Happy 2006!

 

Hope you all had a good Christmas - mine was very very quiet but lovely with my family. Last year has been a little tricky as my brother has been quite ill with cancer, but he's doing well with treatment and all the family have been utterly amazing. I am very very proud to be part of them.

 

2006 looks like it will be quite busy - Celtic Connections is coming up as usual in Glasgow - I'm playing there with Timo Alakotila and a host of friends, including Sandra Joyce, Niall Keegan, Ursula Leveaux, Emma Reid, Elvie Miller and John Dipper. Roger Wilson will be opening this concert on the 13th Jan at the Arches.... should be a lot of fun! Then I'm off on a tour with Nimbus (me and Tapani Varis from Finland, Steve Turner and Helena Torpy) round the lovely uk village halls and then to the States to record a CD with Stuart Kenney (double bass and 5 string banjo) and Marko Packard (flute, whistles, saxophones and guitar).

I'm also launching a series of workshops called Adventures in Music (see courses on this website) and they are currently in Yorkshire, Edinburgh, Northumberland, Llandinam and Italy....! All sorts of instruments, ensemble, dance , voice and all sorts of tutors....

Lastly, Swap have been nominated for best live band on the BBC Folk Awards; Tony Hillyard's CD that I played on has also been nominated for best folk CD in New Zealand and Hoirup and Haugaard's new CD (which I'm also on) has also been nominated for best folk CD award in Denmark. Blimey!

 

Have a great January and a nice cup of tea.

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Posted: 2005-12-14

Hi all,
When I was in New Zealand last March, I was delighted to take part in a recording by a singer named Tony Hillyard. He's a Londoner, living down under and I had bumped into him at Wellington Festival the previous autumn (when on tour with FAERD). It was a late night singing session and he started to sing a favourite song of mine (written by Bruce Cockburn) called 'Pacing The Cage'. I joined in and a few months and many emails later, myself and Tapani Varis (double bass) were in Davy Stuart's front room recording on Tony's CD. we had a wonderful time recording with Tony, Davy and Bob McNeill. Davy and Libby (his wife) were amazing hosts and Davy himself is a fine musician, luthier and excellent producer. The CD is now out and if you look at my merchandise page, you'll get details all about it. Chris While and Julie Matthews (who happened to be passing at the time) were nabbed and generously gave some brilliant backing vocals.
Purchases can now be made by credit card from Indie-cd's: www.indie-cds.com
I hope Tony, Davy and Bob can come over here sometime - it would be such fun to get the 'Coiled Springs' together....

Also check out: www.tonyhillyard.com

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Posted: 2005-12-06

'Hello everyone and sorry for the lack of activity on this website for sometime - things should be back to normal now.

This summer saw the launch of the Seed weekend which was a great event with workshops and concerts... one of the the highlights probably being the acoustic ceilidh led by Alistair Anderson. It was a really memorable night.

I had a fantastic time at Jay and Molly Ungar's Northern week in Ashokan, USA - a beautiful setting and teaching both accordion and ensemble playing. During the evenings, I joined a superb group of muscians (Sarah Blair on fiddle, Stuart Kenney on double bass, Mary Cay Brass on piano and Marko Packard on flute and guitar) to play for some of the contra dancing. It was also lovely to meet and play with old friends David Kaynor and John Krumm... a really brilliant week.

I was also draughted in at the last minute to teach at Folkworks Summer School, which was great (so many accordionists these days!) and I was honoured to work with Kerry Fletcher to create a music / dance ensemble. Thanks to all those who took part - you worked so hard and made us extremely proud!

The Poozies tour was great fun and took us to some delightful places in the UK - thank you to all who attended. We are now planning our 2006 dates and will let you know where and when as soon as possible.

October saw Swap return to Britain for a great tour that took us almost everywhere and back again; too many great places to mention here but our trips to the Isle of Man, Nottingham Lakeside Theatre and Stirling were fun packed.... especially as I met old friends I hadn't seen in over 20 years! By the way - we're really delighted with our BBC Folk Awards nomination - a lovely surprise!

A highly enjoyable ensemble workshop I gave near Settle for the Yorkshire Dales Workshops has inspired me to start a series of workshops around the country in 2006. Some will be for accordion only, others will be combining different instruments, voice and / or dance and others will include ensemble. Most will be weekend workshops and if you are interested, please email me for details via this website.

So now I'm about to go on tour with Roger Wilson and after Christmas I'm looking forward to Celtic Connections where I'll be performing on 13th and 14th Jan with the superb Timo Alakotila (piano). On the 13th, we will also be joined by Ursula Leveaux (Bassoon), Emma Reid (fiddle), Niall Keegan (flute) and Sandra Joyce (voice / bodhran).

Nimbus, a new project involving myself, Tapani Varis (bass, guitar, overtone flutes and mouth harp), Helena Torpy (fiddle) and Steve Turner (accordion) will be touring village halls in Jan and Feb - watch the website for details soon.

Recording -wise... Swap's new CD 'Du Da' is doing well and is going to be featured on the Froots compilation CD....the 4K Plot (myself, Kerry Fletcher, Karen Wimhurst and Keith McIntyre) will be releasing it's CD of the theatre piece in early 2006.... I'm in the middle of recording a new CD with Christy O'Leary (uilleann pipes, whisltes and voice) and Bert Deivert (guitars and bouzouki)....and May Monday is rumoured to start recording mid 2006.....

Phew.

Hope you all have a restful and snoozy Christmas.....'