TwickFolk Birthday Concert 2024

The String Fellows - Bernie Dembowski, John Rogers Prosser, John Davies

Sue Graves
The String Fellows - Bernie Dembowski, John Rogers Prosser, John Davies
Amrit Sond
Ivor Game
Mandy Woods
Martin, Helen and Vanessa
Michael De Podesta
Paul Solman
Paul Vile

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

21st January 2024

Paul Solman & Paul Vile

A great mix of current and vintage performers, together with the friendly and fun atmosphere that has made TwickFolk so popular for more than four decades.

Amrit Sond

Last Sunday at TwickFolk marked the final night of my year long art residency. It has an been an amazing privilege to experience such high quality performers, to hear their music and to sketch them of course. The year started with a re-brand of the TwickFolk logo and the unveiling of a new stage banner. I felt very proud to watch the performers strut their stuff in front of the banner. And it is testament to the team at TwickFolk and especially their official photographer, Riikka Gregorowski, that images of the folk musicians (and the banner) can be found all over social media.

Ivor Game

There were several highlights of the residency. First must be the quality of the floor spots. These brought both new discoveries to my attention but also an appreciation of the talent that is the TwickFolk team ranks. My favourite night of the year was the Young Folk Showcase, curated by Jennie Higgins, and featuring Sean Spicer, Seb Stone, and East Corner Trio. It's good to know that the future of British folk music is in such good hands.

Sue Graves

I'm very grateful for the Sunday night welcome I received from Sue Graves, Paul Kenny, Paul Vile, Paul Solman, Riikka and the rest of the team at TwickFolk each week. It really is a special folk club and they would not have been able to flourish for 41 years without nurturing a community around them. I feel fortunate to have been placed at the heart of this community for a year of my creative life.

Mandy Woods

Martin, Helen and Vanessa

Michael De Podesta

 

Pete Morton - Twickfolk

Pete Morton

Pete Morton

floor spots from
Paul Vile
Paul Solman
Michael De Podesta

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

14th January 2024

Paul Solman

Pete Morton fired 2024 into life for the Twickfolk audience this week. He sang from the heart, for there is no better place, delivering songs that spoke of the human condition. His passion was unquenchable, his strong voice a guiding light, especially when a string broke on his guitar, and he dropped to his knees to repair it. It was a pleasure to hear his songs, a mix of humour, politics, love and social comment.

Michael De Podesta

Pete Morton began his musical journey after he came across a Buffy St Marie record. It was from that moment on he decided to become a folk singer. Discovering the songs of the early sixties protest movement, it inspired him to write and take his songs into folk clubs and beyond. Starting out as a busker on the streets of Europe, he has entertained all over the globe with his unique and involving style of song-writing and singing. 

For thirty years, Pete has been performing to audiences all over the world. Throughout that time he has been regarded as one the best on the contemporary roots music scene.  His latest album ‘A Golden Thread’ has received rave reviews with eight newly self penned songs, a Pete Seeger classic ‘Oh Had I A Golden Thread’, and versions of the traditional gems, ‘Barbry Allen’ and ‘The Farmers Boy’.

Paul Vile

Katie Spencer - Twickfolk

Katie Spencer

Katie Spencer

Floor spots
Paul Vile
Amrit Sond

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

3rd December 2023

Katie Spencer‘s visit to a wintery TwickFolk rounded off a fabulous year of concerts in impeccable style. Beautiful, haunting and tender, her music transported us through the glistening landscapes of the North of England.

Guitarists like John Martyn and Michael Chapman come to mind, Beth Orton’s voice and touches of Joni Mitchell. Katie’s first album was the aptly named Weather Beaten, which summed up the inhospitable Twickenham streets outside, but just like Katie's words and heart, inside the Cabbage Patch there was a warm welcome. Katie was raised in Yorkshire, and the county's topography is conjured through the lush simplicity of her music. Delicate and un-rushed, her songs drift by like ships on the horizon, yet an intimacy and introspection still remain.

Paul Vile

Amrit Sond

Alex Seel + Pip Collings & Paul Vile - Twickfolk

Paul Vile

Alex Seel
Pip Collings & Paul Vile

Floor Spot
Tom Poslett

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

25th June 2023

Alex Seel

Alex Seel is a singer-songwriter and guitarist with roots in folk & blues. We last saw him in February 2020, and we look forward to welcoming back to the stage.
Music has led Alex from Devon to London to Ireland and back to London again. Through his wanderings, Alex has picked up a beautifully crafted rootsy song-writing style with thought-provoking lyrics and a gift for acoustic guitar finger-picking. He has a growing reputation as a solo performer. His most recent release is the album ‘Spell On A Tin Drum’. This and previous releases have been well received by press and radio.
The album, written partly in a caravan on the west coast of Ireland and mostly recorded in London, has retained a raw emotional feel and with it gained new heights of songwriting within Seel’s unique repertoire.

