When it comes to writing songs, having a baby has unexpectedly made things easier for Rachel Sermanni.

“I think mummahood has made my approach to songwriting much more simple,” says the singer, speaking to The Herald on Zoom with her 11-month-old daughter Evelyn wedged on her hip. “The results of that have actually been surprisingly alright. The songs have been far more intuitive, less intellectual. When I was recording the songs for my most recent album with a bunch of musicians from Berlin, I was nervous to play the songs for them. At the time I really felt like I was exposing myself and I was really nervous. But now I see how that worked. Time pressure can create interesting things.”

The results are alright, indeed. The album, Dreamer Awake, is Sermanni’s sixth, and landed her a shortlist nomination on this year’s Scottish Album of the Year Award. She’s touring it next month throughout Europe, and will return for a homecoming of sorts, at Glasgow’s Mackintosh church at the end of November. “I’m on sporadic tour,” she says, laughing. “November will be the first time I have spent touring in Europe for a while and I’m excited about that.”

Sermanni has supported Mumford and Sons and Elvis Costello, collaborated live with Ricky Ross and become a popular regular at Celtic Connections. She won an early fanbase on the continent in her teens, supporting Cornish artist Fink across Europe. “I was 18 and did a 49-date tour and the agents and promoters around Europe have supported me since then. I have a lot of really lovely fans in Germany and the Netherlands so it’s nice to be back there and build on that again.”

The Midlothian-based folk singer, from Carrbridge outside Aviemore, is balancing the demands of motherhood and touring her own way. “It has been a real challenge, but surprisingly okay. I’ve always been somebody who, before parenting, would go off to somewhere like the Samye Ling Buddhist monastery in the Borders. I would just stop what I was doing. I wasn’t scared of taking time away.” says Sermanni, who also has a six-year-old daughter with singer songwriter Adam Holmes. 

“It’s about trusting and patience, I guess, first and foremost and this goes for most people I know. What I am going to write about is what I’m living and experiencing. You have to go through experiences and transformations and it’s not always very comfortable. With my first bubba (her daughter Rosa) there have been challenges. I was 26, not in a stable relationship, and now it’s a co-parenting situation, which is a logistical and practical challenge. I came to parenthood earlier than I thought I might, if I even did. Some people have a really strong vision, but I didn’t really see how it fitted in with my lifestyle. So I had to start living somewhere and paying rent, which is something I hadn’t done up until that point because I was just driving around in my van.

“Now Evelyn has come along and I’m in a more stable situation but I definitely have a bit of guilt about going away. I bought another van recently so that I can take us all away and have an adventure. You have to evolve with it. There are loads of logistical and emotional things to deal with. And then on top of that, when did I last write a song? Not for a while. But I trust it all.”

This month Sermanni released Now I Know, a two-song EP featuring No Way Blues, a lyrically stark sign-off to a relationship from the past. ‘What’s done is done, you’ve found someone / I’ll be happy if it’s true / but there’s no way that I can stay the friend I was to you’ she sings in her signature whispery vocal, above gentle fingerstyle guitar plucking. Three years after it was written it’s as honest and raw as the moment it tumbled out of her.

“Something is being laid bare there,” she says. “It’s amazing how many people have related to that song. It’s really about the weighted emotions that can occur when someone does something that you just didn’t see coming. It was my earthquake for a wee while, small in comparison to what’s going on in the world, but we all have our things that weigh on us. Usually I can’t write when I’m in the centre of something but in this case it felt like the clarity was right there.

“As soon as I’d written these songs and finished crying into my guitar, I went to my friend’s studio in Portobello and recorded them, right out the oven, as demos. When I came back to them I figured they’d be better just being put out as they were, because my feelings weren’t as strong and I’d end up changing them to be less bare. It’s hard for me not to say stuff, express whatever my experience is. I felt like I really needed the opportunity.” 

Rachel Sermanni’s new EP Now I Know, is out now. She plays Mackintosh Church, Glasgow, on November 29, and will stage a multi-artist collaboration, Delve, at Aberdeen’s Lemon Tree and Music Hall in January next year.