Here is Page 1 of our catalogue of past guests to let you know what you have been missing over the last few months - an insight into the calibre and variety of guests you can see at our little club.
Guests A - C
They're finger-picking good! Hot jazzers and bluesers to a man, The Amigos love to party - which is why they're on such demand at pubs and clubs across South Wales. It's real festive celebration time!
Ira Bernstein and Riley Baugus
The one-man ten-toe percussion wonder! Ira Bernstein is a tap and step dancing champion who has shared the stage with many of the world's greatest tap and step dancers. His energetic flair and ability to demonstrate a multitude of traditional styles through his feet is quite incredible.
Riley Baugus is accompanying his old friend on this tour. Raised in a household where recordings of old-time music were often played, he developed a love and appreciation for traditional, southern Appalachian music as a young child. He began playing the fiddle in 1976 at age 10.
New Zealand singer, songwriter, bush poet and mountaineer Martin Curtis has been writing and singing songs about his adopted country for well over 20 years. He has recorded eight albums and has toured extensively throughout New Zealand and the United Kingdom, as well as giving performances in Australia, Hong Kong, Austria, Norway and Nepal. He lives in the foothills of New Zealand’s Southern Alps, a place of magnificent beauty that has become the inspiration behind much of his music.
As the South Wales Echo said: "New Zealand is a beautiful land of bewildering contrasts. Drive through Christchurch and you could be in the heart of Southern England. Head south-west and you're in the Scottish glens, with Switzerland just next door and Norway a few miles beyond. One minute it's all so familiar, the next you're trying to read the stars in a totally strange sky and the moon is upside down... Martin’s songs embody this feeling of closeness and distance, of Europeans uprooted to seek a new life on the opposite side of the world. He sings of times past and present, from the days of the Gin And Raspberry mine to the battles of the Nineties. He has added hilarious bush poems and old New Zealand songs... to create a fascinating, captivating repertoire." Last appeared at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday June 6, 2007
Sizzling Irish squeezeboxes and guitar - from Galway, veteran melodeon master Joe and Anne kick up a storm with thrilling reels, jigs and beautiful airs. Plenty of Celtic spirit - and charm, too.
All the way from New Mexico!
Founders of the group Ken Keppler and Jeannie McLerie are joined by Mark Mueller who adds guitar and second fiddle to the line-up.
Their repertoire spans Cajun, Zydeco, cowboy songs, Norteno
(Tex Mex), early Chicken Scratch and New Mexican Spanish
colonial dance tunes, all served heavily spiced with the hot
chilli spirit of the modern Southwest.
Les Barker
"Les Barker writes strange poems and comes from Manchester." So starts the biography on Les's own site. We won't try and elaborate here - it's all been said before. Yes, he's hilarious - but wow, does he make you think!
A fantastic hit at the Easter At Miskin Festival and winners of the Harry Prigg Absent Friends Trophy – that’s who Chord are! Harriet Earis and Colman Connolly are both musicians with the London-Irish band Siansa. Colman is well known as an uilleann piper is one of the principal teachers at the London Pipers Club. Harriet, who has already been invited to America twice, reached Grade 8 with Distinction on classical harp, then got converted to Irish music and has never looked back.
For
the Chord website, click here.
Baggyrinkle, the Swansea shantymen, delivered a seasonal surprise for the Folk Club Christmas Party 2003! Who said that salt and snow don’t go together? Dear old Santa (that’s Dave Robinson) and his merry crew have been flying off to America, to Mystic Seaport’s festival - and we don’t mean sleigh bells and reindeer…
Jim has been on the traditional music scene since his days as leader of The Marsden Rattlers, of South Shields, one of the first dance bands top come out of the folk revival. He first picked up a melodeon in 1964 after moving to London and hearing the local Irish in their musical strongholds of Fulham and Holloway. Moving home again, the Rattlers were formed and played many a barn dance and folk club between Yorkshire and Fife, where he heard the wonderful Scots tradition at Blairgowrie and Kinross, winning the melodeon competition at both before becoming a judge. Festivals in Cambridge, London and abroad followed, often in support of Bob Davenport.
