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ventaAfter a journey up the M1 that was rather longer than intended, I landed back in Darlington for the Spring Thing folk festival, which my parents help run. The festival is based in the local Arts Centre, where my Dad also works, and has been going for nearly twenty years now.
The Darlington folk club always runs on Thursday nights, and last night's marked the official beginning of the festival. Having spent the early part of the evening on the M1, I lurched up just in time for the main act. Although I'm aware of the names, I'd not heard them play before: Saskia Tomkins (fiddle) and Steafan Hannigan (guitar, whistles, Uilleann pipes, bodhran, etc, etc etc).
They're absolutely amazing.
ST is a fantastic fiddle player - one of those irritating people who manages to make it look effortless, as if she's barely paying attention and is actually mentally doing the crossword at the same time. I didn't know you could make a fiddle sound breathy if you wanted to.
ST also has a huge and varied repertoire of tunes. It seems as if she's been all over Europe, picking up music as she went, so there were Bulgarian, Swedish and Czech tunes, mixed in with their base of Irish. She reminded me of someone, too, but I couldn't work out who and this bugged me all evening.
There was absolutely no problem working out who SH reminded me of. A bloke with a broad Belfast-region accent, saying things like "Arrgh, it's always a good trick when your pipes EXPLODE mid-gig." (Can you see who it is, yet ?)
To be fair, his pipes didn't exactly explode. Just some bits fell off at some point. But it did remind me how much I like Uilleann pipes. They're a much gentler tone than their scary Highland cousins, and they're bellows-blown which makes playing them look a lot less painful. They've also got a multiplicity of extra levers and twiddly knobs, meaning you can get more than one note out of them at once (in addition to the drones). Fantastically complicated sound - I'd love to be able to play them. (Even if, while strapping them on, SH described them as part musical instrument and part S&M kit.)
The thing SH is most famous for is playing the bodhran. "But how come?" I hear you cry. "Surely a bodhran is just a flat drum that you hit with a stick?"
Well, yes. That's what 99.9% of the population do, and accounts for why the folk world has nearly as many anti-bodhran jokes as it does anti-banjo jokes. (What's the best thing to play a bodhran with ? A Stanely knife.) Y'see, most people haven't noticed that a bodhran belongs in the tunable percussion section. With your spare hand you push against the skin of the drum, and change the note it makes. So by the time SH has got going, he can have two different rhythmns and a tune going. The guy is a god-like genius.
Mind you, by the time he's doing that while ST is playing a tune in 7/8, we're getting into the realms of excess cleverbuggery. If you like traditional tunes, though, get off your bum and go and see them.
This morning, the plan was as follows: Dad takes me to the dentist, goes to the covered market to pick up millions of daffodils (which get used to decorate the Arts Centre for the festival), he and I meet and the Arts Centre, come home. Simple. Of course, as I was leaving the dentist, a phone call informs me he's going to be late: parking in the church yard, he got nabbed by the vicar who wanted him to sort the church's central heating clocks after a power-cut threw them all out.
Never mind, I'll sit and wait quietly with my book. Only no, there's carnage in the Arts Centre already, which I'd got sucked into by the time Dad arrived. During the festival there are craft stalls which, to fit into limited space, are carefully planned. Except the Arts Centre staff had lost the floor plan the festival stewards drew up last night, and put several people in the wrong places. Who now said they wouldn't move. Then there was the music stall who'd only booked two tables, but was taking up three, and claimed everyone knew the size of the stall when he booked, so he was keeping all the space...
So there was wrangling, and ringing stalholders, and moving tables, and arguing with people, and lots of sticking bits of paper on the remaining tables to identify whose they were. Dad and I escaped eventually, and ran away. No doubt someone will have found some more crisis to have when we get back this evening.
The Darlington folk club always runs on Thursday nights, and last night's marked the official beginning of the festival. Having spent the early part of the evening on the M1, I lurched up just in time for the main act. Although I'm aware of the names, I'd not heard them play before: Saskia Tomkins (fiddle) and Steafan Hannigan (guitar, whistles, Uilleann pipes, bodhran, etc, etc etc).
They're absolutely amazing.
ST is a fantastic fiddle player - one of those irritating people who manages to make it look effortless, as if she's barely paying attention and is actually mentally doing the crossword at the same time. I didn't know you could make a fiddle sound breathy if you wanted to.
ST also has a huge and varied repertoire of tunes. It seems as if she's been all over Europe, picking up music as she went, so there were Bulgarian, Swedish and Czech tunes, mixed in with their base of Irish. She reminded me of someone, too, but I couldn't work out who and this bugged me all evening.
There was absolutely no problem working out who SH reminded me of. A bloke with a broad Belfast-region accent, saying things like "Arrgh, it's always a good trick when your pipes EXPLODE mid-gig." (Can you see who it is, yet ?)
To be fair, his pipes didn't exactly explode. Just some bits fell off at some point. But it did remind me how much I like Uilleann pipes. They're a much gentler tone than their scary Highland cousins, and they're bellows-blown which makes playing them look a lot less painful. They've also got a multiplicity of extra levers and twiddly knobs, meaning you can get more than one note out of them at once (in addition to the drones). Fantastically complicated sound - I'd love to be able to play them. (Even if, while strapping them on, SH described them as part musical instrument and part S&M kit.)
The thing SH is most famous for is playing the bodhran. "But how come?" I hear you cry. "Surely a bodhran is just a flat drum that you hit with a stick?"
Well, yes. That's what 99.9% of the population do, and accounts for why the folk world has nearly as many anti-bodhran jokes as it does anti-banjo jokes. (What's the best thing to play a bodhran with ? A Stanely knife.) Y'see, most people haven't noticed that a bodhran belongs in the tunable percussion section. With your spare hand you push against the skin of the drum, and change the note it makes. So by the time SH has got going, he can have two different rhythmns and a tune going. The guy is a god-like genius.
Mind you, by the time he's doing that while ST is playing a tune in 7/8, we're getting into the realms of excess cleverbuggery. If you like traditional tunes, though, get off your bum and go and see them.
This morning, the plan was as follows: Dad takes me to the dentist, goes to the covered market to pick up millions of daffodils (which get used to decorate the Arts Centre for the festival), he and I meet and the Arts Centre, come home. Simple. Of course, as I was leaving the dentist, a phone call informs me he's going to be late: parking in the church yard, he got nabbed by the vicar who wanted him to sort the church's central heating clocks after a power-cut threw them all out.
Never mind, I'll sit and wait quietly with my book. Only no, there's carnage in the Arts Centre already, which I'd got sucked into by the time Dad arrived. During the festival there are craft stalls which, to fit into limited space, are carefully planned. Except the Arts Centre staff had lost the floor plan the festival stewards drew up last night, and put several people in the wrong places. Who now said they wouldn't move. Then there was the music stall who'd only booked two tables, but was taking up three, and claimed everyone knew the size of the stall when he booked, so he was keeping all the space...
So there was wrangling, and ringing stalholders, and moving tables, and arguing with people, and lots of sticking bits of paper on the remaining tables to identify whose they were. Dad and I escaped eventually, and ran away. No doubt someone will have found some more crisis to have when we get back this evening.
