A staple of Jim Barnes’ live performance is to cover the works of earlier folk greats, such as Gordon Lightfoot (Early Mornin’ Rain, For Lovin’ Me), Bob Dylan (Blowin’ In the Wind, It Ain't Me Babe, Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright) Donovan (Catch the Wind, To Try For the Sun, Remember the Alamo & others.

Jim’s rich baritone captures the emotions of these songs, while expressing their timeless ideas in contemporary ways.

As an Irish singer, Jim has no equal. He has sung and played Irish music for nearly 4 decades and is

equally familiar with the love ballads (The Fields of Anthenry), songs of rebellion (Johnson’s Motor Car), drinking songs (The Jug of Punch) and songs of witty Irish fun (The Rocky Road to Dublin).

Whether performing these on guitar, banjo or unaccompanied, Jim’s presentation and voice will just draw you in.

Jim has written a good number of songs about his home state His debut album, New Hampshire On My Mind, was released in 2009. These originals, witty, poignant and sometimes irreverent, expose the flaws of a bumbling State Government (Fees! Fees! Fees!) and the foibles of local politics (Trouble at the Dump) but they also reveal Jim’s serious side, with beautiful ballads such as Our Last Farewell as well as his tribute to our men and women in uniform (A Soldier’s Farewell).

A second album, Made in the Granite State, was released in December, 2010. Its thirteen original tracks celebrate life in New Hampshire (Everybody's Gotta Be From Somewhere), from what to do and where to do it, to growing peaches (The Parable of the Peach), to Jim's very serious views on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (Homecoming, Afghanistan) and how those wars have impacted our state and nation.

Jim is near completion of an album of traditional Irish songs (due out in March 2012) and is also writing songs for a third album of his original, New Hampshire-flavored music.