Jim moved to West Cork, where the locals wanted a singer. No-one else was singing the old Irish songs, so he racked his brains and soon was singing all over West Cork in bars, where he is quite capable of entertaining a noisy audience without the aid of a bank of speakers.
He began to tour the UK again in 1991 and now is a regular
visitor to clubs from Bodmin to Inverness, as well as being
a guest at the prestigious National English Festival and the
traditional Scottish festivals at Auchtermuchty and
Kirriemuir. He has also become a regular reviewer and writer
for Living Tradition magazine.
Joy's warm, big voice won a host of friends and admirers when she came to Llantrisant on her last tour from her home in New York - and we promised to rebook her and all her wonderful tales of American tradition. Joy's leaving her Shanty group, The Johnson Girls, for the moment and teaming up with guitarist Don for another surprise.
This lovely storyteller, singer and musician comes from Port Macquarie, New South Wales. She performs Romancing the Stories in my Life, a selection of songs and stories of rural Australian life from the 1850s to the present day - an entertaining and moving tribute to the courage and resourcefulness of Australian country women.
- From Combe
Martin in North Devon, Tom and Barbara have a fine
pedigree of traditional singing. Barbara was
raised in a musical family in North Wiltshire, while Tom's
family were also singers and musicians, on both sides
through several generations. He went to work on the land
in Cornwall, where he encountered the extant Cornish
song and music tradition through people such as Charlie
Bate, Mervyn Vincent and Bob Cann, together with
innumerable other singers who met regularly in pubs or
at home and sang for the joy of it. It is this that has
deeply influenced both Tom and Barbara's interest,
approach and attitude to the material.
- Tom and Barbara have been singing and organising together ever since they met at Padstow in 1969. Although their speciality is songs of the West Country and Cornwall, their repertoire draws from a huge range of traditional and modern songs. Tom's instrumental ability on guitar, mandola, concertina and melodeon is a highlight - and Llantrisant Folk Club welcomes back two old and precious friends. Last appeared at Llantrisant Wednesday January 10, 2007
Dangerous
Curves
Viva Smith, Jen Ingersoll and Anne Rickard bring together their backgrounds of jazz, traditional and country - a gourmet menu of familiar, new and humorous songs, all served up by rich vocal harmonies and extra pepperami. They have made their mark on the acoustic music scene with harmony workshops at festivals, clubs and cabaret. It's a unique full-bodied style – for a reasonable fee and BIG sticky cakes!
Here they are again - and Llantrisant Folk Club is looking forward so much to seeing and hearing them. When Nicole Murray and John Thompson drove into the Windsor Hotel's car park in their much-loved camper van to share with us what they called "hot harmonies and beautiful ballads", we didn't know what had hit us. Cloudstreet kept the audience on the edge of their seats with their stunning, inventive takes on international folk song - it's intelligent refreshment for the mind and body, and it's fascinating fun, too!
Nicole and John are experts on the flute and strings - other experts on Australian tradition are Nancy Kerr and James Fagan, who expound enthusiastically: "A delightful duo who not only inspire one another but put an indelible smile on the faces of their audiences. Strong harmonies, side-splitting stories and ballads brought to life in a way we hadn't seen before."
Last appearance at Llantrisant Folk Club - Wednesday 21st June 2006
"A one-man folk festival", as BBC Radio 2 dubbed him, or "One of our most versatile and impressive performers" (Sidmouth International Festival). Pete is a celebration of song, music and dance, performed with great skill and energy and presented with authority and good humour. Pete's latest CD, In Paper Houses, has been reviewed as "a tour de force" and "a great mix and a splendid album."
From Herefordshire. Strangely enough, this 1986 photo is the most recent that Blake's III have published on their Internet page! We'll have a camera ready to record for posterity - but does anyone have images of the band that haven't reached their sell-by date? Still together and still fabulously innovative after all these years, with Paul Rogers occasionally augmenting the band on double bass, Blake's III are Mick Freeman, sax/clarinet/flute & vocals; Rob Strawson, fiddle & vocals; and Martin Blake, guitar & vocals. Their eclectic blend of musical styles still enthrals and excites audiences everywhere.
