Lewes Festival Events at the Royal Oak

Subject: Lewes Festival Events at the Royal Oak
From: Vic Smith
Date: 30 Sep 11 - 11:51 AM

Event 1 Thurs 6th October 8pm
Folk Club Evening with
BLACK UMFOLOSI 5
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Advance tickets £10 Door £12
Black Umfolosi are an internationally acclaimed multi-discipline performing arts group specialising in harmonic acappella singing and traditional African dance, based in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe. The original members have developed their skills and their organization to a point where the now 18 members provide a multitude of services in the performing arts industry in Zimbabwe and internationally. Compared to the likes of Ladysmith Black Mambazo of South Africa, Black Umfolosi, tour extensively from their homeland Zimbabwe to the UK, Australia, Asia, Europe, Canada and the USA. They have released a number of recordings that feature singing styles of Imbube, Mbaqanga and Township songs. Their dynamic live performances showcase the traditional dancing styles of the Southern African region as well as the more contemporary styles and movements they develop themselves.
*****
Event 3 Fri 7th October 8pm
"YOU NEVER HEARD SO SWEET"
A Multimedia presentation on recordings made by
Peter Kennedy and Bob Copper by
SHIRLEY COLLINS with PIP BARNES
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Advance tickets £10 Door £12
Shirley Collins         Shirley has become one of the really iconic figures of the folk revival…. and she lives in Lewes and has agreed to become the patron of the festival! Her great contribution to English folk songs includes decades of performing and some of the most highly rated and influential albums of English traditional song. She has been awarded the MBE, an Honorary Degree by the Open University and has been made president of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. Though, she no longer sings in public, her multimedia presentations have gained great popularity. "America Over The Water" has been performed over 100 times and has been seen in five countries.
*****
Event 6 Sat 8th October 11.45am- 12.45pm
An Hour with
ANDY TURNER
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Advance tickets £4 Door £6
Andy Turner         Andy Turner fell in love with traditional music in the late seventies, and has been performing it ever since. He is a fine singer of traditional songs, and a leading exponent of the anglo-concertina.
Andy is a member of Oxfordshire group Magpie Lane and the dance band Geckoes. He performs solo, and in a duo with fiddle-player Mat Green. He has also worked with Chris Wood, the Oyster Band and the Mellstock Band.
*****
Event 8 Sat 8th October 1 – 2.30pm
Fiddle Workshop led by
BEN PALEY
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Advance tickets £4 Door £6
Ben Paley         Ben Paley has been playing the traditional music of Sweden, Ireland and the USA (as well as blues, jazz and rock of various kinds) since he was six, on the stages, screens and street corners of two continents. His book of Swedish traditional tunes is one of the classics of that music. As a fully professional musician, he has toured and recorded extensively with his famed father Tom, both as a duo and with Joe Locker as the New Deal String Band, the leading Old Timey band in Europe. He was a member of the prominent country/rock band, The Wild Turkey Brothers. In that band, he played alongside the guitarist, Tab Hunter, whom he still plays with regularly as a duo. He has been in considerable demand as a session musician and he has worked with Chris Wood, the Levellers, the Sawdoctors, Mandragora and Murray Lachlan Young, He has been called "The finest folk fiddler of his generation" by fROOTS magazine. He plays regularly with a wide range of musicians including with Sara Grey and Kieron Means, with Maggie Boyle and Duck Baker in The Expatriate Game, and most often locally eith in a duo with Tab Hunter or with the popular local folk dance band, The Sussex Pistols.
*****
Event 12 Sat 8th October 3 – 6pm
Singaround led by
SANDRA GODDARD
Tune interludes led by DAN QUINN
Short Display by SWAN STEPPERS
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Free with collection
*****
Event 14 Sat 8th October 8pm
An evening with
THE LONG HILL RAMBLERS
Plus DAN QUINN and
DENISE & STUART SAVAGE
plus young musicians from Lewes Old Grammar School
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Advance tickets £10 Door £12
The Long Hill Ramblers         If you're looking for a gimick, move along. All the Long Hill Ramblers have to offer is folk music: clear, beautiful vocals, rich harmonies, virtuoso musicianship, and a repertoire drawn from among the finest traditional songs on both sides of the Atlantic.
Laura Hockenhull's voice must have been the best-kept secret in folk music over the last few years. Those in the know, including some of the most repected names in the business, have admired her work for the purity of her voice, and the strength of her interpretations. Now the secret is out.
Tab Hunter on guitar, Ben Paley on fiddle and Dan Stewart on banjo and mandolin have each made international reputations for themselves as instrumentalists in all sorts of traditional music, in more bands than we can begin to list. They should need no introduction, but if you've missed out on them so far, well, that's what the internet's for!
Reputation only gets you so far, though; what counts is the music, and that's why the Long Hill Ramblers are great: real music. No gimicks

