Folk Fights Back – Coventry’s CVfolk Inaugural Live Event in bid for City of Culture Status.
By Pete Clemons
This article is the blog for Pete Clemons articles – ie another of the Hobo Coventry Music Websites – HERE
At a time when young Teesside folk acts like Megson, Cattle and Cane, The Younguns are reinventing what folk music can be, filling venues around the country, and getting write ups in the Guardian and Independent, the Coventry folkscene is fighting back and celebrating its own historic and dynamic folk culture that has attracted the likes of Joe O’Donnell, Dave Swarbrick and many others to the City and boasts a range of singer songwriters giggling around the country. With Selecter star Pauline Black as patron, Pete Willow is working hard to put Coventry folk on the map!
Pete Clemons reports from CVfolks inaugural Live event..
“Whippersnapper was an English folk band formed in 1984, consisting of Dave Swarbrick (fiddle, mandolin, vocals), Chris Leslie (fiddle, mandolin, vocals), Kevin Dempsey (guitar, vocals) and Martin Jenkins (mando-cello, flute, vocals).
Swarbrick left the group in 1989, and the band continued as a trio until 1993, with the only album recorded that line-up being Stories. During that time, Dempsey and Leslie released an album called Always With You as a duo. The band split when Jenkins left the group in 1993.
Following Swarbrick’s recovery from illness, Whippersnapper toured again as a full four piece in both 2008 and 2009. Martin Jenkins (born 17 July 1946, London, England) died on 17 May 2011, in Sofia, Bulgaria, from a heart attack.”
This folk outfit consisted of two members of Coventry progressive folk band Dando Shaft – Martin Jenkins and Kevin Demsey and from the 80’s, I think, Dave Swarbrick – formerly of Fairport Convention, has lived in Coventry.
“Whippersnapper were a four-piece acoustic band formed by Dave Swarbrick, Chris Leslie,
Kevin Dempsey, and Martin Jenkins in Northamptonshire during 1983. Although none of the others could quite compare with Swarbrick’s long experience or near-legendary status, each of the others brought something substantial to the table at the outset of the group’s history — Chris Leslie was a musical instrument maker as well as an experienced violinist (who had Swarbrick’s playing as a model); guitarist, singer, and percussionist Kevin Dempsey had played in Dando Shaft, and had experience with Latin music as well as Celtic and English folk repertory; and multi-instrumentalist Martin Jenkins had played with Matthews Southern Comfort and was also an ex-member of Dando Shaft, as well as a Bert Jansch alumnus. As a result, the group’s work was highly anticipated by folk enthusiasts, as a unique all-acoustic supergroup. The group made its debut in January of 1984 at the Burnt Post in Coventry and subsequently played the Cambridge Folk Festival, a performance that was captured on video as well.
Their music was a deceptively complex brand of progressive folk, driven by the presence of four full-fledged virtuoso players. Whippersnapper spent most of their first year honing their sound and repertory, which started out fully formed, drawing on the songbags of all four members. As a result, their debut album, when it came time to do it — recorded for their own Whippersnapper label — came together very quickly. The Promises long-player was recorded in December of 1984 and in stores just about eight weeks later, and well received by fans and critics. A second LP, Tsubo, didn’t appear until 1987, and it was similar in form and structure to the first. A third studio album was intended, but in the interim the quartet issued These Foolish Strings, a compilation of four years’ worth of live recordings. The fourth album, Fortune, was released in early 1990, and also marked the end of Swarbrick’s involvement with the group. The group continued as a trio of Leslie, Dempsey, and Jenkins, and Leslie and Dempsey recorded the LP Always with You, released in 1996. Dempsey eventually teamed up with Swarbrick anew, while Leslie joined one of the latter-day lineups of Fairport Convention.”