Jacey
Bedford, Brian Bedford and Hilary Spencer celebrate twenty years together as the vocal powerhouse
called Artisan, which first hit the unsuspecting British
public in 1985 – they rapidly did the rounds, being
invited to play at almost every major festival and folk club
in the
From Massachusetts, USA Jim is master of the hammered dulcimer, a marvellous musician who soaks up stunning songs and beautiful reels, marches and jigs like a sponge. Calennig first met Jim when they were interviewed for Philadelphia radio, and those with long memories will recall Jim, member of Llantrisant Folk Club, living in Siwsi and Stuart's flat in Talbot Green, before he moved away. The Nonesuch website for hammered dulcimer fans carries this quote: "Anyone I’ve ever known to speak of Jim Couza has called him a “Very Big Man”; indeed he is, not in just a physical sense, but also in stature, the man is larger than life, full of tunes and tales, delivered in gravely baritone and more often than not accompanied by a song or two on an old dulcimer that seems to have lived as hard as the man himself." Welcome, Jim!". Last appearance at the Club: February 8 2006.
Joy Bennett and Chris Koldewey
A warm welcome for newlyweds Joy and Chris from New York, USA. Joy is almost a regular at Llantrisant Folk Club - she's one of the shanty-singing Johnson Girls, who included the Folk Club on their tour last year, and has guested both solo and part of various duos. She says she got hooked on sea songs during the 1970s, when she worked as a volunteer at New York's South Street Museum. Chris is a shantyman through and through, and is one of the crew at North America's famous maritime museum, Mystic Seaport. A good night is guaranteed! Last appearance at the Club: 22nd February 2006
Judy, from Maryland USA, has been on the road since the early 1990s, making her own the songs and ballads of traditional Americana and the British Isles. She is respected on both sides of the Atlantic as both a singer and interpreter of traditional songs. Born in Virginia, the third of four children, Judy grew up with singing from both parents and a love for music - “We sang at the table, we sang washing dishes, we sang riding in the car, they sang lullabies to us.”
Over here, Sara Grey introduced Judy to the folk community at the Whitby Festival in 1997. She has quickly come to be well-respected on both sides of the Atlantic as a singer and propagator of the old songs. Her joy in singing, deep respect for the tradition, and sense of humor delight her listeners.
Judy’s first recording of unaccompanied traditional songs and ballads, If You Sing Songs… was released in 1998, followed two years later by Far From the Lowlands. Last visited the Club on March 22nd 2006 with her husband, Dennis.
John comes from Grimsby and has been writing and singing folk songs for many years - his name appears on the Sidmouth and many other festival guest lists, even earlier than Martin Carthy! Many sing some of the songs he has written over the years, not knowing who wrote them - and John has lost count of the amount of times you see his world-famous song Fiddler's Green listed as traditional in the credits on other artists' albums. Other masterpieces, or folk classics, of his include Punch and Judy Man, Send Us A Postcard and his classic monologue Albert goes to Cleethorpes.
John's songs serve to demonstrate the wide diversity of this fine singer and entertainer who is justly revered by his fellow singers, not only for his song-writing skills but also for his charm and wit. Last visited the Club on April 12th 2006
Cheryl Beer: Heaven Scent
A finalist for Welsh Woman of the Year in 2003 for her contribution to Welsh culture, Cheryl Beer has been singing solo as a touring songwriter for more years than she now cares to remember - but she started out as a singer in a band when she was just 12 years old. It wasn't until her late 20s that she hit the road with just a guitar. She has played at or presented over 40 British festivals and has played countless acoustic music venues across the UK. Her second album, Little Fish, was an HMV album of the month and her single Heaven Scent helped raise funds for Velindre Hospital breast cancer research. Her work in India has seen her raise money for a bore well in a community School, and as a patron of the Zimbabwe Academy Of Music she has raised money for women and children to access music and dance lessons.
This year, she was in Cardiff Bay's Millennium Centre presenting her one-woman show Heaven Scent - now it's the turn of Llantrisant Folk Club, as Cheryl traces women who have enhanced Wales. Appeared at Llantrisant folk Club Wednesday July 5, 2006
We saw them at Crediton Festival, where crowds shouted for more - Morris Ironing, Escapology, an Excuse for a Magic Act, Budgies of Prey, Levitating Toilet Tents and many other life-defying tricks! Bonzo and Doris have made an art form out of doing very nearly nothing. Once you stop trying to analyse them and come down to their level, you might find where they are at ... nowhere! This is comedy at its best, a concept which has people crying with laughter. Nothing very magical, clever or musical happens, as they base their act on not having one - like Tommy Cooper meeting Mr. Bean.
