Every year, Sidmouth Folk Festival (29th July – 5th August) put on amazing headline shows featuring established favourites and rising talent. The Ham venue is close to Port Royal at the eastern end of the Esplanade (see the festival map here), and, for many, it is the heart of the festival. There are three daily concerts at lunchtime, afternoon and evening. It’s a seated venue, and, according to the website, they have increased ventilation to ensure the comfort of all, which on days like this, make all the difference.
You can experience a great festive atmosphere and grab food and drink at the Hub. After a concert, you can head to the Ham Lawn, where you’ll find Festival Merchandise and the artists’ cd stall. A range of tasty food and drink outlets is on the fringe of the lawn. There is also undercover seating and a bar area with picnic benches. It’s also a great place to meet old friends and soak up that Sidmouth festival atmosphere.
Before I dive in here, remember that Sidmouth is a big festival so if you already have a ticket, plan your own festival by choosing your personal preferences from the extensive programme of events. I can really only scratch the surface in previews, so do yourself a favour and download the full programme here.
If you still need to get your ticket, check out the flexible range of ticket options, and choose from week, day or event tickets. Details here: https://sidmouthfolkfestival.co.uk/tickets/
Individual event tickets can be purchased here.
Below are four evening concerts we strongly recommend. We’ll have more recommendations soon.
Saturday, 30th July
Eddi Reader plus Ryan Young & David Foley
Earlier this year, Eddi Reader, one of Scotland’s all-time greatest female voices and performers, celebrated her extensive music career with a 40 Years Live Tour.
In his review of her 2018 album Cavalier, Neil McFadyen summed up her pre-solo career in a tidy para: Eddi started singing in public in Ayrshire and Glasgow folk clubs in the late 1970s. She soon moved to London in search of work as a session singer, a move which saw her work alongside Gang of Four, Alison Moyet and The Eurythmics. It was with Fairground Attraction‘s huge hit, Perfect, that Eddi started to make a UK-wide impact. The band’s debut album, The First of a Million Kisses, reached number two in the album charts and won Best Album in the 1989 Brit Awards. The album was a kaleidoscope of country, folk and jazz, and ever since, Eddi’s music has remained a colourful, constantly changing, fascinating mix of styles.
On the tour being announced, Eddie told fans, “The past forty years have been a remarkable experience – I still can’t believe it’s really been that long! I’ve been lucky enough to meet and work with some incredible musicians over the years, many of whom have become lifelong friends.
“I’ve also witnessed a lot of change in the industry, the coming and going of many folk. Throughout it all, the music itself, and my love of sharing it with people, has been the constant driving force.”
Here she is performing a personal favourite: Willie Stewart at Celtic Connections 2009:
In 2017, Scottish fiddler Ryan Young released his self-titled debut, which was a Featured Album of the Month on Folk Radio UK (reviewed here). In his album review, Neil McFadyen concludes: It’s tempting to say that we can expect great things from Ryan Young in the future. His quiet success to date and open, exploratory style is evidence of an impressive, budding talent. That future has already begun to open up, though. Ryan Young’s debut is a remarkable and fascinating album that no fan of traditional fiddle should miss.
David Foley is a multi-instrumentalist, probably best known for his incredible flute and guitar playing. As well as being a tunesmith and teacher, he is also a founding member of RURA. They have been playing together since they first met at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
Here he is performing with Ryan with Jenn Butterworth at Sidmouth in 2018:
Sunday, 31st July
Show of Hands plus Hannah Sanders & Ben Savage
Festival patrons Show of Hands are one of England’s finest acoustic duos featuring singer songwriter Steve Knightley and multi-instrumentalist Phil Beer. They have been delighting audiences for many years, having formed in 1986. Their last album, Battlefield Dancefloor, was described in these pages by Danny Neill as the most cohesive, diverse and persuasive sets of their entire career and one of the most consistently adventurous collections in their catalogue. Need I say anymore? The performance will feature a set of iconic signature tracks from the last 25 years, encapsulated on their new compilation album ‘Singled Out‘, along with new material and classic Show of Hands tracks.
A few years back, we asked Steve Knightley about his memories of the Sidmouth Folk Festival, which go back to his teens – he would also later meet his wife there!
When did you first come to Sidmouth, and what for?
Living only about eight miles away in Exmouth, I first came to the festival when I was about 14. I used to come over for the day. I remember when I was 15, it was the first time I ever stayed away from home without permission. I slept in Connaught Gardens and hung around on the beach and also under the old promenade. I remember going home and getting there about 10.30am and my dad walking in and saying, “You’re up early son!”. The moral being if you’re going to run away, make sure someone actually notices!
What do you most remember about your first (and/or subsequent) Sidmouth festival experiences?
I remember sneaking into the Beach Store and Roger Watson (of Muckram Wakes) was compering. He was great, really gruff and grumpy. I used to really like the way he would tell people to shut up and get off who were going on and on! The act that we saw was Carthy & Swarbrick, which changed my life because I didn’t realise that it was the same Martin Carthy mentioned on the back of Bob Dylan’s Freewheeling album. So that’s how I got into English traditional music at such early age – because of Sidmouth back in ’69.
Do you remember the first song you sang, tune you played, story you told, the first dance you called or danced or played for?
The first song I sang was probably busking on the seafront, the Keys Of Canterbury, with me and Paul Downes in a band called Gawain. And Spanish Ladies too, probably.
