Chester Folk Festival - Saturday 28th May to Monday 30th May 2005

Our first attempt at attending a Folk Festival in earnest, although we're not ready for camping out yet, but this one is on our patch, so we were able to drive in each day. Saturday we started late after a difficult night, so by the time we had parked it was too late for the daytime programme, but this didn't matter at all, within minutes we had met friends and stood talking, drinking and enjoying The Witchmen performing Morris dances in the Black tradition - i.e. with attitude.

In the evening we were really torn between the sessions going in the Olive Tree and the concert in the main marquee. In the end we went for the marquee (and missed a legendary night in the pub in the process!) and arrived just in time to see the future. The future is called things like Heyfeva and its in good shape. Three lads, they can't be more than 15, playing fiddle, accordion, keyboards, guitar and rocking out like they've been at it for 30 years - fantastic stuff. They even managed to do a theatrical ending as one by one they left the stage leaving the poor pianist all alone for a few agonizing seconds before he stopped playing and they burst back on to take the well deserved applause.

We also saw The Waite Collective, a mother and two daughters singing in close harmony in fine style, Tom Lewis who sang sea songs in a big voice, Sean Cannon previously of the Dubliners and his son, both of whom were a delight, Sean playing Durham Jail much better than Jez Lowe had done a few nights earlier (see elsewhere) and his son gave a brilliant rendition of Rainy Night in Soho - again the future seems safe.

Bernard Wrigley was much funnier than we'd dare hope - his bass concertina providing a memorable sound or two!

The end came a little disappointedly with a lackluster performance by the Poozies, and that cut back due to lack of time. It could have been a really good set, but the gaps between the songs while they changed and retuned instruments were lazy and the introductions a bit vague, including a contradiction by one member about what the next song was all about after it was explained by another. One of the harps had a section that came over as an electric bass, but this seemed to dominate an otherwise delicate sound, and often it seemed to be just plain wrong. Gill commented on this too.

Later we found out that the session in the Olive Tree was perhaps the best ever - well according to Brass Tacks John it was the first one that kept him out of the Marquee, so it must have been good.

We had a good time on Sat night with some people from Rhuddlan, we went back to their tent after the pub and everyone was singing and playing instruments. It was pitch black and they had a small fire under the gazebo, they were mostly drunk, it was really funny. They
called Mally 'Fid' because they thought he looked like Fidel Castro, which he did! A welsh couple appeared out of the blackness and sang the most beautiful welsh folk songs in close harmony, then later a Texan bloke turned up and sang 'Help me make it through the yard' and others in a similar vein! Very funny! Annie, one of the group, played a tiny sailers squeezebox, in fact it was so small she could play it in the pub making no apparent movement so that you couldn't see who was playing.

Sunday we arrived and stumbled upon Shay and Jenny guarding the campsite, and within an hour we'd spent money on a Bodhram at Pete's tent - a fascinating emporium with lots of vintage accordions and other delights, including an indescribably delicious looking hand made guitar from the 40's complete with original case and a period copy of News of the World as a liner. It had been owned by man who used it every week in a jazz band, but had lain in an attic for years since. There was also an old hammered dulcimer which everybody had a tentative bash at, but it was Mally that got the best from it later in the day.

Naturally we had missed a good blues session in one of the pubs, and a "cracking" Irish music session that finished just as we arrived.... So we drifted around enjoying some bluegrass under the pagoda and moved on to the Social Club for the evening where we enjoyed Mr Pantin ( see separate), but felt that the following acts were a bit dull, so we went home about 10:30.

Our Texan crooner met us on the way down the hill and told us about the closing ceremony about which we knew nothing, but it was too late for us by then.

I don't want it to end on a downer though, we had a good time and heard some great music, certainly met some good friends and enjoyed the sun while it shone.

The barman in the Olive Tree reckoned that 9000 pints of beer had been consumed by Sunday tea time.....

Jez Lowe and the Bad Pennies at Parkgate Folk Club - 26th May 2005

Now I have to say in advance of writing further that whilst this is not going to be a rave review, the first I will have written here that has any real critisism, I fully appreciate that these folk are very talented, very popular and they are out there performing and I'm not.

I just didn't seem to be able to get too much out of this gig, and it's troubled me a little because I like to like music. Gill too has expressed disquiet, and is reserving judgement until we have given them a second chance. Certainly Jez Lowe has written some fine songs, we heard Black Diamonds on a CD over the weekend and it is already growing on us, but there is an overall naivity in his song-writing that doesn't seem to work for me, and this has been underlined by listening to others at the Chester Folk Festival where I found he original material to be lacking when compared to the wealth of traditional and older songs that are around.

So maybe I'm just an old traditionalist?

Anyway Jez Lowe's band are pretty good, if a bit wooden (shy even!) in fact the young man who plays the pipes and keyboards is apparantly a champion piper, and I think I've said enough - I couldn't even come close!

On a technical note, the band features a lovely smooth 5 string electric bass and a 5 string violin.

E.S.T. at Buxton Opera House

The Esbjorn Svensson Sextet!