Bonzo and Doris are the "ultra egos" of that well known Irish folk duo, Paul and Glen Elliott.
Appeared at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday December 20, 2006
Tom lives in Leeds, but he holidays constantly in the Channel Islands and is a songwriter of repute. He has been compared in style and quality with both Steve Knightly and Jez Lowe, and over the past five years he's built a solid reputation as a pro performer with duo partner Tom Napper, playing folk clubs, theatres, arts centres, village halls and festivals. While still touring both with Tom and with their quartet The Pipers Sons, Tom Bliss is now branching out as a solo artist. Some of his finest songs work best with just one voice and one accompanying instrument, he explains. Tom's also written many excellent songs that have never made it into the duo or quartet sets for one reason or another, and working alone lets him present new material as soon as it's ready - so solo gig audiences are often the first to hear a new classic!
Last appeared at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday January 31, 2007. Tom was a late substitute for Cockersdale, as John O'Hagan, one of the trio, was in hospital after a serious heart operation.
John Connolly and his Seaside Special
The Folk Club’s famous beach party welcomes John, who comes from Cleethorpes and has been writing and singing folk songs for more years than we care to remember. His name appears on many other festival guest lists – including Sidmouth - even earlier than Martin Carthy! Many sing John’s songs, not knowing who wrote them. In fact, John has lost count of the number of times you see his world-famous song Fiddlers Green listed as traditional in the credits on other artists’ albums. In keeping with beach party theme, John is presenting his Seaside Special show, including his well-known and well-loved song Send Us A Postcard.
What makes John so special is not just that he has the gift of writing songs that become instant classics, but that he performs them with a genuine sincerity and natural warmth that makes an audience feel good.
NB: If you’ve
not been to a beach party before, why not come dressed for
sun, sand and sangria? Or a nice warm mac? And it’s not halfway though March
yet…
Last seen (on the beach) at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday March 14, 2007
United States folk afficionados know Mike - tall, red beard, and always around where the music is. He's been on the scene for many many years, listening to the fine details of what makes this genre of music so special to the soul, so able to make us laugh and cry and think. And lucky for us all, he got serious about having fun at it.
Equally at home in the contemporary and traditional camps of the Folk world, he is a fine musician and storyteller. His prime instrument is the guitar, upon which he shines with intricate fingerstyle arrangements of anything from Tin Pan Alley tunes of the '20s to fiddle tunes to his own music. He also plays concertina, piano, banjo, or sings unaccompanied. He can be uproariously funny, contemplative, and powerfully emotional in the space of a few minutes. The man will capture your attention, and then your heart.
They came for a
Showcase, and here they are again! The audience wanted them
back so much... Simon and Rosalind are interpreters of
English folk song and contemporary folk songwriters who live
in
Last performed at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday April 25, 2007
"Simon (Barron) and Rosalind (Brady) are two of the brightest rising stars of the new generation of Folk singer/songwriters. These two young artists demonstrate most clearly in their work the relevance of an old tradition expertly employed to reflect a modern world, appealing to both the intellect and the emotions" - Peter Reeves (promoter, The Blue Stage)
"Really beautiful songs... fragile gentle and lovely - and no extraneous guff" - Karine Polwart (songwriter)
"Terrific... good songs well sung... I kept hearing things - Incredible String Band, Nick Drake, John Martyn - lots of stuff and yet at the same time the music is very much their own... very, very, good" - Mike Harding (Radio 2)
"Really lovely, very gentle and beautiful music" - Bob Harris (Radio 2)
They came for a
Showcase, and here they are again! The audience wanted them
back so much... Simon and Rosalind are interpreters of
English folk song and contemporary folk songwriters who live
in
Last performed at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday March 12, 2008
For well over
20 years, Ian has been refining and honing his talents
as a singer-songwriter. His finely penned songs and powerful
presentations, well laced with a sparkling, friendly wit,
have won him respect and admiration around the world. Ian
McCalman (of The McCalmans folk group) said Ian is:
"amongst Britain's most talented
singer/songwriters", and he has been described as
"Scotland's Harry Chapin."