View a recent Pete Clemons article on Dave Swarbrick for the Coventry Telegraph here Hobo – Coventry
“Geoff Smedley, whose clear, gentle voice and warm humourous personality has brought pleasure to uncounted numbers of people. I hope this LP will help him achieve some acclaim, Geoff is not – does not pretend to be – a superstar – but he IS worth listening to.” Rosemary Hardman from the back cover of his LP Love is Mine 1972
I don’t know a lot about Geoff Smedley but he was a member of The Idiot Grunt Band (Coventry) in 1967. Becoming The New Modern Idiot Grunt Band (Dando Shaft, Rob Armstrong, Rod Felton) and breaking in 1972 (Armstrong forming “The Music Box”).
Geoff was a contemporary of Rod Felton and Rob Armstrong on the Coventry Folk Scene in 1965, and when the Coventry Mummers visited Germany to perform, Rod Rob and Geoff went over too, playing solo or together as The Gentle Idea and it seems Geoff played sometimes with The New Modern Idiot Grunt Band.
In 1972 Geoff Smedley made a limit edition (200 pressings) folk album Love is Mine on the Westwood label.
It has become increasingly obvious in the last two years that the whole music world – including the folk scene – has declared the 70’s the age of the superstar. Names like – Steeleye Span, Ralph McTell and America’s James Taylor, receive the acclaim that up to this time was only accorded to pop artists. There seems little doubt that the possibility of achieving that sort of acclaim – and the resultant ego-trip has affected the overall standard of folk music in this country. But whilst artists like Steeleye Span pack the concert halls and what the public’s appetite for bigger and better things – it is still in the local folkclub that the average folk fans seek their music. These clubs rely to a great extent on the talents of semi-professional singers and it seems that many of these never receive an acclaim in proportion to the great contribution they make to the scene. Such an artist is Geoff Smedley, whose clear gentle voice and warm, humourous personality have brought pleasure to uncounted numbers of people. I hope this LP will help him achieve some of that acclaim. Geoff is not and does not pretend to be a Superstar – but he is worth listening to.
This new book by Ruth Cherrington captures the 70’s music and entertainments scene in Coventry and includes a page on the Coventry Folk Scene and quite a lot of material from these Hobo – Coventry music archives sites – of which this one. Indeed Hobo magazine is featured in it too.
Well worth a read – all the favourite venues are covered.
Ben Arnold was one of the early pioneers of the Coventry Folk Scene in the 1960’s
The following cuttings were sent to me by Larry Arnold, son of Ben Arnold and are largely from around 1967. Pete Willow’s article on Coventry folk clubs in the 1960’s, provides good background.Read more here
Paddy Prescott and his brother at the Lanch Poly in Coventry 1970’s
The following memories of Paddy Prescott come from William Arnold, son of Ben Arnold, of which more is written on this blog as a Coventry folk club organiser and pioneer in the 1960’s. William shared accommodation with Paddy at one stage.
Update9th January 20199 – William Arnold has informed me that Paddy Prescott sadly passed away yesterday 8th January 2019. Below is William’s tribute to his life.
Paddy Prescott – Photo courtesy of John Boocock
“Paddy is and was a fascinating character and a genuine person. I was introduced by Paddy to Irish music sessions at the Four Provinces Club which tended to be rather republican and a bit off putting for non Irish. Chapelfields, with its many pubs, was the setting for various Sunday dinner time sessions. Remember this was when pubs religiously shut early on Sundays. A long running one was at the Nursery Tavern, Lord Street where Dave Bennett was a stalwart, amazing every one with the volume of his repertoire and his amazing skill and dexterity producing rhythm, bass, treble and harmony lines in perfect time with only 10 digits. A genuine virtuoso, he was never tempted to go even semi-professional, even though his skills equaled and exceeded many name musicians. Think Chet Atkins and Les Paul his material was mostly western Swing and Ragtime music. Rod Felton would sometimes appear and I am always grateful to him for the support he gave me when I needed it after too much to drink!