The very next day, while still reeling from the after effects of Manchester, Gill & Sue are having a natter about things and suddenly there is an imperative to travel to Buxton! For me this means a hasty dinner while we look at the map, the clock, find out if there are tickets, decide that it is feasible, get changed and we're off. Neston to Buxton via the Cat and Fiddle in 110 minutes and all within the speed limit!

Buxton Opera House is a lovely slice of olde Englande and it provides a nice cosy setting for E.S.T. to strut their stuff, but apologies first to the Eivind Aarset Trio - time was so against us that we arrived about 5 bars from the end of their last number - or just in time to get to the loo before the interval rush! I will make a point of checking this band out on CD as soon as possible because they sounded so good in Manchester and they deserve more attention.

So we settled down at the back of the stalls just a few feet from the mixing desk and waited to see what would happen - I paid the 50p for a pair of plastic opera glasses, but the venue is small enough to not need them - the stage was set up as described yesterday, except that the 5 banners were closer together, necessitated by the size of the stage. That said, the E.S.T. instrumentation is clustered so close together that there was plenty of space around them if they felt the need to wander around.

"A Picture of Doris Traveling With Boris" opened the set, Esbjorn starting off with an almost classical style swirling piano introduction, with Dan's bass and effects setting the tone and Magnus' constant, consistent and often cymbal-led beat setting the pace.

We were surprised by how different the set was, why I don't know, this band have such a large repertoire to call on, never mind the standards,and they seem to have adjusted the set to fit the more intimate venue, the event having something closer to the feel of the familiar jazz trio, but without loosing the special E.S.T. magic. So we heard renditions of "Mingle in the mincing Machine","Viaticum","The Infamous Fable and the Unstable Table" and so many that went unannounced, Esbjorn's announcements seeming to indicate that he can never remember the names either, its the music that counts anyway.

"Evaluations of Love" featured some cunning doctoring of selected piano notes, and this piece demonstrated E.S.T.'s superb ability to take the music to the highest crescendo and then suddenly stop and revert to a simple rhythm played by one hand on the piano before the tune continues. I picked out "O.D.R.I.P" (for the encore?) and possibly "Tide of Trepidation", "In the Tail of Her Eye" (drum solo),"Letter from the Leviathon" and "In My Garage" too. "Seven Days of Falling" ended in a simple, slow subtle dreamlike drone of the bow being very gently rubbed on the bass strings in a circular motion.

Visually I will remember this gig as being mostly red and gold light reflecting off every surface possible, with the projections adding a little moving interest behind.

Afterwards we hung about and were last in the queue for signatures and were rewarded with the group photo - the Esbjorn Svensson Sextet for 2 minutes.....

So was it worth the dash half way across the country? Too right it was, we all left full of praise and eager for more - though I don't think Leicester will be troubled by us tonight, its just a bit too far - and I have to sleep sometime!


PS Our apologies to Joseph Topping, but he'll be round again before E.S.T.

Something to look forward to - Vegan Beer!

I was looking for somewhere to eat in Manchester tonight and Google came up with this place: Marble Beers

I intend to look further into this but not tonight.

We were intending to go to The Eighth Day, but its shut on Sunday, as are so many of the few Veggie places.

Stay tuned to see where we end up!

E.S.T. at Manchester Bridgewater Hall

JS up in the gods

Gill and I are agreed that when E.S.T. are on form (and we have only ever heard them on form), they are the best in the World. Words like pure, precise, intense, real, and vibrant flow off our tongues as we reel out into the world beyond the concert hall doors.

Tonight was no exception and the reeling was even more marked because we both spent the first hour of the night's 2 performances gripped by some dreadful fear than can only have been vertigo brought on by the precipitous heights of the Hall's Gallery and the unusual amount of heat that seemed to have gathered under the Bridgewater's cavernous roof. This was a real shame because the support:

Eivind Aarset Trio were a fine band and musically challenging with the wealth of electronic effects being driven by the three young men and their guitar, bass and percussion. Our malaise was such that we both found ourselves thinking - "This is great but please stop so we can get out of here!" - as the sounds rose and fell in great swirls of rhythm and colour. They deserved better attention than we were able to give, and during the interval we revived our spirits with fresh air, ice cream, red wine (or water) and found ourselves a seat further back from the rail. And so to the much anticipated:

E.S.T.

I make no bones about my regard for this band - they are the cream of live music - full stop. There is so much oozing from those three men and their instruments when they play on stage that its awe inspiring. Several times, Esbjorn, announcing the songs in his quiet, slow English style paused as if waiting for a reaction and was then prompted to ask "Are you still alive?" - well we were - but the whole audience was stunned into reverent silence that was only broken at the end of pieces for heartfelt applause, not least when the Dan put down his bass after the last piece - surely not - already?

The set was superb, leading out with "Rubes song"??? Written for Esbjorn's son, we heard several tunes from the new album Viaticum, and other older pieces, many of them mixed into medleys of 3 or 4 pieces. These included "Tide of Trepidation","Eighty-eight days in my veins","Viaticum", "Mingle in the Mixing Machine" and my favourite of the night: "The Unstable Table & The Infamous Fable" in which Esbjorn keeps up a classic style arpeggio(?) throughout whilst Dan lets rip with the bow on his bass and Magnus keeps the incessant beat going.

