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For Maryah McHam and Martyn Popey, jazz is about storytelling. Its songs are classic, timeless and beautiful.

“To me, jazz is relaxing but it’s also fun. It’s nice and it’s just beautiful,” McHam said. “We hope more people will open their minds to the music. Come and try it, you’ll love it. I promise.”

McHam and Popey make up a jazz duo simply known by their two names. McHam sings while Popey plays jazz guitar. The two play venues across East Texas where they perform a variety of songs, including timeless jazz classics such as “Fever” by Peggy Lee and original songs written by Popey.

While the two are working to introduce East Texans to jazz, they haven’t always performed jazz themselves.

Popey is from the United Kingdom, where he learned guitar so he could play in his brother’s rock ’n’ roll band. That’s how his music career started, but it’s included performing across Europe with another band and freelance performing jazz and R&B. On a train ride back to England from a gig in Paris, Popey met his future bride, Gae-Lynn Woods. She is an East Texas native from the Carthage area. About seven years after they married, the couple moved to East Texas where Popey began teaching music lessons in Carthage and performing across the area.

At Cafe Barron’s, Popey had finished an evening of playing guitar when McHam approached him to ask if he ever accompanied singers.

McHam is a Longview native who grew up singing at her home church, Oakland Heights Baptist Church. She moved to San Antonio for about eight or nine years, and while away she began singing as part of a trio, and then in a country band and later in a house band at a bowling alley/bar.

When she moved back to Longview, she and her mother visited Cafe Barron’s one evening where she saw Popey performing. She’d never sung jazz tunes before, but she decided to give it a try. She grew to love the storytelling of the songs and now enjoys sharing the music with others. The two started playing gigs together in 2017.

Popey said he enjoys the challenge that comes with playing jazz tunes, but lately he’s enjoyed writing songs.

“I just love to create, really. I compose all the time and lately I’ve been writing a lot of songs,” he said. “We’ve been performing some of those. They’re not easy either, but Maryah can perform them really well.”

He’s particularly enjoyed writing Bossa Novas lately.

“People think of Bossa Novas as kind of elevator music, but the stories are great and the music’s really good. It’s always really unusual,” he said.

“They’re dreamy,” McHam added.

McHam isn’t much of a songwriter, but back in her college days at East Texas Baptist University, she did write poems. Popey set one of those to music and now they perform “Tears Like Falling Stars” (or “Tears Falling Like Stars,” as Popey sometimes calls it) publicly.

An added bonus to the duo is that they have their own songs to perform. Restaurants or venues that host live music must have a license to do so for songs that are under copyright. For bands that play original music, a license isn’t needed.

“We’ve got enough original material that we don’t have to worry about that anymore,” she said, noting the duo has more than 200 original songs.

They also released their first album Oct. 31. The album is a recording of 13 songs that were written prior to 1923, so they are out of copyright. It also includes an original song.

Both McHam and Popey offer private lessons, as well. Popey offers private lessons for guitar and bass and can be reached at martynpopey@yahoo.com. McHam offers private voice lessons and flute lessons and can be reached at maryah.mcham@gmail.com. Individuals interested in purchasing their CD also can contact McHam.

While their live performances have been limited during the COVID-19 pandemic, the duo plans to perform at Los Pinos Ranch Vineyards in Pittsburg from 6-9 p.m. March 20 and from 6:30-9:30 p.m. April 10.

As the pandemic gradually comes to an end with more vaccines on the horizon, they are hopeful to book more shows so they can introduce more people to jazz.

“The older generation that grew up with these songs and that knows these songs, they’re dying. And the younger generation doesn’t have a clue about jazz,” Popey said. “It’s not the songs they grew up with, but we’d like to introduce them to it. We hope to open more people up to it. It’s really creative and fun and it’s beautiful.”

What: Maryah McHam & Martyn Popey performances

When: 6-9 p.m. March 20 and 6:30-9:30 p.m. April 10

Where: Los Pinos Ranch Vineyards, 658 CR 1334, Pittsburg