United Folk Orchestra in Tenterden

Hastings Folk Fest is coming

The third Hastings Folk Fest 2016 is only a week away, starting the day after Jack In The Green, and running from Tuesday 3 to Sunday 8 May. As in previous years, most events are free and take place in the pubs and cafés around the Old Town. Paul Dengate writes.

Hastings-based Oudolin bring authentic Mediterranean and Middle Eastern folk music to The Crown from a range of countries including Egypt, Syria, Greece, Lebanon, Turkey and Moorish Spain. Meanwhile, not far away at The Stag, the regular Tuesday night open folk session will take place, where musicians and singers come together to share their repertoire of mainly traditional music and song from around the United Kingdom and Ireland.

Andy Twyman

Andy Twyman, an eccentric one-man band, is playing at First In Last Out, blending blues with humour and rock and roll to titillate your ears, mind and toes. Another option is a visit to The Dolphin to catch Tune Raiders, who will be playing Irish folk music.

The free events continue throughout the week with The Orange Circus Band, Folk It, Pocketsize, The Travelling Talesman, This Train, Garry Blakeley Band, Titus, Wildflowers, Ed Boxall, Le Skiv Family Band, Los Twangeros, Jamie Smart, Stone Junction and Jim Board.

Wildflowers

As well as the venues previously mentioned, others taking part include The Jenny Lind, The Albion, The Beacon, The Plough and Porters. There are also English and Irish traditional folk sessions, a song session and a folk club. Glashin and Rattlebag will be raising money for St Michael’s Hospice when they take their café tour around Aroma, Hanushka and the Jerwood Gallery.

The programme includes two major concerts in St Mary In The Castle. On Saturday 7 May you can see Show Of Hands (Steve Knightley and Phil Beer), who are widely acknowledged as the finest acoustic roots duo in England, described by Peter Gabriel as “one of the great English bands”.

Gigspanner

In the same venue on Sunday night, 8 May, there’ll be an augmented line-up of Peter Knight’s Gigspanner, joined by very special guests Phillip Henry and Hannah Martin. This will be the first opportunity to see the “big band” in Hastings, led by Peter, the legendary fiddle player who played with Steeleye Span until 2013.

At St Clements Church on the afternoon of Saturday 7 May, there’s a concert by The United Folk Orchestra, combining two long established English folk orchestras, Yardarm and Sussex, creating the unique experience of more than 40 musicians coming together to play music from around the world. Instruments played include guitars, mandolins, bouzouki, fiddles, accordions, melodeons, concertinas, recorders, flutes, whistles, bodhrans and cellos.

The Electric Palace Cinema is showing David Thomas Broughton’s The Ambiguity, a musical documentary following the creative process of one of the UK’s most enigmatic musicians and performers.

Printed programmes are now available in the venues and the Tourist Information Office. The full programme can also be viewed online and downloaded from the festival web site or our Facebook page.

Rattelbag

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