Do you have memories of particular venues?
I used to love the old Bowd…1000s of people on the side of a hill in the summer. And all the singarounds. Fond memories of all of the venues, really.
Do you have memories of particular people you met at the festival? Or particular performances?
Mrs Knightley, my wife, Clare. We met in 1998, just after an open-air gig we’d done. She was in the audience. We got married within two years.
Joining them are Hannah Sanders & Ben Savage, who signed to Topic Records this year for their album Ink of the Rosy Morning, which Mike Davies described as “their most immediate, beguiling and…finest work yet.”
Wednesday, 3rd August
Spiers & Boden plus Bryony Griffith & Alice Jones
Having parted ways back in 2014, Spiers & Boden, one of our finest folk duos, returned in 2021 with Fallow Ground. In his album review, Billy Rough concludes: At the album’s heart, though, is the utter joy of two friends making music together. Throughout, Spiers’ melodeon and Boden’s fiddle dance with delight. It is a rare indulgence to hear new songs and tunes from Spiers and Boden and to join them as they revel in the pleasure of their duet. Fallow Ground is a joyful, exciting, and beautifully produced release. It’s great to have them back.
Billy followed his album review up with an extensive and thoroughly entertaining interview here, which concludes: At the end of the day, it’s the music that matters. As we finish our chat, Spiers succinctly sums up the appeal of Fallow Ground both for the duo and, hopefully, their audience, “We’ve made some music that makes us happy, and we hope other people enjoy it as well. That’s all you can do!” I couldn’t have put it better myself.
Here they are performing Bailey Hill / Wittenham Clumps:
Boden reveals that ‘Bailey Hill’ relates to a location that holds fond childhood memories. “‘Bailey Hill’ is a fort just outside Sheffield. It’s abandoned really, covered in trees, no signage saying this is a Norman fort or whatever, but it’s lovely. It’s sort of been reclaimed. It’s covered in bracken, and it’s a place we used to go for picnics quite a lot and spend quite a lot of time up there.”
Spiers’ tune ‘Wittenham Clumps’ has a similar history, providing a valuable link to Spiers’ past and early session playing. “I wrote that a long, long time ago before I even met Jon. I was playing that in sessions in Oxford; in fact, all the old crowd in Oxford will probably recognise that tune; I used to play it almost every session!
“It’s just one of those places I’ve always known. The clumps refer to two hills with little bunches of trees on top of them, and one of these had a poem carved in the trunk of a tree. It was legible in the 1960s. When I first saw it in the 1980s the tree had grown over the poem, and some letters were bigger than others. Now the tree’s dead, and it’s just photographs that remain.”
Earlier this year, Bryony Griffith & Alice Jones delivered an incredible album – A Year Too Late And A Month Too Soon which Dave McNally described as traditional folk music at its most beguiling. It is one of those rare collections of music that cajoles its way into your listening consciousness, drawing you in so you become immersed in it and want to bring it to the attention of others.
We premiered their video for Wanton Lasses Pity Her on International Women’s Day. As I said then, their vocals seem made for each other, engaging, full of character and harmony. They told us:
‘Wanton Lasses Pity Her’ is a traditional song from North Yorkshire, collected by Mary and Nigel Hudleston and published in ‘Songs of the Ridings’ under the title ‘A New Song’. In 1961, Mark Newham of Newham’s Dairy in Scarborough responded to an advert that the Hudlestons had placed in the Scarborough Mercury in search of any surviving local folk songs. He provided them with ‘a very old book of local songs’ that had belonged to his Great Grandfather James Barthram. James had been a farmer in Kirkbymoorside before moving to Scarborough to run The Fountain Inn in the 1840s.
The song tells of the woes of a young woman who has given up the joys of single life to marry a rather unpleasant man named Dirry Doodham, who treats her very badly. The language and imagery suggest the song is much older than the 1800s, and we re-named it ‘Wanton Lasses Pity Her’.
Thursday, 4th August
Kate Rusby plus Jack Rutter
Another lady of folk who has been celebrating anniversaries this year is Kate Rusby, who celebrated her three decades of music making with ’30: Happy Returns‘. Watch Kate performing Ghost, the title track of her 2014 album. The original version, also an original composition, closed that album and was simply set with just Kate and her piano. On this new version, there are no less than three electric guitars (played by Nick Cooke, Sam Kelly and Damien O’Kane), Moog & synths, and drum programming.
In an earlier interview with Folk Radio, Kate told us: “Ghost was written on the piano at home in the room where our ghost lives. We have seen it a few times and after asking about it we know it’s been there for a very long time. I thought it deserved a song so [I] sat in there and serenaded him until the song was formed.”
In his review of the album, Peter Shaw concludes, “As a celebration of three decades of incredible music that has touched the lives and hearts of so many people, ’30: Happy Returns’ can’t be faulted. Take a bow, Kate, and keep shining your light.”
Traditional folk singer and multi-instrumentalist Jack Rutter released his solo debut album ‘Hills‘ in 2017, described on these pages as a vital, enthralling record which showcases his storytelling. He followed up in 2019 with Gold of Scar & Shale. Kathryn Tickell said of Rutter: ‘In the spirit of the old traditional singers, Jack Rutter takes a song, shapes it, lives with it and brings out something unique. This album makes my heart sing’. Here he is performing Fair Janet & Young James for Sidmouth Folk Festival Online 2020.