In the 80’s Paddy lived in Alma Street and worked as bar cellar man in the Foresters Arms pub, just over the road, which was run by Sid a character in his own right and a folk enthusiast. It was in the back room here that Paddy held court on Wednesdays for his nondenominational folk sessions. A group of friends and associates, yet not exclusive. Occasionally people just popped in and we’d always make them feel welcome. Lenny was a regular ,he had converted to Roman Catholicism and would occasionally lament the passing of his wild youth and poor taste, maintaining that the only real music worth bothering with was Blue Grass and Appalachian Mountain music and Rod Felton was also commonly in attendance and the hard core of Coventry folkies and they’d often continued until early morning at Paddy’s minuscule bedsit. Most of the other residents had probably attended as well. Alma street had houses only on one side and they had all been gradually bought up by Paddy’s landlord, not being a thoroughfare, occasionally he would hold street parties for his tenants, complete with music and dancing in the street!
Never one to take himself too seriously Paddy used half jokingly describe himself as an anarcho-syndicalist with Trotskyite leanings. he could of been described as a skinhead,outlaw biker / Irish folksinger with attitudes! I first met him in 1978 when we shared a 2 up 2 down in St George’s Road, Coventry, with his two cats, Trotsky and Durutti!
As well as being External Affairs Officer at the Lanch Poly Tech, he was acting Entertainments Officer as the incumbent was not up to the job of hiring bands etc. In this role his greatest regret was turning down Dire Straits at £1000 as it was too expensive, just before they released Sultans of Swing. Strongly individual, he was not concerned that people laughed behind his back when at his parties he’d play the Trojan Story double LP and show off his skinhead and stomp dancing! This was not cool then but not too much later when the Specials and Selecter became Three Minute Heroes and every student it seemed had to know one, they stopped laughing.
Lachester Poly Union building Coventry
Whether or not Paddy originated the Lanch Folk Club or not, he certainly gave it vigour and manage to attract large audiences both student and locals (unfortunately though I never paid to get in, and I can’t remember who i saw there or even what night it was held!).
It was held in the infamous downstairs bar of the Poly, where plastic glasses sat on desk type tables and the walls displayed murals from the 60’s of scenes from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings (these were painted over just before Lord of the Rings became cool again with the release of the film version). The admission was a modest fee and allowed for well known folk groups / artists every other week and each week local folk impresarios and floor singers with Paddy doing the comparing and launching into one of his unaccompanied songs to get things going.
The accent was always on entertainment and many a student who had attended out of curiosity was converted to the cause despite his student providence and Paddy had managed to become integrated into the differing folk scenes that were going on in Coventry, particularly those that had carried on from the 60’s, when Coventry was a strong center of Britain’s new folk-scene. Despite being the son of Ben Arnold, who was one of the movers and shakers of the 60’s folk scene, it was Paddy that introduced me to the late 70’s Coventry folk scene where i would meet people such as Rod Felton, Lenny, Gib Tod and others who considered me Ben’s Son.
Paddy’s enthusiasm for folk music stemmed from his enthusiasm for Irish culture, being irish by birth and happily adopted by a family of Norwich Catholics (he served as an altar boy in Norwich Cathedral) and wishing to establish an identity he mixed with the Irish diaspora acquiring, by osmosis, a non regional English / Irish accent that became stronger the drunker he became! Singing unaccompanied, sometimes adopting a Norfolk accent for songs like 3 score and ten, a good example of folk songs with strong choruses that the audience could sing along to (and its 3 score and 10 boys and men were lost from Grimsby town from Yarmouth down to Scarborough many hundreds more were drowned. Of fishing smacks and trawlers etc etc)
Unconcerned about trivialities like what is or isn’t folk; for Paddy, folk music was a social and community activity and only really bothered about hushing the audience when it might discourage newcomers to performing. Apart from the Lanch Folk Club, Paddy was well known and liked in the many Coventry folk sessions. He was a stalwart at the Dyers Arms backroom sessions and introduced me to them (incidentally Pauline Black’s description is pretty much as I remember it. I can’t remember ever seeing her there, which is not surprising, as I haven’t the faintest idea of what she looks like!
