like Bellowhead and Seth Lakeman.

John McCusker has been on a world tour with Mark Knopfler and it gets zilch press. I really do believe this, that people think folk music isn’t as marketable in the same way as pop music. It’s not full of pretty young things who can be marketed and pushed forward from a sausage machine.

It doesn’t fit in so the marketing people don’t like it,” Harding rages.

The performer, who released his first album back in 1972 before his single, Rochdale Cowboy, earned national fame, came up with the idea of running the National Folk Awards 13 years ago and he’s presented the event ever since.

“I’m finding it really difficult to vote because there are so many people who deserve an award. It’s being broadcast on the red button this year after going out on BBC4 for about three years. I’m really surprised that BBC2 aren’t broadcasting it on mainstream TV.

“Somebody has said it’s the hottest ticket at the moment. Over the years the votes have been cast in the right way, but you can’t vote if you’ve got an interest in any of the acts,” says Harding, who will be presenting alongside Barbara Dickson.

Does it always go to plan? “Always, it’s folk music remember. There was one time Mike McGoldrick was in the toilets and should have been on live and the band just carried on and I stood there doing some jigs and reels for about five minutes while they got him out of the toilet.”

I ask him how strong a chance he feels that Teessiders’ Megson, North- East The UnThanks or Scarborugh’s Eliza Carthy stand this year.

“They all stand a chance. There is a lot happening in the North-East.

Some albums have just come out and missed the deadline. By next year there’ll be another 300 brilliant albums out. I don’t like awards ceremonies as such but this is really a way of saying ‘thank you’ to people who have done a great year’s work.

* Mike Harding, Georgian Theatre Royal, Richmond, February 12, 7.30pm, Tickets: £7-£18. Box Office: 01748-825252

* BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards 2011, February 7, goes out live from 7.45pm

* March 22, Customs House, South Shields, 7.30pm, £16, 0191-454-1234 customshouse.co.uk