Chainsaw sisters: Kathryn Locke and Tanera Dawkins (if I remember correctly)

I play cello too. Have been a full time cellist in a ceilidh band, and also use it a lot for song accompaniments with Mary Humphreys. We have discovered that 5-string banjo and cello is a brilliant combination, possibly better for Mary's banjo style which she claims to be imitating a Welsh harp.

There's a couple of demo MP3's on This page of our web site - "Lowlands of Germany" uses banjo and cello, and "Aderyn Du" is a song in Welsh with just a cello accompaniment. I have to say that I'd been out of practice for many years when those recordings were made, and I'm working hard at getting my technique up to approaching what it used to be.

I'm sure there are plenty of traditional precedents for use of the cello, especially in village dance bands. I have heard of a gathering of 6 cellos in the Radway Inn at Sidmouth one year, and mine wasn't one of them. Dee de Wit and I are regular Radway cellists, except I wasn't there much of the time this year.

Anahata