My review of the festivities.......

Wow......people came!

Firstly a big thank you to everyone who came and helped create the great vibe for the weekend. Special mention has to go to (in no particular order!) to: Tony Levy, Hamish Currie, Glyn (Burneston Folk Club) Cavell, Joolz Cavell, Brother Crow & Ruth & Wendy Arrowsmith....all of whom have MySpace pages and are in my Top Friends....(check them out from here) . Thanks also to Zeke, Jenny and Phil & Gill at the Black Horse who don't!

I'm not going to write about every act....just pull out some highlights!

I'll start on Friday, though it seems a distant memory. We had 90 plus paying punters.....Tony Levy opened the whole event giving us folk, but not as we know it with plenty of witty songs and banter. Tony did an excellent stint as M.C. as well.......you should invite him to be part of your festival too. The world needs people like Tony....and boy can his other (better?) half, Sian, sing or what?

The Hall Brothers & John Carey were relatively new to me (I had previously seen about 15 mins of them in a noisy pub in Whitby) and lots of other people up our way. Thoroughly professional performance and I am under threats of death (mainly from the ladies, Nick) to re-book them....which I am more than happy to do! Good songs and tunes and fine fiddle and guitar playing.

Brother Crow on the other hand I seem to see at least once a month........not for the faint hearted their epic acoustic prog-folk songs are thoroughly rewarding painting vivid pictures of the Durham Dales....they played my favourite songs to....including Tom Barton (aka "Freebird for Folkies")......it's not short (the mandolin solo alone is longer than most pop songs) but is a beautiful piece of writing. .....Andy does need to learn to stop insulting the club organiser's banjo though!

We had the full Duncan McFarlane Electric six piece band to finish the evening....folk 'n' Roll at it's loudest ....absolutely rocked the place...top stuff!!!!!!!

Sing around still going strong when I left at 1.15 a.m. top hearty trad stuff from Mick McGarry and his mates from Hull & beyond...and lots of good stuff from guys and girls with their guitars...oh and dulcimers, banjos (4s & 5s) mandolins, recorders, whistles, accordions etc, etc....... cool as f*ck actually. Folk music, cool?......oh yes!)

Took a fab walk from home on a very crisp Saturday morning to the pub (I forgot the car on Friday night....just as well really) in time for a bleary start at something past 10a.m. from my pal Joolz and some of her great self penned songs.

The Hut People (that's Gary Hammond who was the percussionist for The Beautiful South & Sam Pirt on Piano accordion from 422) were up next........they really are fantastic, mixing tunes & rhythms from all over the world, I didn't know accordion could be so interesting! Great guys as well.

The acts came thick and fast after that, I think I caught at least a bit of everyone.....Zeke Deighton with his fine traditional tales of rape, pillage and love.....Rod Baxter and his flying fingers (boy, he can really PLAY guitar).....Anna Shannon, who I could listen to all night, great singer with great self penned songs deeply rooted in North Yorkshire (and occasionally Tennessee!)....Diad playing some fine Irish tunes and songs.....Hearty, unaccompanied, traditional 3 part harmonies from 2 Black Sheep and a Stallion (rafters were raised!).......A very polished Stan Graham, this guy has real presence and a bunch of fine songs.......Brother Crow again (I'm not going to flatter them any more though!).......

Hamish Currie did a fab set which included some great guitar playing, fine traditional (and other) songs and the on stage creation of a South American (I think, Hamish WILL tell me if I'm wrong, I have no doubt!!) party brass band using looped Cornet....pretty surreal in a pub in North Yorkshire but very clever.

The Young 'Uns REALLY raised the rafters...again, great unaccompanied (mainly) harmonious mixture of trad, self penned and other songs.......top entertainment from top lads.

Then the Mrs (Wendy Arrowsmith) did her (nearly) solo set....well I like her anyway, very hard to be objective about this act! She did foolishly invite a certain banjo player on stage to sing a song.......that destroyed the lovely mellow vibe she had created!

Keepers Fold did what Keepers Fold do.......the rafters were so raised that they were now in orbit. Great hearty singing & playing from Iain (he's getting married....congrats) and Jeff. They mistakenly left of a couple of "I'm a Keepers Fold Groupie" T shirts behind...I'm sorely tempted to start wearing one!

Then Jez Lowe (who had arrived early enough to join in the bear pit that had once been a singaround....and hold his own against the massed ranks of 2 Black Sheep & A Stallion, Keepers Fold, The Young 'Uns and "Da Crew" from Hull and beyond. None of your namby pamby "I'm a star" attitude from Jez....which gets huge kudos from me. His set was pretty fine too....he has this ability to completely draw in an audience with his songs and playing.........his stagecraft is absolutely amazing.

110 paying punters (thank you, thank you, thank you!) + bands, locals and assorted organisers meant that Saturday night was hot, sweaty and really pulsing in both the singaround (still going when I left at 1.30ish) in the bar and in the concert in the club room.........I really quite enjoyed myself!

Aren't kids great? My 8 year old daughter said to me over the breakfast table "I can't believe it's the last day of The Winter Warmer, I want it all to start again tomorrow"....she pretty much summed up my feelings.

Another beautiful walk through the North Yorkshire Countryside got me to the pub ....I must take the car home at some point! Sunday was mellow mainly, I kinda drifted through the first few acts.......came too momentarily and sort of tuned into Acoustica...top harmonies and assorted instruments and a good choice of songs.

I woke up later and realised my wife was on stage with another, younger man.......oh the anguish....actually I pretty quickly got over the anguish when I heard the sounds they were making. Ian McKone really is a top musician...he played stunning guitar (if you haven't heard him you really should), fab mandolin....oh and he sings a bit (ahem...if you haven't heard him etc....). This was their debut as a duo, they were pretty damn good, I suspect with a few more gigs under their belts they will be really stunning. Nice complimentary harmonies and some good arrangements. Looks like me and the banjo might be out of work again...........

Zoox were a revelation.....folk music on a contra bassoon? We have it all at The Winter Warmer! Fantastic musicianship on all things blown, plucked, bowed or banged.....except (thankfully) not a guitar in sight. Tight vocal harmonies, great arrangements and a really interesting selection of material. BOOK THEM FOR YOUR FESTIVAL NOW!

I drifted back off to "Uncle" Chris Milner......in a really nice, fuzzy warm way.....completely mellow, nice one Chris! I was so relaxed I forgot to tell him when to finish and kind of interrupted his flow when I zoned back in and remembered that they were making me do some M.C. work this afternoon. oooops.

I then added in a special, extra treat for the hardened people who had survived this long....Mick McGarry, he had done sterling work in the singarounds all weekend and I reckoned it wasn't safe for anyone to drive after an hour of the mellow CM. Mick woke us all up with his fine renditions of traditional and "struggle" songs...more top stuff.

I must mention the singarounds again....I walked into the bar at one point on Saturday and the beautiful sound of singing completely blew me away....2 Black Sheep, Keeper's Fold, Young 'uns, Mick McGarry and everyone else in the room all singing their heads off with perfect harmonies together.....the hairs on the back of my neck were standing on end....the very essence of "folk" music...perfect!

Lot's of other good stuff discovered in the singarounds, I suspect some of them might find their way onto a stage around here in the not too distant future.

KFFC 1st birthday party weekend on 14th-16th November anyone?

Plenty of club nights before then as well.

As I say, I think we got away with it!

Paul