It was Crowded House who sang that you should 'always take the weather with you'. So, we did our best yesterday to take some sunshine with us from sunny St. Albans. We certainly had 'four seasons in one day' on the drive up the Gate to Southwell Festival on Saturday but, as we arrived, having driven through torrential rain and thickening mist, the rain eased, and the sky brightened beyond its Tupperware grey. So, we didn't do too badly.
We arrived at the Gate to Southwell’s new festival site on Southwell Racecourse as early as we could to make the best of the day. The Gate to Southwell is a great festival with a fantastic line up and this year was no exception, and we were keen to make the best of it.
We were booked for two performances, one mid-afternoon on the Folk Stage and one in the evening on the Barleycorn Stage. The time in the middle was our own and we used it actively to see some other performers not to forget noshing a very fine Burrito from the Tex-Mex stand.
In terms of bands we hadn't seen before the stand outs, not surprising given our interests, were the multi-talented Vishtèn and Meaghan Blanchard. Two of the members of Vishtèn and Meaghan Blanchard originate from Prince Edward Island and fiddler Pascal Miousse comes from the nearby Magdalen Islands on the Eastern coast of Canada. What musical riches must exist in that area! Is there anything that the members of Vishtèn can’t play well?
In terms of bands we knew well, The Jackie Oates Trio was superb as always and, at the 75th birthday celebrations for Bob Dylan organise by Jim Moray, we saw many of the festival headliners doing tributes to the great man. These included Show of Hands, Pete Morton, The Henry Girls, Paul Downs and Mick Ryan and The Ooks of Hazzard. Quite a line up when they are all on stage together.
For our mid-afternoon performance, we had the honour of following The Jackie Oates Trio on to the Folk Stage. We had chosen an upbeat set that attracted and maintained a good audience throughout the session. Feedback from audience members (and CD sales) after the set were very encouraging. It was also lovely to see friends from Carrington Triangle, Cambridge and Loughton Folk Clubs in the audience. Many thanks to them for coming along to support us.
In the evening session, we followed the irrepressible Isambard's Wheel onto the Barleycorn Stage. The Sheffield-based foursome was on fine form and really got the evening off to a great start. Watch out for them in the future.
Our own set was again upbeat. With the weather closing in again, the rain beginning to teem down and a lot of ambient bass and drum noise from the nearby main stage we felt our quieter material risked being compromised. Again, the audience appeared to enjoy what we did and showed a wonderful ability to pick up choruses quickly.
As we packed up and made way for our friends, Two Coats Colder, the rain began to ease but had already done damage. We had had a 30 second power failure during our set and, on the way out of the Barleycorn Stage area we passed more festival stewards fighting to make parts of the Beer Tent marquee waterproof again.
Mercifully, the A1 was kind to us - not too many travellers were out on such a rainy night - and we were home before midnight for a well-earned beer and bed.
Many thanks to the festival organisers for the invitation to play the great Gate to Southwell Festival again and especial thanks to Martin and Marion Smalley for their continuing support for us. Thanks also to Ali, Jake, Doug and his young colleague for delivering such a great sound, under time pressure, in both the Folk and Barleycorn Stages respectively. We certainly hope to make a return to Gate to Southwell at some time in the future and, if and when we do, we will do our best to bring some more lasting good weather with us.
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