Folk Revival in Scotland
After 18 months or more of lockdown live music is gradually coming back to life in Scotland. We had an Edinburgh International Festival in open air big tents, a socially distanced Lammermuir Festival mainly in big venues, and now an autumn season of socially distanced and masked classical concerts is underway at the Usher Hall and the Queens Hall. Both venues are soon deciding on their spring programme, maybe opening up in full, but of course we are all dependant on the Scottish government regulations on COVID and what’s happening to the infection rate.
Folk music in Scotland has gradually been reviving too, with clubs reopening across Scotland and concerts even if socially distanced coming back. Celtic Connections has just announced a full concert programme for the first time in 3 years. The Edinburgh Music Review will try to cover this revival of folk music as it is one of our remits and of course it’s a very important part of Scotland’s cultural heritage.
I have recently enjoyed sessions in Edinburgh’s informal folk music venues, Sandy Bells my local pub and home of traditional music in Edinburgh, having taken down those nasty plastic screens and beginning its music sessions again, is beginning to look more like it’s old self. The Captains Bar, that lovely small pub in South College Street, having creatively survived the lockdown with a combination of Zoom events and al fresco sessions in the street and even miming in the bar, is back in action and producing lively sessions. The Captain’s Bar offers a space for up and coming young singers to make a name for themselves, and I discovered a remarkable young Scots-Brazilian singer, Guilia Drummond Battesini, who has a wonderful voice, dark rich and powerful. When I first heard her, I thought she could have an operatic background, but no she sings Brazilian and Romany songs, some Portuguese fado and traditional Scottish songs with a very good Scots accent! In the Captains’ Bar Halloween concert she appeared beautifully disguised as a bird (see below) and sang ‘Twa Corbies’ in a powerful Scots tongue.
Edinburgh Folk Club has also reopened at the Ukrainian Centre on Royal Terrace and have attempted to create some social distancing by having people grouped round tables. It is slowly building up its numbers, but some people remain cautious about attending singing events indoors. The night I attended the guests were Eilidh Steel a fine young fiddler from Helensburgh who studied at Glasgow’s Conservatoire which remains among the top music schools in the world. She was accompanied by Mark Neal on guitar and vocals who proved a perfect accompanist to Eilidh and is not a bad singer although he should take some time to teach his audience the chorus of songs which were new to them. One of the joys of folk clubs is the audience being able to sing at least in the choruses, but many singers fail to engage the audience in sufficient chorus singing. I learnt much of my folk music at the Singers Club in London run by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger and they made sure that their audience knew the words before singing the chorus. Sadly the same mistake was made the next week at Edinburgh Folk Club when again a young duo of musicians, Dowally, made up of Rachel Walker on fiddle and Daniel Abrahams, showed they were good musicians but not such good singers, failing to engage the audience in chorus singing. Ironically, the vocal star of the evening was the aforementioned Guilia Drummond, who opened the second half with a fabulous Gaelic song. As Dave Francis said, “she is perhaps the only Gaelic singing Brazilian in Scotland”, and the good news is that Edinburgh Folk Club have booked her to do an opening spot in January.
Leith Folk Club has also re-opened and I hope to attend on November 9th, when BrOg are playing, and November 16th, when Shianfolk are playing – I remember giving them a five-star review at Edinburgh Folk Club in one of the last concerts before lockdown. The Royal Oak is also back in session for singers, although the Wee Folk Club has not yet reopened; the small underground space it uses is judged to be too small to practice social distancing. Folk concerts are also beginning to come back. Clannad played the Usher Hall on Thursday 4th of November, Steeleye Span filled the Queens Hall last week (although I must admit I didn’t attend, preferring to remember them in their prime 50 years ago!) Richard Thompson sold out at Perth and Glasgow and reputedly gave a good performance. Folk is back, not quite as normal, but good enough to engage a big audience in Scotland. The Edinburgh Music Review will be there to review it.
