Gate To Southwell Festival (June 29-July 2) have called their 16th edition their most international, entertaining and musically diverse event yet, with Sunday’s headliners and other key artists still to be announced.
Among the headline acts already confirmed are acclaimed contemporary Indian folk band The Raghu Dixit Project. Raghu himself is a famous singer-songwriter, producer and film score composer from Bangalore, and the Project have become one of India’s best musical and cultural exports.
Also headlining GTSF will be The Dog Show Sessions – a collaboration between Show Of Hands and the Madrid-based Irish-American roots quartet Track Dogs. Both acts have played Southwell before, but together they’re sure to become a folk roots supergroup.
Other artists already booked for the festival include Thursday Blues Night headliners the veteran British R&B outfit Nine Below Zero (the big band version featuring Charlie Austin on vocals); The Hoth Brothers bringing bluegrass and Americana from the wilds of New Mexico; old-time & ragtime from Italian duo Max De Bernardi & Veronica Sbergia, famous West Ireland traditional musicians Gatehouse, and Morton Valence who take the sound of Americana and put it through their unique London filter with an intimate authenticity of their own, top quality slide blues guitar from the Martin Harley Band and Birmingham’s rising progressive folk band, Bonfire Radicals.
…anyone who comes into their orbit is going to be hard pushed not to be swept up by this blazing folk comet; the Bonfire Radicals are a band for the here and now who could give us all a much-needed, welcome lift.
Danny Neill, Folk Radio
As usual, there’ll be plenty of great singer-songwriters performing, including John Smith, who missed the 2022 festival due to Covid but whose ‘Far Too Good’ has been streamed nearly 50 million times on Spotify, and the Californian troubadour Tom Russell who Rolling Stone called “the greatest living folk-country songwriter”.
More than fifty great music acts will perform across four stages, including raving Welsh steampunk-meets-traditional from NoGood Boyo, the immensely danceable rhythms of London Afrobeat Collective, and Martyn Joseph, who’s rightly been branded “the Welsh Springsteen”.
Amongst recent additions to the GTSF lineup there’s Jake Blount, one of the rising stars of American roots music and who was also one of Folk Radio’s Artists of the Month. His latest album, The New Faith, was described by Billy Rough as “…an album rich with themes of hope, resilience and salvation.” He added that, “With a keen sense of tradition, Blount has cleverly delivered a bold, thought-provoking and judicious album, but one which is also a thoroughly, staggeringly thrilling listen. Glorious.”
Check out his recent Tiny Desk Concert for NPR.
Other artists signed up to play include the Manchester collective Kabantu, the award-winning folk duo Good Habits, English folk ambassadors Tarren, Northallerton-born poetic guitarist George Boomsma, rhythmic South African soulful trio Stone Jets, Northumbrian harmonies from The Brothers Gillespie and the highly-regarded vocal and instrumental virtuosity of Jon Doran & The Northern Assembly. Plus, there’s a welcome comeback from that unique singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Rory McLeod, who played Southwell in 2010 and 2018. Rightly branded a British storytelling troubadour, Rory’s also been a fire eater and circus clown and remains one of the great entertainers on the festival circuit.
For tickets and more details on dancing opportunities, family events, and a special evening of music hosted by Kip & Dave from Winter Wilson and Ali Russell, visit https://www.gtsf.uk/