The Folk Forecast: 2–15 Aug 2021
Sidmouth Folk Festival Online, Saltburn Folk Festival, Leveret, Ninebarrow and the Official Folk Albums Chart Show.
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Hello, and welcome to a double issue of The Folk Forecast! With online gigs looking a bit quieter over the summer, and a busy weekend at a friend’s wedding ahead of me (at last!), I’ve added gigs for the next fortnight into this bumper issue.
From virtual festivals including Sidmouth Folk Festival Online and Saltburn Folk Festival, to gigs from Leveret and Ninebarrow and the latest Official Folk Albums Chart Show, there’s lots to look forward to in the next couple of weeks.
Here’s this week’s playlist too, to get you in the mood!
MONDAY 2 AUGUST
The Sidmouth Folk Festival Online — Events daily until 6th August
The Sidmouth Folk Festival
Sidmouth Folk Festival are offering gigs online this week, including:
Mon 2nd Aug - John Kirkpatrick + Alice Jones
Tues 3rd Aug - Westward The Light + Brighde Chaimbeul
Wed 4th Aug - Jez Lowe + Ben Paley
Thurs 5th Aug - Matthew Bannister of Folk on Foot interviews Steve Knightley, Eliza Carthy, Jo Freya and Jim Causley
Fri 6th Aug - Around The Festival with Jack Rutter, Belinda Kempster & Fran Foote, Bird in The Belly and Stone Monkey
There were also gigs over the weekend - sorry for the late spot, but you can still catch up on them now (Fara + Rachel Hair & Ron Jappy and Martin Simpson). In addition, there’s a programme of online workshops.
Free to view, with donations to the festival encouraged.
TUESDAY 3 AUGUST
The Official Folk Albums Chart Show* — 7pm BST
Folk on Foot website, YouTube and podcast feed. Commissioned by English Folk Expo and compiled by the Official Charts Company.
See which albums have made the Official Folk Albums Chart this month, with Folk on Foot. Packed with stories, music and exclusive content, this is always a joy to watch. I’ll also be on the show to talk about the latest folk news.
Free to access, but you can support the podcast by becoming a patron.
Covid Sings Singaround — 8pm BST
Soundpost
If you’re missing your usual folk club or singaround, join Fay Hield and fellow folkies from near and far to swap songs over Zoom. Covid Sings is held on the first Tuesday of every month.
Free to attend.
FRIDAY 6 AUGUST
Leeds City Stompers — 8pm BST
The Globe Newcastle
Leeds City Stompers play a mixture of blues, swing, jazz and folk, with Martyn Roper on guitar and double bass, Ian Blackburn on guitar and double bass and John Arnesen on drums and washboard. Expect the odd original song as well as songs by Robert Johnson, Blind Boy Fuller and Hank Williams. They’ll be travelling up from Leeds to Newcastle for this hybrid gig, available to watch in person or online.
Tickets £7.50, with the option to pay more to support the artists and venue. Stream is available to view for a week.
SATURDAY 7 AUGUST
Goderich Celtic Roots Virtual Festival — 12-4am, and 6pm-10pm BST
Goderich Celtic Roots Festival on Facebook
Goderich Celtic Roots Festival will be streaming live on Facebook from Goderich, Ontario. Artists include Seán Keane, The Ennis Sisters, Daoirí Farrell and lots more. Due to the time difference, in the UK it will begin in the early hours, but keep an eye on their Facebook page later on if you’re not a night owl!
Free to view, with donations to the festival encouraged.
Monster Ceilidh Band — 8pm BST
The Globe Newcastle
Monster Ceilidh Band are no strangers to experimentation, and they continue to demonstrate a great talent for producing innovative yet accessible music. They are a band that pushes the boundaries of contemporary folk in all the right directions. This hybrid gig will be available to watch in person as well as online.
Tickets £7.50, with the option to pay more to support the artists and venue. Stream is available to view for a week.
TUESDAY 10 AUGUST
Tuesday Folk People: Jim Causley & Susan Gibson — 9.30pm BST
Home Stage on YouTube and Facebook
Home Stage have been hosting ‘Tuesday Folk People’ every fortnight, with artists being invited to showcase their music and tell us their story. This week, tune in for music and chat with Jim Causley and Susan Gibson.
Free to view
THURSDAY 12 AUGUST
Leveret* — 8pm BST
English Folk Expo / Queen’s Hall Arts Centre
Leveret features three of England’s finest musicians – Andy Cutting (button accordion), Sam Sweeney (fiddle) and Rob Harbron (concertina) – playing together in a unique trio. Leveret’s music is not arranged and instead they rely on mutual trust and musical interaction to create new settings of their repertoire in the moment, drawing audiences in and inviting them to share in music-making that is truly spontaneous and yet deeply timeless. This is a hybrid gig, available to watch at Queen’s Hall Arts Centre in Hexham, Northumberland, as well as via a high-quality livestream.
Tickets £12 plus booking fee.
Saltburn Folk Festival* — Events on 12-15 August, full timings TBA
Saltburn Folk Festival
Join Saltburn Folk Festival for their virtual gathering — a small but perfectly formed celebration of all things Saltburn, available to watch from wherever you are! Expect a great mix of concerts, exclusive video content from artists, public events, sessions and singarounds. The line-up includes both festival favourites and new faces, including Nancy Kerr and James Fagan, Granny's Attic, Narthen, The Wilsons, Alistair Anderson, Janice Burns & Jon Doran, Grace Smith and lots more.
Tickets available soon - keep an eye on the website and Facebook page for more info!