I wonder if the the recent shift from being the Esbjorn Svensson Trio to E.S.T. is not at least partly driven by the their being a band - a unit - in which all 3 players play an equal and high role, with each of them demonstrating virtuoso levels of performance: Magnus played the most amazing thing - an interesting drum solo - mixing percussion with echo and no doubt other electronic effects brought out a new dynamic that I'm at a loss to find words for it, and provides a spectrum of texture in his playing that underpins the Trio's music, whilst Dan finds so many colours in his bass and provides so very much excitement in the music. Esbjorn of course has the name and plays his piano with such an intense and passionate manner, not just the keys, but the strings too, and his posture makes me fear for his back in later years!

A word too about the stage - 5 simple vertical strips of white material hung behind the band and they received projections of patterns and at one stage a three dimensional image of Esbjorn's head rotating slowly, whilst the band were lit by a simple but effective set of lights, including an earthy orange light that seemed so rich, supplemented by 3 rotating pattern lights from above which which added further movement to the overall effect. The lighting highlight was an intense pool of purple that was centered by red-orange and that further centered by a yellow, giving the band a warm, sumptuous, fiery glow.

The handout brochure is effusive in its praise - invoking the name of Hendrix and rightfully noting that E.S.T. link 21st century dance rhythms with the acoustic of the jazz piano trio, Gill coined it well on the way home - "Heavy Jazz". Heavy yes, but when needed E.S.T. can be light and delicate as proved on the beautiful, lace thin rendition of "Believe, Beleft, Below" they used as an encore - encore? Already?

No need for gatecrashing tonight, the Trio turned out to sign CDs and be photographed in the foyer - another snap for Sycophant's Corner is bagged - and we reel out into the Manchester night - thanks Gill for a top birthday present, and thank you E.S.T.

Next up - E.S.T. Manchester Bridgewater Hall

EST

Coming up tonight - my birthday present from Gill - we can't wait!

Paul Brady - Liverpool Philharmic Hall 19/5/2005

Late decision this one – treat from a friend, Sue, who is a long term fan and who “just happened” to be in town (she lives in Holland!) – so we all arrived a bit breathless half way through the support:

Declan O'Rourke

I had a few problems with this act – we were only 3 rows back in the stalls, but on the right hand aisle – and the noise was a bit of a shock considering he was only playing acoustic guitar and singing – my he has a powerful voice. The first song we heard (part of) seemed to go on and on, and for me there was something un-meshed between the voice and the guitar that put me a bit on edge and made it harder to appreciate a young man who is clearly very talented. His playing was loud and confident, his voice deep and powerful but not lacking in feeling, his links were funny and nervously confident. When he put down his guitar and sang his own song about marrying the sea, he hit his high point for me. The song attempts to explore a young Irish farm-boy’s thought processes before he decides to take to the sea with Scott and Shackleton, and the lyric finds him proposing to the sea that they marry and share their lives together. The sea is at first coy having known very many men before, so many who left her for the shore, and it’s a fine song. Paul Brady was later, rightfully, complementary to his special guest.

Paul Brady came on with a 4 piece band and came over surprisingly rocky. I wasn’t very sure what to expect having had only a brief listen to a couple of songs from a CD down the phone, but the opening number was loud and it was obvious from the outset that there was a wealth of talent on the stage and that we were in for a good night. This turned out to be the case and, despite being completely unfamiliar with his material, I really enjoyed the set which consisted of just about all the songs on his latest CD, some of his own choices from the past, and a fair few of those old favourites that the obviously keen fans in the audience insisted on quite vocally!

We were ideally placed to observe the intricate techniques employed by the guitarist – I’m sorry but all of the names of the band completely escaped me on this occasion – who generated a fine mix of sound including some nice bottleneck work and some interesting effects alongside the “usual” playing. I particularly enjoyed observing the drummer (when not obscured by the Bass) who was clearly giving it all without any histrionics and looked absolutely knackered after the performance when he appeared back on the stage.

So it was a good gig – I even found time to enjoy a half of Cains Triple Hopped Pale Ale which was really refreshing, and Gill & Sue (said friend) almost managed to gatecrash the after-gig party in the Green Room!

John Sharp

Paul Brady @ Liverpool Philharmonic 19/5/2005

Garva - The Old Manor Folk Club

This is the first band that I have heard forgetting the words on the last song - big finish! This gave the audience, most of whom counted the band as friends (thank goodness), a chance to abuse them in the nicest possible way and made it into a special, if flawed, night.

Tony Gibbons is a very accomplished singer and guitarist, playing in the best Liverpool-Irish traditions, and woodwind player Terry Coyne is a master of his craft - indeed I believe he's a champion! Their keyboard player (who's name has gone) added some nice harmonies, though I felt the keyboard was a bit superfluous much of the time.


This was our first visit to "The Manor" and we were made very welcome by the folk there. Thanks!