Paddy eventually moved to Bolton to be with his girlfriend Belinda Moore, who used to be Julian Bell’s girlfriend of Hot Snax (Snacks) and left the Coventry Folk Scene a little bit duller. That’s about it for Paddy.
Rumour has that Rod Felton made an album for Pye Records in the 70’s.There are tapes but nothing has surfaced so far. We believe it was through Barry Murray and Harry Simmonds – managers and producers of Mungo Jerry, Savoy Brown, Chicken Shack etc.
However, a number of people have uploaded live tracks on Soundcloud or YouTube or sent copies to me for this site. So I’ve created this hub page for those 20 odd tracks. They remain on the original sites but are linked here to make a kind of double album. If anyone else has any tracks they have uploaded of Rod’s or want to send them to us for this page, please do so. You can send them here hobozine@googlemail.com
Thanks to those who have uploaded or supplied material linked or added to this page and they are Marko Krnjulap, Dave Cooper (of Dando Shaft), Russell Smith of Bam Bam Music Productions, John Silver of The Falcon Hotel, Bromyard. Norman Wheatley of Gentlefolk Radio and Pete Clemons and Jan Felton.
New as of February 19th 2017 – a 12 track CD now on Vimeo kindly supplied by Jan Felton via Pete Clemons. 12 Tracks – Curly* – No Doubt about it (Live) – I Want to be free (ska)- I Want to get there my way – Here with Me – Interplanetary Trucker (Live) – Your Love’s Good for me* – Lady baby gypsy queen* – Love is (Taken by Surprise) (double tracked vocals) – Liberty Bell* – My Old Man* – Really don’t believe she’s true* (with fiddles).
The Mountain Ash Band were an electric folk band, in the style of perhaps of Steeleye Span, based in The Hermit – became a collectors piece in Progressive Music circles. and, for the purposes of this particular site, they do have a strong Coventry connection.
Ilkley in 1975 and their one and only limited edition album –
Coventry Connection In June 1973, while we were printing the very first issue of Hobo – Coventry Music and Arts Magazine,Colin Cripps and Lynda Hardcastle (later of the Mountain Ash Band, were preparing The Willenhall Free Press for print also at the Left Centre bookshop in, Lower Ford Street, Coventry. The centre had a community Offset Litho which had been donated to the centre by Edward Thompson, author of Making of the Working Class, who at the time was a Professor of historyWarwick University. Colin and Lyn were musicians, magazine editors and, I discovered live quite near to me in Willenhall, so naturally we became good friends and Colin and Lyn participated in the Hobo Workshop gigs at Holyhead Youth Centre (where the Specials and Selecter later began). They lived in a flat in Ivy Walk with their son and held regular soirees with poets, musicians and like minded people. Colin Cripps, who later authored the book Popular Music in the 20thC – Cambridge University Press 1988. Colin was an undergraduate at Warwick University, studying Literature at the time and they were both involved with a Community campaigning magazine The Willenhall Free Press and other forms of community activism. One of the poets, from Ivy Walk was Ray King (Not to be confused with Ray King of the Ray King Soul band – also from Coventry). Ray went on to write the lyrics for the Mountain Ash Band‘s album – The Hermit. Colin and Lyn left Coventry in 1975 after Colin graduated and moved to Ilkley where they formed the Mountain Ash Band. Ultimately Colin was originally from Cambridge and Lynda from, I think, Filey in North Yorkshire. Lynda Hardcastle went on to sing with Grace Notes, featuring Maggie Boyle and Helen Hockenhull.
at
Colin Cripps (Guitar / Research and original concept, music for songs) –
Ray King (Lyrics)
Sean Mansley (Narration)
Lynda Hardcastle (Vocals and Recorder)
Alan Rose (Vocals and Whistle)
Martin Carter (Vocals and Guitar)
Geoff Bowen (Fiddle and Recorder)
Graham Jones ( Bass, Vocals and Recorder)
Kevin Slingsby (Drums).
Production and arrangements including traditional tunes by Mountain Ash Band.