Born in Glasgow in 1956 to a Scots pipe major and a South
Wales mother, Ian is a big man with a big voice to match.
His reputation is deservedly growing fast on both sides of
the Atlantic. His singing of the Burns songs has taken him
to countries throughout the world. Every January he does a
Robert Burns tour of Germany. Ian had already released
several CDs (including the WildGoose recording of A
Kind And Gentle Nature,
with Ian Hutchinson and Paul Sartin). Last performed at
Llantrisant Wednesday
August 15,
2007
For many years
Cockersdale have been one of the leading unacompanied groups
in the UK. Originally formed by Keith Marsden to perform his
songs, the group's reputation soon grew making them a major
force in folk music. Following Keith's death in 1991,
Cockersdale reformed and have now re-established themselves
on the UK folk scene.
Although they now have a repertoire that stretches beyond
that performed before Keith's death, they still perform many
of the songs that he wrote and for which he is famous. Newly
written songs still feature within the performances but are
now more commonly from the pen of Graham Pirt (pictured
right, with Val Marsden and John O'Hagan) and also Chris
Sugden.
With a number of CDs to their credit and a history of
appearances at most of the major festivals in the UK,
Cockersdale bring guaranteed enjoyment to any performance.
Cockersdale also present a number of special shows for
festivals, art centres, village halls and theatres.
Llantrisant Folk Club welcomes Bernard back again! He’s a songwriter and singer with a witty touch and a sense of humour. His shows focus on his original songs which are exceptional for the wit and smartness of the lyrics and the flawless guitar style that accompanies them. He's an exceptional wordsmith and an all-round good guy as well.
While a troubadour by trade, Bernard began his life in Australia as a geologist, but found that sitting in a pub playing Beatles songs made a better income and way of life. "I've been knocking around the scene for about 30 years," says Bernard. "I've been singing songs about Australian people, characters, history, the human condition. I've been knocking around festivals, picking up a few awards here and there - I guess that's what it is. In the old days, the travelling troubadour was a person who went around from court to court and entertained the masses - I reckon I'm still doin' it."
Last performed at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday April 2, 2008
John Howes
(guitar and bouzouki), Huw Jones (melodeon) and Steve
Passmore (bass, mandolin) make up the bear bones of
Swansea-based The Bear Band, who chalk up 29 years of
playing ceilidh tunes to appreciative dancers throughout
Wales and beyond. Bear Bones love the intimate and friendly
nature generated by folk clubs, and they’ll really
appreciate it we join in the choruses to some well-chosen
folksongs!
Steve, who
lives in Gloucestershire, has long been regarded as one of
British folk's finest singer-songwriters. His reputation for
writing contemporary songs inspired by the English Tradition
was established in 1974 with his innovative debut album, Stroll
On. Since
then his songs have been recorded by many leading folk
artists including Fairport Convention, Anne Briggs, Dave
Pegg and PJ Wright, The Arizona Smoke Review, Martin and
Jessica Simpson, Grace Notes, Phil Beer, Maggie Boyle and
The Bushwackers. Topic has just released his latest CD, Time
and Tide.
His intelligent and funny repartee is just the icing on the
cake. An evening spent with Steve is a perfect evening
indeed.
Born in the
Last appeared at Llantrisant Folk Club (as a solo artist) Wednesday August 27, 2008
Showcase with Sandy & Graham Ball
Sandy & Graham are well known for running the very successful Folk at the Oak club in Corsham, Wiltshire, and also the Club Tent at Priddy Folk Festival. Both of them are great singers and musicians, drawing from both traditional and contemporary sources. Come and see what a friendly club they run, as well as being superb entertainers in their own right. Priddy Folk Festival website hit the nail right on the head when it enthused: "Great to see them back."
Last appeared at Llantrisant Folk Club Wednesday October 29, 2008
Contact...
For booking information and general club enquiries, contact Pat Smith:
Telephone 07989 209824 or 01443 226892
Email ................. Pat Smith
Copyright © 1998 Mari Arts.
Last modified: 09 November, 2008