Come All Ye (again) for a day in London of folk, food, facilities and a nice warm winter sit down all in the company of some of the country’s finest folk musicians.
The Magpie Arc are very, very delighted to announce that lining-up at our 3rd Indoor Festival of Folk at Cecil Sharp House in London on Saturday the 8th of February are the collectively superb and award-winning Edgelarks, The Bookshop Band, Sam Carter, Frankie Archer AND “The Guv’nor” of all things British folk rock, Ashley Hutchings, who in his 80th birthday year will be BBC presenter and Folk On Foot podcaster Matthew Bannister’s special interview guest.
THE MAGPIE ARC
The Magpie Arc are, of course, ATB favourites, and with good reason. Let’s face it, Martin Simpson isn’t going to plug in his dextrous talent into any old folk-rock band, the band rounded out by fiddle player and consummate trad interpretess, Nancy Kerr, and guitarist/singer-songwriter, Findlay Napier. Add in the back line of Alex Hunter, on bass, and Tom A. Wright on drums and gizmos, and you have an Anglo-Scots behemoth. No wonder we loved their latest album.
SAM CARTER
Sam Carter has been quietly honing his skills, as singer and writer over several years, a very steady hand on guitar to boot, with the realisation coming that he is “suddenly” one of our best. Whether solo or with his band, a stonking show is guaranteed, and will be showcasing the songs from his recent 5th solo album, Silver Horizon, reviewed here.
EDGELARKS
Edgelarks are the duo of Phillip Henry and Hannah Martin, he the dobro maestro, she adept on just about anything with strings, equally at home with traditions drawn worldwide, well beyond Celtic and/or Americana. . Besides performing as a pair, they are frequently also part of Peter Knight’s Gigspanner Big Band. They are very, very good, without even mentioning their well-paired vocals.
THE BOOKSHOP BAND
Maybe less well known than the others, The Bookshop Band should be an equally inviting treat. Another duo, Ben Please and Beth Porter (from Spellsongs), they specialise in being inspired by books, and over a dozen releases have seen them tackle shelf upon shelf, by writers as diverse as Shakespeare to Philip Pullman. No less than Pete Townshend of the Who produced last summer’s Emerge Return.
Last but by no means least, Frankie Archer has exploded onto the folk scene with music that transcends stereotypes using a combination of manipulated samples, synths, drum tracks and earthy Northumbrian fiddle and voice to capture her audience. Her aim? To shake up genres and traditions, challenge perspectives and call for a fairer future.
Do we really have to explain the worth of Ashley Hutchings? “Tyger” has been at the forefront of electrified folk music his near entire career, as founder member, in turn, of Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span and myriad incarnations of the Albion (Country/Dance) Bands. Add in a slew of celebrated solo and other recordings, The Compleat Dancing Master and the dynasty of Morris On recordings being very notable examples, and he truly is the Guv’nor.
This should be an eminently fascinating romp through his decades of influence. Not for nothing does Bob Dylan say: “My friend Ashley Hutchings is the godfather of folk-rock; he made us a genre we couldn’t refuse.”
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