FRIDAY 13 AUGUST
Katie Doherty & The Navigators* — 8pm BST
English Folk Expo / Queen’s Hall Arts Centre
Katie Doherty is an award-winning songwriter, and alongside fiddler Shona Mooney (former Scottish Young Trad Musician of the Year, founder member of The Shee) and the smiliest man in folk, Dave Gray on melodeon, Katie Doherty and The Navigators were formed. Their album "And Then" was released in early 2019 to high critical acclaim and airplay all over Europe, including live sessions on both BBC Radio 2's Mark Radcliffe show and BBC Radio 3's In Tune. This is a hybrid gig, available to watch at Queen’s Hall Arts Centre in Hexham, Northumberland, as well as via a high-quality livestream.
Tickets £12 plus booking fee.
SATURDAY 14 AUGUST
Ninebarrow Live From the Great Outdoors: Volume 2 — 7pm BST
Ninebarrow
Last August, Ninebarrow decided they wanted to give audiences a live stream with a difference. They called it ‘Live from the Great Outdoors’ – a never-before attempted, multi-media concert, broadcast live from a field in North Dorset. This year, they’re doing it all again, with a different selection of songs combined seamlessly with stunning new footage of the Dorset landscape. Join them for an incredible journey through the seasons and the landscapes that inspire their music.
Single tickets £12.50, households £25.
Tom McConville Band — 8pm BST
The Globe Newcastle
Fronted by the incendiary fiddle playing of BBC Radio 2 Musician of the Year Tom McConville (who Seth Lakeman regards as his biggest influence), this band also features Shona Newey, a BBC Folk Award nominee and one of the finest accordion players in the country. Add to that David Newey’s ‘incredible, unique guitar playing’ (BBC Radio 6), and Phil Murray – the man Mike Harding called ‘the best acoustic bass player in Britain’, and you have a force to be reckoned with. This hybrid gig will be available to watch in person or online.
Tickets £7.50, with the option to pay more to support the artists and venue. Stream is available to view for a week.
SUNDAY 15 AUGUST
Songwriting Masterclass: ‘Character & Story Songs’ with M G Boulter — 11am BST
Hudson Records
Hudson Records are running a series of songwriting masterclasses over the next few months, giving you the chance to learn from some of the finest songwriters around! M G Boulter will be sharing his wisdom on character and story songs, and if you’ve heard his recent album Clifftown, then you’ll be sure he knows a thing or two about great storytelling!
Attendance is on a ‘pay what you can’ basis - email songwriting@hudsonearth.org to sign up.
Regular events
‘Almost Acoustic’ with Eliza Carthy on Radio Scarborough - Mondays at 8pm. The show is also repeated through the week, so you can catch up if you miss it.
The Folk Club on Clubhouse - The Folk Room with Eliza Carthy is held on Wednesdays at 7pm and the Traditional Ballad and Songs Session is on Thursdays at 7pm. You’ll need to join the Clubhouse app to come along.
Afternoon Tea with Paul Walker and Karen Pfeiffer - Concerts are held on Fridays at 4pm on Facebook.
Jack Hogsden’s Kitchen Sessions - Concerts are regularly held on Saturdays at 7.30pm on Facebook. All money raised goes to Don’t Stop the Music.
Tim Edey’s Saturday Night Late Date - Concerts are regularly held on Saturdays at 10pm on Facebook.
Social Dancing with Lisa Heywood - Regular chances to get together and learn about folk dances from the UK and further afield.
‘Folk from the Boat’ - a YouTube series exploring traditional songs and tunes with Anna Tam, as she travels through Britain’s waterways on her canal boat.
James Riley: The Rooftop Sessions
James Riley, who livestreamed gigs from his roof in London during lockdown, has got Arts Council funding for The Rooftop Sessions, a live streamed concert series with music every weekend in August - keep an eye on his Facebook page for details.
Free online folk films
The British Film Institute and Cambridge Folk Festival have teamed up to make a selection of folk music related films available for free, including documentaries about The Watersons and Kathryn Tickell, performances from Fairport Convention and lots more. Find more details over on Folk Radio UK.
This week’s playlist
Head over to this week’s playlist to hear a selection of tracks from artists featured in this issue. Listen to something new, and see which gigs you might fancy going to!
Record of the week
Record of the Week is Live from the Glass Isle by Chris Cleverley. Featuring tracks from Cleverley’s previous studio albums which have been stripped back for solo performance in the pandemic era, the result is an album that puts the spotlight on honest and expressive storytelling. The recording of the album also has quite a story — it was recorded a stone’s throw from the foot of Glastonbury Tor in Somerset on the day of the pagan festival of Lughnasadh.
Reflecting on the experience of that dawn, Cleverley says:
“This old pagan rite of passage, commencing the harvest season, is so symbolic of facing a period of doubt and inconstancy with hope and conviction. It carried immense meaning for me as we waded, knee-deep, through the mind-spinning uncertainty of the pandemic. It offered the perfect clarity & headspace to make these recordings.”
The album will be released on Friday 6th August, which also happens to be Bandcamp Friday, so if you order it on release day you can support Chris even more.
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The Folk Forecast is created for artists, for audiences and for the UK folk scene. All information is correct to the best of our knowledge. If you have queries about the events listed, please contact the artists or promoters. If you have any suggestions for inclusion in future newsletters, please email TheFolkForecast@gmail.com. We may not be able to include absolutely everything, but we’re interested in UK folk events with a broad appeal, and would particularly welcome suggestions from Scotland, Wales and Ireland. The Folk Forecast is compiled by one person, so please bear with me if I can’t get back to you right away.
* Alongside The Folk Forecast, I’m associated with other organisations on the folk scene, including Folk on Foot, Fancourt Music, Live to Your Living Room and English Folk Expo. Events where I have some involvement with the promoter or agency are marked with a star. Although I have other affiliations, I strive to be fair and inclusive and tell you about anything I think you’ll enjoy!
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