Legendary British Soul music pioneer, Geno Washington, was moved to tears by returning to play Woodbridge for the first time since 1965.
The soul singer who scored two chart topping LPs in the 1960s and was celebrated in Dexy’s Midnight Runners hit ‘Geno’, played his first gig in Woodbridge for 60 years at this year’s Woodbridge Festival of Art and Music.
The 81 year old singer, widely recognised as the father of Brit Soul, wowed the festival crowds with his powerful vocals and charismatic performance.
Geno was moved to tears by the experience of being back in Woodbridge. He had never sung before he arrived in Suffolk as the PE instructor for the US Airforce base in Woodbridge in the 1960s. But while serving in Woodbridge he started singing in local pubs and on leaving the forces in 1965 he went to London to join the Ram Jam band. From here he went onto have chart topping LPs and a successful 60 year long music career.
The festival invited Geno to play as part of the Super Fly project, which is researching the influence Suffolk had in bringing American black music into the UK via the many US Airforce bases in East Anglia. The festival also invited some of Geno’s Suffolk-based family to the event. Geno was delighted to unexpectedly see his son and grandson and other family members and old friends. His son joined him on stage for the final song.
Other headline performers at the 14th Woodbridge Festival included Colin Newman, the front man of seminal punk and post punk act Wire. Colin and partner Malka Spegel, of Minimal Compact, launched the national tour of their band, Immersion, at the festival.
TV and film star Ben Miles played an all vinyl Italo Disco and House DJ set with Noise of Art’s Ben Osborne on Saturday night with visuals by VJ Girl in a T-shirt. The festival hosted three busy club nights from Thursday to Saturday, with Les Spaine, the father of UK Funk DJs, playing a funk set on Friday.
The annual event featured Woodbridge Festival’s regular popular art engagement activities, including Spin – the festival’s arts project exploring the role that milling has played in human creativity since ancient Greece; and the role it is playing as we move into the era of clean energy.
As well as the popular annual event in Elmhurst Park, the festival packed out venues around town, with New Street Market, Marlowe’s and Hopsters becoming the new hub spaces for this year’s festival.
Woodbridge Festival is grateful to its funders Scops Arts Fund, Woodbridge Town Council, East Suffolk Council and The Co-Op community Fund and MSC for its community engagement.
Alice Stallard, festival chair, said: “This was possibly the most engaging Woodbridge Festival yet. The art sections in the park and hub venues were at their busiest yet, with pottery and spin art joining the activities as part of our Spin project. Seeing Geno play was a highlight of the year. It directly connected Woodbridge and Suffolk with the roots of Soul music in the UK and it was lovely to see Geno being so visibly moved by the whole experience – and crowd responding to him so enthusiastically.”
Festival Founder and Super Fly project creator Ben Osborne said: “We’ve been planning Geno’s appearance for five years as part of the Super Fly project and it was great to have him and Les Spaine play the Festival. Both of them played a massively important part in the story of how American Black Music came into the UK via the Suffolk US Airforce bases. It’s great to have them involved in our project.”
