Maria is steeped in the world of roots music as a performer, writer and enthusiast, and also as a promoter and booking agent. Maria has been successfully promoting live music events in Yorkshire under the True North Music banner for the last 10 years, 
specialising in Americana, bluegrass, old time, folk & roots. Since 2015 she has hosted over 60 gigs in Yorkshire, featuring exceptional artists from the USA, Canada, UK & Ireland, including Sierra Hull, Gangstagrass, Stillhouse Junkies, Molly Tuttle, Jaywalkers and Foghorn Stringband to name just a few (check out the gig archive here). As a booking agent, Maria has brought top flight roots music artists to hundreds of venues across the UK, booking tours for The Slocan Ramblers, Jake Blount, Front Country, AJ Lee & Blue Summit, Bill and the Belles, Mile Twelve, John Reischman and many more. In both her programming and booking roster, a fair level of gender representation is vital to her, and she’s also been working to improve the overall diversity of the programme. Maria’s new podcast Womenfolk will be showcasing the stories of women working in roots music too.
Maria’s tireless work to champion grassroots live music has been recognised with various awards and opportunities. She received Arts Council England Project Grants funding to support True North Music’s local live music series in 2023-24. She participated in the 2021-22 cohort of the Both Sides Now Leaders Network, a leadership development programme for women working in music. In 2021 Maria was also nominated for an International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA) Industry Involvement Award. In 2017 she won Yorkshire Gig Guide’s Outstanding Promoter award, and in 2018 Maria was invited to the USA to participate in the American Sounds programme showcasing quintessentially American music to international presenters. In 2019 she was selected for the prestigious Leadership Bluegrass course run in Nashville by the IBMA. These opportunities have all been hugely valuable in building Maria’s extensive network of world class artists and music industry contacts.
The Covid-19 pandemic was of course a hammer blow for everyone working in live music. In the absence of her usual live music series, Maria organised a series of online events in 2020 & 2021 with the support of Arts Council England funding, featuring livestreamed concerts and online workshops which were a big hit with True North Music’s followers. Since 2022 Maria has returned to presenting real life local gigs, including True North Music’s 2023-24 which was also backed by an ACE grant and included successful school music workshops as well as the first Marsden Americana & Bluegrass Day. Performances were livestreamed from the festival and you can check these out at the True North Music YouTube channel.
Maria has been active in the bluegrass and folk music community for over 15 years as a singer, songwriter, musician and volunteer, as well as a promoter. With a former career in marketing, Maria has combined her commercial experience with her passion for roots music to build True North Music into a beacon of excellence, bringing some of the finest acoustic musicians in the world to appreciative audiences across the UK. Check out the TNM testimonials page for a taste of the overwhelmingly positive feedback she has received.