Saturday
Well it just gets better and better!
After meeting some of Jen's former Uni mates in Cambridge for coffee, we returned with our Marks and Spencer sandwiches to the festival site, bought a Guinness or three and prepared for another day.
Chris Wood began with some lovely songs full of pathos and humour, particularly one about his daughter, simply called 'Hard'. His song 'One In A Million' won him the best original song award at last years Radio 2 Folk Awards.
Canadian Devon Sproule was probably my first 'no-no' of the weekend. A mixture of jazz, blues and country with some interesting rambling tunes and lyrics. Didn't work for me. Not unpleasant, just lacked edge.
Irish band Altan were at their best, Brilliant sets of tunes that got the whole crowd jumping. Songs sung mostly in Gaelic were beautiful.
Jen and I then went for some food. Greek today, chicken kebabs with humus. Tasty. After some more Guinness we returned for the evening session, parking ourselves quite near the front.
Eric Bibb, my personal favourite was as brilliant as ever. What a cool guy he is. Great songs and fabulous blues guitar work. He was accompanied by the legendary Danny Thompson on bass. His song, 'Pockets', off his latest album, is one of my current favourites. This was also Jennifer's top performance of the day.
Martha Wainwright, daughter of Louden the third and Kate McGarrigle, and also sister of Rufus, performed a very lively set. Think she was on something! I'm not too familiar with her songs but warmed to her as the performance went on. She sang one of her Dad's songs as a tribute to him being a Cambridge regular. She also sang a song about her dad called 'Mother F*******g A***hole'. BBC 4 were recording this performance for TV on Aug 29th (she was introduced on to the stage by Mark Radcliffe, my favourite DJ!). Not sure how much of it will make the final cut as she littered the set with expletives. She finished with a quite stunning performance of the standard 'Stormy Weather'.
Next up was the legendary songwriter from New Orleans Allen Toussaint. He has written many hit songs too numerous to mention here, for people like the Stones, Bonnie Raitt, Lee Dorsey, Glen Campbell, Elvis Costello and many more. He is in his mid sixties I think and looked very dapper in his grey suit, playing his Steinway Grand. And what a piano player! Some brilliant playing and good singing too. He was supported by bass, drums and a Alto sax player who was quite fabulous. One song 'Mardi Gras' was great and he took time out during a drum and bass solo to throw carnival masks and necklaces out into the audience. Another really cool performer.
kd lang we had not seen before. I have a couple of her albums and although she has a just fabulous voice, I have found her songs difficult to access at times. The audience filled up with many of her 'female followers'. She started unsurely because of some technical difficulties, but once they were resolved she took the place by storm. She had a great band and sang some fantastic songs including crowd pleasers 'Miss Chatterlaine' and 'Constant Craving' . Her rendition of Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah' was memorable. Jen and I were certainly won over by this performance. Really brilliant.
The final act of the night, 'The Imagined Village' took ages to set up but was well worth the wait. An incredible fusion of sounds and cultures, all about Englishness featured Simon Emerson of the Afro Celt Sound System, Eliza Carthy and her dad Martin, Chris Wood and Billy Bragg amongst others The performance explored Englishness through amazing arrangements of traditional songs including Scarborough Fair, Tam Lyn, John Barleycorn, Hard Times of Old England and others. Instruments included fiddles, mandolins, sitar, Indian percussion, drums, cello, guitar, double bass and more. Paul Weller had some input to the project as did poet Benjamin Zephaniah. The traditional folk family 'The Copper Family' were also featured. There was a video playing as well, with commentary from one of the Copper family and Zephaniah's poem. It was all just superb. I will now buy the album, however, like kd lang, I don't think it will match the live performance.
So ends another memorable day. Great music, food, atmosphere and company. Couldn't ask for more. My feet are killing me!
One day to go. Tomorrow is Seth Lakeman day. Can't wait! Really don't want this to end. Why aren't I going on to Cropredy?!