Pip Collings

Pip Collings and Paul Vile have been performing together since the late 80s. Paul is no stranger to TwickFolk audiences – our longest-serving volunteer is also the sound engineer, floor-spotter and until recently was the M.C, not to mention his gigs with John Prosser. Pip has appeared on the TwickFolk stage a few times, the most recent being with Paul at our 40th Anniversary bash.

This renewed activity coincides with a new album – Diaries released in March this year.

Tom Poslett

Sam Kelly & Jamie Francis - Twickfolk

Sam Kelly & Jamie Francis

Floor spots
Pip Collings & Paul Vile
Holly Rose Thomas

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

4th June 2023

Sam Kelly & Jamie Francis are no strangers to TwickFolk audiences. Sam brought his trio to the Cabbage Patch in January of 2015 and as a duo they returned in January 2017. In the intervening period, Sam was presented with the Horizon Award at the 2016 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.

Pip Collings & Paul Vile

As a young child hailing from the depths of Norfolk, Sam’s only link to folk music lay in the Gaelic folk songs that his Irish grandfather taught him. Although many individual songs and tunes have been lost in the blur of childhood memory, Sam has never lost his love for the beautiful sounds of traditional music, and this passion pours out of him in every note he sings. The EP ‘Spokes’ landed Sam a nomination in the Best Singer category at the 2015 Spiral Earth Awards, and his debut album (The Lost Boys) was released the same year, to great acclaim. It received a four-star review in R2 magazine and was included in the Daily Telegraph list of best folk albums of 2015.

Holly Rose Thomas

Jamie Francis (on banjo, guitar and backing vocals) met Sam when they were studying music and playing at open mics in Brighton. Jamie fronts his own alt-blues trio called Stark and brings his own varied musical influences to bear on the songs he writes with Sam. He is building a reputation as a formidable banjo player.

Open Water - Twickfolk

Joanne Doolan

Open Water
Joanne Doolan
Jeff Alexander
Richard Rozze
Dave Whitford

Floorspots
Paul Vile
Holly Rose Thomas
Michael de Podesta

Michael de Podesta

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

26th March 2023

Open Water are an acoustic trio based in the South East of England, their music is rooted in the British Folk Tradition with influences of Celtic and American Bluegrass.

Joanne Doolan’s unique vocals emanate from her Welsh musical roots. An award winning vocalist,  she started to perform as a jazz vocalist whilst training as an actress at the prestigious Royal Central School of Speech and Drama.  Since then Jo has developed her vocal style to embrace folk and country styles.  Open Water features Joanne’s intriguing lyrical writing, much influenced by the Romantic poets, Shakespeare, Virginia Woolf, Rumi and the lyrics of Joni Mitchell.

Dave Whitford

Guitars and other stringed instruments are played by Jeff Alexander and Richard Rozze. Also for this Twickfolk gig, the trio were joined by the doyen of jazz bass, Dave Whitford .

Jeff Alexander 

Jeff is an acoustic guitar specialist, particularly classical and flamenco styles. He has researched early music and plays the lute and related instruments, and has been heavily involved in folk and Latin styles. Jeff has recently been interested in developing his own guitar tunings to create haunting melodies and fascinating textures. An enthusiastic and much respected educator, Jeff has worked at Canterbury Christ Church University as guitar tutor and lecturer since 1979.

Richard Rozze

Richard’s influences stem from rock, blues and jazz traditions. He is a former Graduate of London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama, where he studied a Masters in Jazz. He currently teaches guitar and Jazz styles at Canterbury Christ Church University and has been involved in teaching on the Mehr Clef Jazz Summer Schools.

Paul Vile

Open Water were supported by floorspots from Paul Vile, Holly Rose Thomas and the Michael de Podesta.

Holly Rose Thomas

Charlie Dore - Twickfolk

Charlie Dore

Charlie Dore with Julian Littman

Floor spots
Sue Graves and Mary Wilson (Suntrap duo)
Paul Vile
Michael de Podesta

Julian Littman

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

19th February 2023

Charlie Dore is best known as a respected songwriter, but has been performing in her own right since the 1970s. She made her first album in Nashville and London and released a single, Pilot of the Airwaves, which became a hit in the US.

