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You can find Warwick Folk Club
every Monday night at The Warwick Arms Hotel in the heart of Warwick.
Warwick Folk Club Newsletter
- June 2008
Here's a round-up of the happenings
at Warwick Folk Club during June.
We kicked off the month in fine style on June
2nd with Dark Island as our featured guests. Check out the photo
gallery for their individual portraits! Stefan, the fiddle player
is still really a "guest" member of the group, since
he also plays with several other bands but you'd never know it
from the way they all play so well together. It's a beautiful
mixture of sounds, with the bouzouki and mandolin (sometimes banjo)
allowing the fiddle and low whistle to swoop and soar with the
melodies.
Dark Island
Well what can we say about the Top 20 Theme
Night on June 9th? Everyone who came really entered into the spirit
of it and we were treated to a wide variety of chart entries.
Because the songs were so well known, everyone could join in with
them and there was more chorus singing than in a month of folk
clubs! Ten of the chosen songs had been No. 1 hits so it's not
surprising they were well known, from "24 Hours From Tulsa"
(Kathy Shore) via "Those Were The Days" (Bill Bates),
to "Apache" (Robert and Julie Neale.) Many of the songs
were from the 50's and 60's but Jonathan Waller brought it more
up to date with "Message In A Bottle" and the Roddy
Frame song as done by Aztec Camera, "Somewhere In My Heart".
The accolade of "left field" songs of the night must
go to Martin Day who did "Ghost Riders In The Sky" (see
the photo gallery if you dare..!) and Des Patalong who brought
back memories of Saturday morning children's programmes on the
wireless (it wasn't called the radio in those days…) with
Ronnie Hilton's timeless classic "A Windmill In Old Amsterdam"!
Watch this space for the next theme night later in the year.
Martin Carthy
Our special guest on June 16th was Martin Carthy,
one of the best known names of the folk world for over 40 years.
Some people expressed surprise at the club being able to have
someone of this stature as a guest but Martin has been, and continues
to be, a great supporter of folk clubs, making sure that he's
not out of reach of the smaller clubs such as Warwick. Sadly,
Danansooz were indisposed at the last minute, so Norman Wheatley
stepped in to entertain the capacity audience before the main
act of the night. During Martin's sets we were taken into the
world of the English tradition with stories of witches casting
spells, gory beheadings and adventure on the high seas. The guitarists
in the audience were probably trying to work out the many different
tunings that he used during the night while also being reminded
what a good a guitar player he is. Two songs stood out by being
very different: one was the cautionary tale of the wake for the
funeral of someone who wasn't dead (!) and a very unexpected version
of "The Harry Lime Theme" from the film "The Third
Man". Without doubt, a night which was one of the highlights
of the first half of the year.
There was one of the regular Performers' Nights
on June 23rd with several performers doing songs which, as they
said, could have been used on the Top 20 night. One was Maggie
Coleman with a version of the Phil Ochs song made famous by Joan
Baez "There But For Fortune". Imagine a time when that
record made the Top Ten…
Blackheart
To round off the month, our guests on June 30th
were Blackheart - Chrissy Mostyn and Richard Pilkington. They
sang a programme of entirely self-penned songs and by the end
of the evening the audience was won over by their enthusiasm,
obvious sincerity and musical ability. Among their topics was
one which they thought might be the only song about Wigan (later
disproved by Jonathan Waller!) and one about how many of the landmarks
in Bolton have been pulled down. Richard demonstrated his amazing
dexterity on a range of four guitars and a mandolin while Chrissy
lent her very distinctive voice to their heartfelt songs. They
made a lot of friends at Warwick Folk Club that night.
There's more to be enjoyed at the club during
July - we hope you'll come along to The Warwick Arms one of these
Monday nights!
Maggie, Martin, Norman and Val.
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