BRIAN
PETERS: |
 Brian at the Black Diamond Folk Club |
This episode’s mugshot
comes courtesy of Derek Catley, resident photographer at the Black
Diamond Folk Club in Birmingham, who takes shots of every guest
artist for the club’s impressive archive (just the place to look
for pics of your favourite folk stars looking embarrassingly young).
The Black Diamond is one of the best folk clubs in Britain, if you like
a traditional flavour, an excellent set of residents, a nice room and
a responsive crowd; I always like to remind them that when I first played
there in the 1980s as a newcomer to the folk club circuit I was so intimidated
by the standard of the residents I heard in the first half that I nearly
scuttled off home… |
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| So here comes yet another belated update. How these people manage to chirrup on Twitter on a daily or hourly basis is quite beyond me. It’s months since I last wrote stuff here, and it’s hard to remember everything I’ve been up to since last summer’s extended visit to the US. There have been plenty of folk club gigs, of course, and having listed the Black Diamond as one of my favourites it’s only fair to mention Bodmin FC as well – another club where I have a long history and always have a good time. Vic and Viv Legg both on the front row, and many other old friends in attendance. The trip to the South West was a nice few days, in fact, with good gigs at Folk on the Moor and Devizes, as well as a workshop for Tom and Barbara Brown’s Shammick Acoustic organization, with the title ‘Sing the Song Tell the Story’. This was on the topic of song interpretation, and my recorded examples included a comparison of Alexandar Burke’s X-Factor-winning version of Halleljuah with the Leonard Cohen original – something of a stylistic contrast, the class agreed. |
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The ‘Songs of Trial and Triumph’ live show has unveiled its gothic and occasionally gory selection of Child Ballads at quite a few festivals this year, including Celtic Connections in Glasgow back in January, Cheltenham in February (where it drew over a hundred masochistic punters), Girvan and Chester. More ancient mysteries from the pages of F. J. Child will unfold at Chorley and Warwick Folk Festivals, followed by some forays into he worlds of storytelling (Festival at the Edge) and literature (Ilkley and Sheffield Lit Fests during the Autumn). A new review of the CD by Colin Randall (former Daily Telegraph folk music critic) appeared here a little while ago. Scroll down past Tom Bliss to find it! OK, here's something a bit different: when I played the Midway Folk Club in Stockport, I asked Grant Baynham of ‘Quicksilver’ (and formerly BBC TV) to play some accompaniment for Dallas Rag. Obviously I realised he was a pretty handy guitarist, but I still wasn’t quite prepared for the firestorm of picking he unleashed. Talk about stealing the show… |
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Lastly, a photo from the Elephant and Castle, Lewes (thanks Ann), where I was giving a ballad workshop in February. This character tapped me on the shoulder and asked me if I’d like to join his band. I think I might do just that, one of these days… Have a good summer! |
March
brought another trip to the US, confined this time to New England with
concerts in Connecticut, Boston and New York State. I got to do some
playing with 
While
in the US, playing in upstate New York at Caffe Lena in Saratoga Springs,
I stayed over with Kieron Means and was surprised to notice amongst
a collage of photos a picture involving someone looking like me, but
in a situation I had no recollection of. Kieron scanned the snap for
me, and it turns out it was taken at the farewell event at Whitby
Folk festival in 2007. Supporting cast comprises Clive Pownceby of
Southport’s Bothy Folk Club, Sara Grey, Kieron and Alastair
Vannan. The green and purple swatches in my and Sara’s hands
are clumps of heather given out to celebrate the passing of another
Whitby Week, and I think it’s fair to assume that drink has
been taken amongst the assembled company.
Chippenham
Festival at the end of May gave me the opportunity to work with 
In
early June I got together, after a gap of a couple of years, with Dave
Webber and Anni Fentiman to perform some of the material from the old
Widow’s Uniform show (which we look back on with a sense of both
fondness and horror) at Blaydon Folk Club. Always good to perform with
Dave and Anni – they’re a lot of fun and their voices seem
to fit well with the kind of harmonies I like to sing. So here we are,
getting stuck into Peter Bellamy’s brilliant setting of Kipling’s
Recessional. I did a bit of research prior to this show and confirmed
a long-held belief that the line about “Lesser breeds without
the law” - widely assumed to have referred to Indian subjects
of British imperialism - was nothing of the sort, having been intended
by Kipling to signify the Axis powers in Europe prior to World War I.
George Orwell, no less, pointed that out.