Sue Graves

She became one of a handful of UK songwriters to have success across diverse genres with songs covered by George Harrison, Tina Turner, Lisa Stansfied, Ricky Ross, Sheena Easton (US No 4), Celine Dion, Black, UB40, Status Quo, Paul Carrack and a UK No 1, ‘Ain’t No Doubt’ for Jimmy Nail. Charlie’s songs have won two Ascap awards, an Ivor Novello nomination, both the Overall Grand and the Folk Prize from the International Acoustic Music Awards and in 2012 Best Album Lyrics from the Indy Acoustic Project for her album Cheapskate Lullabyes. Charlie’s recent awards include Female Vocalist Of The Year (FATEA, 2020) and Best Lyrics (US Indie Acoustic, 2021).

Paul Vile

For her 10th and most recent album Like Animals, she turns away from the expansive science and space metaphors of 2017’s Dark Matter to focus on the internal landscape of the human brain and just what makes us tick. Sewn-through with Dore’s trademark dark wit, lyricism, and distinctive melodic voice, Like Animals explores some of our most basic instincts and how we’re often hi-jacked by our emotional responses. Fear, anxiety and aggression figure but on the plus side, intense joy and love are in the mix as well. In 2021 Charlie also released her EP, The Man Who Built Christmas, on the basis that a good song isn’t just for Christmas.

Mary Wilson

Michael de Podesta

Twickfolk - 40th Anniversary Bash

Pip Collings

Pip Collings
John Davies
Sue Graves
John Prosser
Paul Vile
Bernie Dembowski
Jennie Higgins

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

5th February 2023

Sue Graves

As TwickFolk entered a second week of 40th birthday celebrations, they brought together many of the characters who have helped nourish and sustain live music in Twickenham on Sunday nights over four decades.

John Davies

John Davies, singer-songwriter, guitarist, sax player, flautist and one-time TwickFolk MC and sound man, returned from Devon, and harmonised with former band-mate, Sue Graves. Sue, current TwickFolk stalwart and treasurer, is universally known across south-of-England folk clubs as the Surrey Songbird, and records and tours widely as a solo act and as part of the polyphonic Suntrap.

Paul Vile

John Prosser, singer-songwriter, guitarist, banjo and mandolin player and former TwickFolk treasurer, performed with TwickFolk's current sound man and longest-serving  committee member, Paul Vile.

John Prosser 

John Davies, John Prosser and Bernie Dembowski performed as the String Fellows.

Jennie Higgins

Jennie Higgins, who performed at TwickFolk last week to a packed audience, took a break from her educational role at the English Folk Dance and Song Society to entertain Twickenham folk lovers once more. This week she launched her new album Where Are All The Women?, you can buy a copy here https://jenniehiggins.bandcamp.com/album/where-are-all-the-women.

Bernie Dembowski

Luke Jackson - TwickFolk

Luke Jackson

Luke Jackson and Andy Sharps

Floor spots
Jennie Higgins
Paul Vile
Paul Solman

TwickFolk - The Cabbage Patch Pub, 67 London Road, Twickenham, TW1 3SZ
www.twickfolk.co.uk

29th January 2023

Luke Jackson toured extensively throughout 2022 performing solo, duo & trio shows. He opened for Fairport Convention on their winter tour, had a dream support slot with Richard Thompson. In August he spent two weeks song writing and performing in Nashville, including a show at the legendary Bluebird Cafe, and ending the year supporting Jools Holland on a run of shows. 

Andy Sharps

His 2023 Tour dates are
Tue 07 Feb - The Courtyard – Herefordshire’s Centre for the Arts
Sat 11 Feb - Hepworth Village Hall, Holmfirth (nr Huddersfield)
Wed 15 Mar - Ashcroft Arts Centre, Fareham, Hampshire
Thu 16 Mar - Forest Arts Centre, New Milton
Fri 17 Mar - The Star, Guildford
Sat 18 Mar - Silver Street Sessions, Wiveliscombe
Wed 22 Mar - Slipped Discs Brown Sugar, Billericay (In Store Show)
Sat 25 Mar - The Salt Work Sessions, Northwich
Sun 02 Apr - The Royal Oak, Eccleshall
Wed 05 Apr - Cafe #9 - Sheffield

Jennie Higgins

Jennie Higgins, who performed her debut album preview gig at TwickFolk to a packed audience last summer, takes a break from her educational role at the English Folk Dance and Song Society to entertain Twickenham folk lovers once more. On the cusp of launching her new album, she will be returning to Twickfolk next week for more 40th birthday celebrations.

Paul Vile

Next Sunday at Twickfolk it is the second week of 40th birthday celebrations, they bring together many of the characters who have helped nourish and sustain live music in Twickenham on Sunday nights over four decades. Including Graham Larkbey, John Davies, Sue Graves, John Prosser, Paul Vile, Pip Collings, Ger Evans, Ivor Game and Jennie Higgins.

Paul Solman