Co-Operative Cambridge Folk Festival
Sunday

Lucinda Williams should have played Cambridge Folk Festival a couple of years back but had to pull out. Lucinda Williams helped define the genre that has become known as Americana, not quite full country, not quite singer/songwriter, hints of the great American songbook, but also hints of blues and swing. I saw her first ever UK festival appearance at Glastonbury a good few years back and only a couple of times since. UK festival appearances are as rare as rocking horse teeth. This was one I was looking forward to

There had been some rumours going around all day that Lucinda has developed a thing about cameras and that there may not be a pit for her set. Rumours also circulated about what the film guys could and couldn't do. As it was we were briefed that we would only be in the pit for the first two numbers, no flash, which is a given.

I mention this only because of what happened on stage later and it needs some scene setting.

There's a small delay in the set up, a bloke in a suit and wellies is making sure that the music stand with the crib sheet on it can be read and Lucinda comes out. You can tell she's not happy. She announces that she's going to play an acoustic number she hasn't played for a number of years. The photographers start taking pictures, no flash.

The first song false starts and Lucinda says she can't do this. She looks down into the pit and announces to the audience that the photographers are the problem. The photographers look at one another and on mass leave the pit so as not to cause an issue or be a scapegoat for Williams.

Lucinda's band come on and she starts playing an electric set. It appears to only be still cameras with no flash that are a problem, the film cameras keep on rolling as do camera phones in the audience. The piece of theatre over, Williams gets on with her set as though nothing had happened.

With her band behind her and songbook in front of her Williams delivered a pretty reasonable set. It obviously did her confidence some good as she found the time to return to the song she'd abandoned at the start of her set.

As a fan of her recorded works, I have to say there were aspects of her set that I would have enjoyed, she's a really good songwriter. I'm not quite sure why this gig went the way it did, only one person knows for sure.

The last act for me was on in Stage Two, I'd originally intended to catch the Treacherous Orchestra, but the lure of slide guitarist Watermelon Slim and his band The Workers proves too much. I'm ending the 2009 Co-Operative Cambridge Folk Festival at Stage Two.

There's a number of different ways of doing slide guitar, Watermelon Slim's method appears to be sticking a dobro to a packing case, raise the strings and get on with it.

Watermelon Slim And The Workers deliver their blues deep and dirty. This is raw southern blues that's as much at home behind chicken wire as it is front and centre of a stage.

Slim, is a visual performer, frequently using his hands to emphasise a point during a song or to display a prop he's brought along. He's ably supported by The Workers who keep pounding out the rhythms for Slim and regular guitarist Ronnie McMillan Jr to work their magic around and it's real magic they're working.

I'd gone into Stage Two with a bit of a huff on and by the end of the first track it had gone, blown away by some incredible fret work.

It was a great way to finish the festival, high octane, hard hitting blues. Watermelon Slim is one of only a handful, a hand that includes BB King and Robert Cray, to have had six Blues Music Awards nominations in the same year. Whilst BB King and Robert Cray are household names, Watermelon Slim has yet to achieve that distinction on this side of the pond, he's definitely headed in the right direction.

With that the 45th Cambridge Folk Festival, the first one under the Co-Operative Banner was over. My initial thoughts are that it's been a good vintage.

As per usual I've been blown away by artists I'd not really heard before, Rupa And The April Fishes, Watermelon Slim, Booker T(well live at least). The next generation of folk appears to be safe in the hands of Bella Hardy, Jim Moray, Ruairidh MacMillan, Paul McKenna, Lorne MacDougall and Megan Henwood.

Brian McNeill's Session was one of the best, there was something about it that just gelled, even if it did leave me feeling old and jealous of all the young talent on display.

By and large the weather was typical of a Cambridge Folk Festival Weekend, one huge shower, but pretty good otherwise. This year it felt like the festival came and went too quickly. There was some great craic all in all chalk up another success.