Category: Folk music writing
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Nick Hart on being a folk obsessive, and coming to terms with fol-de-rol songs as a modern person
This article is about obsession. In some ways, it could serve as a warning: beware, young folk adventurers, for it may all end like this. Nick Hart may have made one of the finest folk albums in recent years, but it clearly came at a cost. This is a man who is kept awake at…
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Katy Spicer on her 10 years at the English Folk Dance and Song Society
On a pleasant autumn day in late 2017, I found myself kicking about in the fallen leaves outside Cecil Sharp House, killing a little time before I was due to meet the chief executive and artistic director (all one role) of the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS), Katy Spicer.
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Lucy Farrell – The Interview
There’s a growing sense that 2018 may be the Year of Lucy Farrell – the year that the perennial band-member and session musician steps out from the sidelights and takes centre stage. If that’s the case, it has been some time in coming. Lucy has been a very sturdy cog in the traditional folk machine…
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Jack Rutter – The Interview
Meet Jack Rutter: folk singer, multi-instrumentalist extraordinaire, and – as you’ll see – man who frets over things like ‘best before’ dates. I mention this point up front because I think it might give you a sense of who you’re going to read about – a gentle, humble, loveable fellow that I had the pleasure…
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Nick Hart Sings Eight English Folk Songs – a review
Damn it, Nick Hart. Here’s me thinking I’ve heard the best albums of the year already, and then you sneak into my inbox and threaten to blow the competition away. Give us fair warning next time, would you? Spread your name far and wide – people will listen! – and approach your musical career with…
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Normafest 2018: Eliza Carthy gives us the lowdown
Ahead of Normafest 2018, I chatted with Eliza Carthy about the festival’s history, the lineup for the coming event, the where to goes and what to knows. Along the way she chatted openly about her mother’s illness, the importance of the Bright Phoebus album, the contraband on sale in pubs around Robin Hood’s Bay, the…
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Laura Smyth & Ted Kemp: The Poacher’s Fate – a review
The Poacher’s Fate by Laura Smyth & Ted Kemp It’s unlike me to come straight to the point, but what the heck: I love this album. Laura Smyth and Ted Kemp‘s The Poacher’s Fate plonked through my door about a month ago and I promptly went out and bought a CD player so that I could listen…
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Jon Boden: the Afterglow interview
Jon Boden needs no introduction for most of the people reading this blog. Front man to Bellowhead, with whom he sold somewhere around a quarter of a million albums, and bagger of 12 Radio 2 Folk Music awards, he has also knocked up a string of accolades with bands and projects that have included Spiers…
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5 to try: British folk songs chosen by British folk singers – pt 2
The first in our 5-to-Try series seemed to do pretty well indeed, so here we are again with another batch of British folk songs. We’ve lined up a second motley crew of folk-performing luminaries and layabouts, each one eager to tell you which British folk song really makes the hairs on their neck stand up…
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Ian A Anderson: the Interview
There are, as most of you will know, at least two Ian Andersons connected with music from the late 60s onwards. The one we are concerned with for the purposes of today’s interview is not known for his legs (as far as I’m aware), but has been known to give the occasional leg up (my…