I had the great pleasure of being asked ro review this book for fRoots magazine. Here is the copy that appeared in it:-

GORDON TYRRALL
Around The Blooming Heather
A Personal Memoir of Whitby Folk Week.
Gaho Publishing ISBN 978-1-5272-3324-9
Two things ought to be made clear right from the outset of this review - this reviewer has the highest regard for Gordon Tyrrall both as a person and as a performer. It turns out that Gordon is a pretty good writer as well.
The reviewer also regards Whitby Folk Week as one of the most enjoyable, certainly the most egalitarian festivals in the UK. Not that he has anything like the experience of the festival as the writer who has spent over 35 August weeks there.
What we have here is a very affectionate, well observed but ultimately very personal memoir of an event that has been enjoyed by thousands over the years.
Like the festival itself, the book is full of encounters and it is heavy on names; celebrating and enjoying the company of like-minded others is one of the most enjoyable aspects of the folk scene. People who have been around the scene for a while are going to encounter lots of friends and associates; this reader reached page 40 before he came across a name that he has not met - and there were only a few after that.
Gordon takes us round the festival's many venues and tells us what their particular strengths are, sometimes inserting a story of something that happened there. Elsewhere he diverts into other aspects of his long life as a professional musician and there is short chapter on the merits and disadvantages of various guitar tunings.
It isn't an autobiography though there is one moving chapter on losing a loved one - also in the context of the festival.
If you've already been to Whitby Folk Week then you will be bound to enjoy this book. If you read it and you haven't been there then you will want to go.
www.gordontyrrall.co.uk
Vic Smith