North Dorset Folk Festival 2017 - a preview

So you thought that the 2017 festival season is over now? Well for the most part it is...
You might still be able to snag a ticket for this, the 6th edition of North Dorset Folk Festival and probably Britain's smallest festival - less than 100 tickets were available at the start of sales - if you get on it quick. The food is to die for too.

TICKETS: here (£29 + £2.61 booking fee)
This is the poster:

I shall be adding details of the artists during this evening and tomorrow. I hope to see you at Marnhull Village Hall in less than three weeks time. I'm super excited for this because, although I am one of perhaps a dozen people other the organisers and crew that have been to all five previous editions of The North Dorset Folk Festival, five of the seven acts are ones that I have never seen live here or anywhere else. In that sense it beats any of the previous five!
The two artists that I have seen playing full sets live before actually have what I think are the two most challenging slots here: Tom Clements opening and Megan Henwood as first support.

Headline artist Lisbee Stainton released her fifth album in the spring of this year so rest assured that she has no shortage of quality material from which to choose for her set. 

Lisbee Stainton - Then Up (Active Distribution, 21 April 2017).

Megan Henwood is not likely to have that problem either and she is a veteran of NDFF. Her third album is due for general release on Friday 27 October. No promises, but it's just possible that you might be able to purchase it person-to-person a few days early. Signed. If you don't ask you don't get.

Megan Henwood - River (27 October 2017).

From Somerset, Kitty Macfarlane and an artist that inexplicably I have managed to avoid seeing live for no obvious reason at all. That is despite the fact that her EP Tide & Time is well known to me and I wrote about it last year!

Preview: North Dorset Folk Festival 2016

In six weeks time the season of outdoor festivals will be all-but over for another year. What to do then other than hibernate?

Here is a suggestion that I thought I might mention before all tickets are gone - North Dorset Folk Festival 2016. It is a one day, indoor festival held in Marnhull Village Hall in rural Dorset from noon - 10pm on Saturday 22 October 2016 and this is the fifth edition.
'Bijou' is a word widely used, maybe sometimes over-used, to describe festivals and other things. It's original meaning is 'jewel' but nowadays it also means 'small, exclusive' (as in hotels) for example.
Well NDFF is certainly small - less than one hundred tickets (£29 + £2.61BF) in total! The artist list is where the jewels appear.

Here is a quick-link to each of the artists, should you wish to investigate:

• Martin Carthy
• Blair Dunlop
• Megan Henwood
• Kit Hawes & Aaron Catlow
• Emily Maguire
• ODi
• Tom Clements

I will add more soon but here are a few things to note:

• Bijou does NOT mean snooty, exclusive or anything remotely like that.
• Nobody will assume, let alone expect, you to know anything about what you have come to see and hear. The artists, organisers and audience DO NOT BITE.
• If you have ever wondered about folk music (it is a very broad church), but never dared test the water, then this is an opportunity to do so without committing to a major investment. 

I bought my ticket before any acts were announced because I have been to all four previous editions. I was certainly not planning to miss out on the fifth such!

Marnhull Acoustic Sessions - Tom Clements and Annabelle Chvostek

Sunday just gone was the last Marnhull Acoustic Session before the summer recess for festivals and suchlike. The opening artist was Tom Clements and he could hardly be more local to the venue.  The use of live self-sampling is amazing to watch as are the sounds that he can make with that guitar. You won't need telling that one of his influences is Mark Knopfler but this is more than imitation, or indeed flattery.

His LP 'Roots, Morals and Other Life Choices' is released on 15 May.

Not so many have come to Marnhull from as far away as Annabelle Chvostek: as she put it, while the consonants in her surname give away her Slovak roots, she is in fact third-generation Canadian.  Some may know her through her stint with Canadian trio The Wailin' Jennys, which she left in 2007, but there is a whole lot more territory that she covers. At times her mandolin playing is replete with eastern European influences but, when it comes to her forthcoming LP 'Be The Media' it isn't the star of the show and neither is her acoustic guitar. In this sense it was one of the least acoustic sets I have seen at Marnhull, but no matter.

Her "new toy" is new to her but not actually new at all. To quote:

"A 1969 Fender Mustang, with a racing stripe and matching machine head."

'Be The Media' is a fine album too and is officially released in July (well, probably it is).

There is a certain, somewhat retro, groove to it as I suggest that the cover artwork implies. It is that good.

Behind The Castle Festival 2014 - Part 1

I spent yesterday at the inaugural Behind The Castle Festival in Sherborne, Dorset. As you may have gathered I had great expectations and, I have to say right at the start, they were exceeded. There were three stages; two tented - Stage 2 and Marnhull Acoustic Stage (MAS) and the out-door main stage. The setting is a dream.
From the start it was clear that this was going to be something rather special. These are just a few of my first thoughts and pictures...

Sun hats and a parasol -- I didn't see a pair of wellies all day!

The main stage seen from outside the MAS stage at about 5pm, during the latter part of Newton Faulkner's set.
The first to play that I saw was not even on the bill...

Tom Clements testing the MAS stage as one of the sound crew.

Stage 2 also incorporated the bar, which proved to be very popular indeed, and also some terrific performances including the first artists on the programme.

Jack McNeill and Charlie Heys.
Their LP 'Any Other Morning' was released just last Monday and here is a sample from it but be warned, to see them live is quite something else: