FolkEast is all set to head to it’s new home at Sotterley Estate in August and has recently announced the first acts who will be gracing the new stages.
Kathryn Tickell and The Darkening will return to headline FolkEast on Saturday night. Kathryn is a stellar exponent of the Northumbrian pipes and has gathered together stand-out musicians from Northumberland, Scotland and England to form her band The Darkening – a band that has finely honed Northumbrian traditional tunes and sounds into a thrilling aural twist.
There’s bound to be a crowd for Penguin Cafe – a band originally conceived by Arthur Jeffes as a continuation of his father Simon’s project, the Penguin Café Orchestra. They are a hard-to-label act that has been variously described as avant-pop and chamber jazz – a blend of folk, classical and minimalism.
Keeping the joint jumping will be Sheelanagig – a quintet offering foot-stomping tunes inspired by pan-European folk music with groove-heavy arrangements of both original and traditional tunes.
Bristol-based sea shanty kings The Longest Johns will be heading to Suffolk to show just why they have become a cult act. Their fame surged when their folk song Wellerman went viral on TikTok back in 2021 (remember those hazy days?), and by 2024, they were the UK’s most streamed folk act.
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Well for starters, there’s The Rheingans Sisters, Jimmy Aldridge and Sid Goldsmith, and Tarren, with new albums and old favourites.
Then how about an exploration and celebration of an iconic London folk venue? Folk musician and writer Jon Wilks is curating the ‘Second Cousins’ stage for FolkEast, celebrating the 60th anniversary of the iconic Les Cousins folk and blues club, a ‘spawning ground’ for musical talent, which opened in the basement of a restaurant at 49 Greek Street, Soho, back in 1965.
Year Round FolkEast
“We enjoyed a sublime Blaxhall Session from Tim Edey in January, and there’s another corker coming up in February. If you haven’t made big Valentines Day plans yet, or you’d rather give the whole hearts-and-roses thing a miss, we’ve got the perfect night out planned for you!”
RANT – 14th February, 7.30pm
With three acclaimed albums under their belt, RANT remain at the forefront of the Scottish fiddle scene. This is a meeting of four of the country’s finest players, and they’ll use just their fiddles to weave a tapestry of melodies, textures, layers and sounds for your delectation.