DAN QUINN Dan helped to form the seminal English country dance band Flowers and Frolics in 1976 and, with them, was resident as singer and musician at the Islington Folk Club at the Empress of Russia until the mid-eighties, enjoying Bob Davenport's eclectic booking policy. From the ashes of Flowers and Frolics arose the phoenix of Gas Mark 5, a band in which he played for five years before his re-settlement in Sussex. He continued to play with Ken Lees and Sue Bainbridge from the Islington folk club days as The Dan Quinn Trio and, with additions to the line-up, as The Dan Quintet. He now plays in the dance band The Watch and sings in a duo with Will Duke, specialising in unaccompanied unison singing. He has toured Sweden (with Gas Mark 5) and has performed at major British folk festivals from Shetland to Sidmouth. He also performs in the very popular trio, Duck Soup.
*****
Event 17 Sun 9th October 12.15 – 1.15pm
"An hour with THE TWAGGER BAND"
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Advance tickets £4 Door £6
Based in Sussex we play concertinas, dulcimers, bagpipes, whistles, psaltery, harmonium, recorders, bouzouki, mandolin, guitar, serpent and crumhorn. There's a lute and a viola waiting in the wings, not to mention a hurdy gurdy and a digeridoo but I'm not sure they're allowed out yet!
*****
Event 19 Sun 9th October 2 – 4pm
Song & Tune session led by
THE TWAGGER BAND
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Free with collection.
*****
Event 22 Sun 9th October 4.15 – 6.15pm
Singaround led by STUART REED
Special Guest TERRY MASTERSON
The Royal Oak, Station Street
Free with collection.
Terry Masterson has been a giant of the Sussex folk scene for over three decades. It was back in 1963 that Scotsman Jack Whyte wrote to him in London to tell him that Brighton was "wide open" for folk music and before long the two of them had teamed up as a singing duo and organisers of some of the most successful clubs on the south coast.. Before long his solo career took off and he made live concert and radio appearances all over the British Isles. Mis spellbinding singing and unique interpretations of both traditional and contemporary songs soon had him in demand at festivals on both sides of the Atlantic. He topped the bill at the first Broadstairs Festival in 1966 and headlined the Red Deer Festival in Alberta, Canada in 1970. After compering at the famous Keele Festival further acclaimed concert tours of both Canada and the USA followed. Terry's love of the oral tradition was heavily influenced from an early age by the storytelling of his Irish father and the song sessions at family gatherings. He was further immersed in the Irish tradition during the time he served with the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, the regiment later immortalised by Eric Bogle in his song The Green Fields Of France. These days, however, his repertoire also reflects a lifetime of travelling and absorption of musical influences from all over the world.

Stuart Reed         Stuart started singing with Sussex band The Taverners in the 70s. They are still going strong and have recently released their 30th anniversary CD.
These days he is better known as a solo performer and has recorded seven albums in his own right.
He has made many appearances on BBC & ITV and was a regular on BBC Radio 2's Night Ride. He has played concerts, cabaret and clubs in many parts of the world and is well-known on the entertainment circuit in the south-east.
Stuart has taken his huge repertoire of songs to club and concert venues all over the world.
Whether unplugged with acoustic guitar, or with a full range of backing tracks, he continues to delight audiences with his outstanding vocals and easy charm.