Musical parties
Nov. 10th, 2008 08:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustMusic at parties is one of those matters about which "One half of the world cannot understand the pleasures of the other." We were at a party on Saturday evening - and it was a very good party, too, in palatial surroundings, and with good things to eat and drink, and enough people we knew to feel comfortable, and enough people who didn't all know each other to be able to talk to people you didn't yet know... Except that once the band came on, you couldn't really talk to anyone at all, unless you knew them well enough to snuggle up very close and yell in their ear. Still, it was a good band, somewhere further out on the jazzy end of the blues than my comfort zone, but good, and listening to them was fine. More to the point, I do believe that if it's your party, you get to choose whether it's a dancing party or a chatting party.
That's the preamble to Sunday, much of which we spent at the Sage for Folkworks twentieth birthday party: an entirely different conjuction of music and party - except that all the people we ran into there who we knew were either people we had seen at the previous night's party, or people who would have been there, but for one reason or another couldn't be. (The 'best' of these reasons being the one who couldn't get to the party because someone had stolen the front of her car - just the front, the rest of it was fine!)
We went to two formal concerts, one in the afternoon called Sharper than the Thorn (recreating a tour which Folkworks had sent out ten years ago), and the grand gala performance in the evening, and in between we sat around the Sage and struggled with the crossword, had something to eat, listened to the music - both the formal permances and the informal, the two lads who installed themselves in a corner of the lounge and were working through some tunes on fiddle and mouth organ while the young woman with them gazed at her phone (oh, she was probably texting, what do I know?) and read her book.
Between our two concerts we had the widest range of folk-related entertainment I can imagine. Sharper than the Thorn was classical; where the evening was baroque. In the smaller hall, four microphones stood in front of four chairs, and four singers rose in turn to sing a ballad. Two of the four were Martin Carthy and Norma Waterson, both in good voice and clearly enjoying themselves, Norma Waterson presiding like the matriarch she is. Alyth McCormack, one of the other singers, prefaced her song Neptune with the caveat that "I'm not sure that this is really a ballad. But Norma likes it, and if Norma says it's a ballad..." She was the revelation of the concert, for me, particularly with the Gaelic song from Saint Kilda which she sang a capella, very pure and high. The fourth singer was Kevin Mitchell, affable and sweet-voiced.
In the evening we had a show of three halves. First came Flook, not a furry caroon beast of uncertain species but a band built around flute and whistle music. They were followed by inspired mayhem from the New Rope String Band, broad physical clowning applied to solid musicianship and total immersion in the folk tradition. What's the complete opposite of this? How about two young women singing in sweet harmony (and with a taste for mournful songs)? So we had a brief and unscheduled appearance from Rachel and Becky Unthank (a pleasant surprise, as I had not much enjoyed the Winterset concertwe went to - which I think confirms that part, at least, of the problem was in the mixing).
Finally Folkworks founders Ros Rigby and Alistair Anderson appeared. There's still a part of my mind that thinks of Alistair Anderson as the baby of the High Level Ranters, so I hadn't been expecting to hear about plans for the succession of Folkworks - but yes, after twenty years, it's not unreasonable. Since this slot in the programme was billed as Kathryn Tickell & Alistair Anderson, the audience leaped as one to a conclusion, and as the speakers waxed lyrical about the difficulties of finding the right person to take over as artistic director, we laughed and applauded and waited for them to get on with it: which they finally did, and then launched the process of handing over with evidence of how well the two collaborate. I'd happily have heard more of this, but it was time for the finale: Clog on the Tyne. Think Riverdance with clogs and a sense of humour - and rapper dancers, and singers. Singers! One of the big differences between the sixties' folk revival and the current one is that these days singers and instrumentalists seem reluctant to mix, so I was particularly joyful at this collaboration - and at the astonishing energy of the young dancers.
Another good party, in fact.
That's the preamble to Sunday, much of which we spent at the Sage for Folkworks twentieth birthday party: an entirely different conjuction of music and party - except that all the people we ran into there who we knew were either people we had seen at the previous night's party, or people who would have been there, but for one reason or another couldn't be. (The 'best' of these reasons being the one who couldn't get to the party because someone had stolen the front of her car - just the front, the rest of it was fine!)
We went to two formal concerts, one in the afternoon called Sharper than the Thorn (recreating a tour which Folkworks had sent out ten years ago), and the grand gala performance in the evening, and in between we sat around the Sage and struggled with the crossword, had something to eat, listened to the music - both the formal permances and the informal, the two lads who installed themselves in a corner of the lounge and were working through some tunes on fiddle and mouth organ while the young woman with them gazed at her phone (oh, she was probably texting, what do I know?) and read her book.
Between our two concerts we had the widest range of folk-related entertainment I can imagine. Sharper than the Thorn was classical; where the evening was baroque. In the smaller hall, four microphones stood in front of four chairs, and four singers rose in turn to sing a ballad. Two of the four were Martin Carthy and Norma Waterson, both in good voice and clearly enjoying themselves, Norma Waterson presiding like the matriarch she is. Alyth McCormack, one of the other singers, prefaced her song Neptune with the caveat that "I'm not sure that this is really a ballad. But Norma likes it, and if Norma says it's a ballad..." She was the revelation of the concert, for me, particularly with the Gaelic song from Saint Kilda which she sang a capella, very pure and high. The fourth singer was Kevin Mitchell, affable and sweet-voiced.
In the evening we had a show of three halves. First came Flook, not a furry caroon beast of uncertain species but a band built around flute and whistle music. They were followed by inspired mayhem from the New Rope String Band, broad physical clowning applied to solid musicianship and total immersion in the folk tradition. What's the complete opposite of this? How about two young women singing in sweet harmony (and with a taste for mournful songs)? So we had a brief and unscheduled appearance from Rachel and Becky Unthank (a pleasant surprise, as I had not much enjoyed the Winterset concertwe went to - which I think confirms that part, at least, of the problem was in the mixing).
Finally Folkworks founders Ros Rigby and Alistair Anderson appeared. There's still a part of my mind that thinks of Alistair Anderson as the baby of the High Level Ranters, so I hadn't been expecting to hear about plans for the succession of Folkworks - but yes, after twenty years, it's not unreasonable. Since this slot in the programme was billed as Kathryn Tickell & Alistair Anderson, the audience leaped as one to a conclusion, and as the speakers waxed lyrical about the difficulties of finding the right person to take over as artistic director, we laughed and applauded and waited for them to get on with it: which they finally did, and then launched the process of handing over with evidence of how well the two collaborate. I'd happily have heard more of this, but it was time for the finale: Clog on the Tyne. Think Riverdance with clogs and a sense of humour - and rapper dancers, and singers. Singers! One of the big differences between the sixties' folk revival and the current one is that these days singers and instrumentalists seem reluctant to mix, so I was particularly joyful at this collaboration - and at the astonishing energy of the young dancers.
Another good party, in fact.
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no subject
Date: 2008-11-11 02:52 am (UTC)Any ballad called "Neptune"—especially one Waterson-approved—I definitely want to hear.
The whole day sounds wonderful!
no subject
Date: 2008-11-11 10:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-11 05:08 pm (UTC)Thank you!
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Date: 2008-11-11 06:09 am (UTC)Nine
no subject
Date: 2008-11-11 10:44 am (UTC)