AMERICAN singer-songwriter Jonathan Byrd will be bringing his band to Cumbria for two nights as part of his latest UK tour.

The award-winning country, folk and Americana performer is joined by The Pickup Cowboys for live shows at Haile Village Hall, near Egremont, on Friday June 29, and Wild Zucchinis, in Cockermouth, the following day.

Jonathan Byrd and The Pickup Cowboys are musical gunslingers, vaudevillian hucksters, and old-fashioned tent revivalists. Between heartbreaking ballads and heart-lifting sing-alongs, the Cowboys entertain and get audiences involved in the show.

Byrd is a preacher's son, a Gulf War veteran, and an accomplished songwriter from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, known for literary, outsider songs that have become campfire favourites.

The Chicago Tribune called Byrd "one of the top 50 songwriters of the past 50 years".

Joined by vocal powerhouse Kyshona Armstrong on bass, and musical renaissance man Johnny Waken on guitar, saw and mandolin, Byrd shares the often-missed, always poignant tales of the small people that make the world such a big place. A new album, Trio, is the first with both members joining Byrd in the studio.

Both Cumbrian shows start at 8pm. For tickets to the Haile Village Hall gig on Friday 29, phone 0782 595 3095, and for Wild Zucchinis tickets, phone 01900 823446.