TheBowerHouse

Welcome to the Bowerhouse

Autumn Program

Martin Carthy

October 28th | DOORS 7.30PM, MUSIC FROM 8pm | At The Bowerhouse, Maidstone

`Arguably the greatest English folk song performer, writer, collector and editor of them all' Q Magazine

The word 'legend' gets bandied around rather too casually these days, but Martin Carthy is a true legend of British folk music. Not only a master guitarist, singer and interpreter of folk songs for the past 50 years, but an endless inspiration to us all! 75 years old, with a seminal career to date and still going strong, Martin just picks up his guitar, gets on the train and travels all around the country (and beyond) sharing his passion and endless curiosity for traditional music - in folk clubs, arts centres, major concert halls and festivals alike.

Whether in the folk clubs (which he continues to champion), on the concert stage or making TV appearances (he was the subject of the acclaimed `Originals' music documentary strand on BBC 2) - there are few roles that Martin Carthy hasn't played. He's a ballad singer, a ground-breaking acoustic & electric guitarist and an authoritative interpreter of newly composed material. He always prefers to follow an insatiable musical curiosity rather than cash in on his unrivalled position. Perhaps, most significant of all, are his settings of traditional songs with guitar, which have influenced a generation of artists, including Bob Dylan and Paul Simon, on both sides of the Atlantic.
In June 1998 he was appointed an MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours. He was named Folk Singer of the Year at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards in 2002, and again in 2005 when he also won the award for Best Traditional Track for 'famous Flower of Serving Men. In the 2007 Folk Awards Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick won Best Duo. In 2008 he won the BBC Radio 2 Folk Award Best Traditional Track for Cold Haily Rainy Night alongside Eliza Carthy and Chris Wood as part of The Imagined Village project.

the Bowerhouse Presents series

Eliza Carthy and the Wayward Band

November 17th | at Theatre Royal Margate | 7.30pm | Tickets

Eliza Carthy - Vocals / Violin
Saul Rose - Melodeon
Barn Stradling - Bass
Sam Sweeney - Violin
Lucy Farrell - Viola
Beth Porter - Cello

David Delarre - Guitar
Andrew Waite - Accordion
Willy Molleson - Drums
Laurence Hunt - Percussion
Nick Malcolm - Trumpet
Adrien 'Yen Yen' Toulouse - Trombone

Eliza Carthy has been recording and touring for over twenty years. To celebrate this, in 2013 the multi-award winner mustered an all-star band, featuring many of the leading figures from her life, for a new and astonishing big band sound covering favourites from her long career in music. They are now embarking on their first album together, "Big Machine", presenting new traditional material alongside contemporary songs, and the sound they make is unlike anything you have heard before. Album out October 2016, touring the UK in November. You really, really don't want to miss this!

Eliza Carthy
Describing herself simply as a "modern English musician" Eliza Carthy is only now beginning to reach the height of her musical powers. During a 20+-year journey/career she has become one of the most dazzling and recognised folk musicians of a generation. She has revitalised and made folk music relevant to new audiences and has captured the most hardened of dissenters with canny, charismatic and boundary-crossing performance. Many of the current crop of young professional folk musicians owe their successes in part to her determination, standard-bearing and campaigning spirit.

Alasdair Roberts

November 28th | DOORS 7.30PM, MUSIC FROM 8pm | At The Bowerhouse, Maidstone

Alasdair Roberts is a musician (primarily a guitarist and singer) who is based in Glasgow Scotland. He has worked with Drag City Records since 1997, firstly releasing three albums of self-written material under the name Appendix Out and then several albums under his own name, the most recent being A Wonder Working Stone by Alasdair Roberts & Friends (Drag City, 2013). He has also released music on labels such as Secretly Canadian, Galaxia and Stone Tape Recordings.
His work mainly consists of two parallel strands: self-written song material (which can be heard on albums such as Farewell Sorrow, The Amber Gatherers, Spoils and A Wonder Working Stone) and interpretations of traditional songs and ballads from Scotland and beyond (which can be heard on albums such as The Crook of My Arm, No Earthly Man and Too Long In This Condition).

website

the Bowerhouse presents series

Chris Wood

December 2nd | DOORS 7.30PM, MUSIC FROM 8pm | Revelation at St Marys, Ashford | Tickets

Critically acclaimed folk music sensation Chris Wood performs at Revelation on Friday 2nd December, performing music from his forthcoming 2016 album. With insight and artistry, he intelligently weaves traditional styles with his own contemporary parables.
Chris Wood is an uncompromising songwriter, ‘speech master’, composer, multi-instrumentalist and all-round musician, who has collaborated with the likes of Martin Carthy, Dizraeli, Billy Bragg, Andy Cutting, Andy Irvine, Joan Armatrading, Karine Polwart, Jean Francois Vrod, The Imagined Village, Hugh Lupton, Martin Butler to name a few!
Wood’s numerous accolades include being a six-time winner of the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards and Songwriter of the Year – Spiral Earth Awards 2014.
His eagerly awaited next album for release in 2016 includes reflections on minor-league football, empty nest syndrome, learning to swim, cookin sauce and, not least, the Gecko as a metaphor for contemporary society!

“As close as it gets to a perfect union of voice and guitar, lyrics and melody, compassion, irony, realism, wit, and humanity.”
***** 5 Stars – The Herald

“a rarefied talent, both as writer and interpreter.” **** 4 stars – MOJO

“[Wood] has managed this magical thing, writing songs on contemporary themes, or putting music to Hugh Lupton’s words, that absolutely fit hand in glove with traditional songs, but are totally modern.”
Ian Anderson – fRoots

tickets

Topette!!

December 18th | DOORS 7.30PM, MUSIC FROM 8pm | At The Bowerhouse, Maidstone

The new Anglo-French acoustic dance band Topette!! is one such…a collective of uninhibited musical adventurers playing self-penned and traditional music from anywhere with a winning mix of bonhomie and grit.

Of course it helps that those musicians are some of the finest on the Anglo-French dance scene…

Andy Cutting (diatonic button accordion)
James Delarre (violin)
Julien Cartonnet (bagpipes, banjo)
Tania Buisse (bodhrán)
Barnaby Stradling (acoustic bass guitar)

Born out of friendship, the five-piece play naturally social music – for filling dancefloors, for listening, for drinking with friends – but don’t expect it to merge into the background. This is raunchy, up-all-night, joyously jugular-grabbing dance music.

Driven by the rhythmic boiler-room of Stradling’s gnarly bass, Buisse’s intuitive bodhrán playing and Cutting’s warm bottom end, the melodies burst out of the seams of this bedrock. With great big anthemic walls of sound, the vibe is ‘Party!’: Cartonnet’s glowing French piping and visceral tenor banjo, Delarre’s bright, bushy-tailed fiddle lines and Cutting’s dynamic accordion style. They are, quite literally, having a bal!

The new 7-track EP Chez Michel – the name of the bar in France where the band was born – features an eclectic selection of material. Recorded in France earlier this year, it opens with an unexpectedly uplifting trad. French dance tune Bourée Morvandelle and Cartonnet’s own La Lustrée. but then careers off via a gloriously plunky version of Ola Bäckström’s Meatballs, Whiskey And Beer, a traditional Gnawa tuneHamouda and, underpinned by some seriously dirty bass, the ecstatic swirling trad. tune Maybe Macedonian?

Join in the party! Topette!!