The album was recorded on 13th and 14th December 1975 by Look Records at September Sound Studios, Golcar, Huddersfield, West Yorks. Mastering and sound on songs David Whitely. Sound on Narration George Parks, edited by Robert Whitely. Sleeve design and artwork Kevin Slingsby. Witches Bane Music.
Tracks
Side One (The is also a narrative before each track)
Birth
Journeys
Stone on Stone.
Side Two
A Long Winter
Who Knows
I’ll Sing For My Supper
The Outcast / Rebirth.
Bonus Tracks.
Colin Cripps supplied a few bonus tracks that were played live after the Hermit project as part of another project or from their next project ‘wind over the borderland‘. English Birds is an instrumental that never made it to the final album. You can hear these tracks directly here by clicking on them.
Two of the bonus tracks have already found their way to youtube – Leading lady and November – so here they are are on youtube –
The Lyrics – by Ray King.
Ray King – Lyricist
Colin Cripps says “When Ray King, a friend from Willenhall, visited I told him the folk tale and he tuned in immediately and came up with a great set of lyrics. They had no verse and chorus structure because Ray was a poet not a songwriter, but there was enough to work with.”
“Job Senior was a hermit. There are many ways of being a hermit. It was only for a short time towards his later years that Job lived on Ilkley Moor away from other people. For most of his life Job was a hermit in a crowd. The facts of his life, as far as they are known, are narrated on this album. The songs are not an attempt at story telling; more a series of glimpses of his world as we imagine it would have been seen by Job at the crisis points of his life.” From the album cover. The Lyrics sheet that came with the album –
Note; You may need to save the lyric sheet graphics and enlarge them via the scroll button on your computer in order to read them.
Some links to background on The Hermit tale and Job Senior
Pete Willow has created a new folk Connection blog to keep you all up to date with the latest happenings on the folk and acoustic scene in Coventry and Warwickshire. Great initiative and much needed in the area.
NOTE – the site mentioned here has been superseded by Pete Willow’s CVfolk site
The other day I got an email from Lot Lorien, a Bulgarian folk band now resident in Coventry. Further more they sent me a copy of their CD Elsewhere and it’s musical alchemy!
NEWS UPDATE – Coventry singer / Songwriter / Venue Organiser has joined Lot Lorien. You’ll find an updated biography of the band below. September 4th 2014
The beautiful Tolkien style cover of their album Elsewhere. The album is a joy to listen to with elements of Pentangle, Everything but the Girl, All About Eve and Bulgarian traditional music.
All you need to know about the band is on their website but here is the biography of the band –
Lot Lorien
Lot
Lorien is a British progressive-folk band, combining in a modern way
the traditions of British and Bulgarian folklore with classical
music, jazz and progressive rock. Some of the main influences can be
found among great musicians and bands like Theodosii Spassov,
Fairport Convention, Dando Shaft, Pentangle, Rush, Steeleye Span,
etc.
The band, initially Bulgarian, first came into existence in 1996,
when the founders – Kiril Georgiev (guitars, lyrics, compositions)
and Zlatomir Valchev (drums, percussion) were joined by Petar Pavlov
(bass). After number of experiments and line-up changes the band were joined by Bora Petkova (vocals), Galina Koycheva (violin) and Nelly
Gancheva (cello, for few concerts).
Being ardent fans of English fiction writer John R. R. Tolkien, the
band members were inspired to choose their name by Tolkien’s
Middle-earth works (the place where the stories of “Hobbit”
and “Lord of the Rings” unfold). Lothlorien is the
fairytale woods kingdom of the Galadhrim elves where time seems to
have stopped and every stranger entering this land forgets all
worries and pending threats. Inspired by this standstill of time, Lot
Lorien (they choose to spell the name as two separate words) begin to
create music evocative of fairytale images that prompt the listener
to forget their mundane worries.
Early years
Lot Lorien’s first serious performances started in 1998. Joined by
Alexander Kinov (sound engineer, technician) and Yasen Kazandjiev
(manager), the band made its first concert in Varna on February 14th
1998. The date is accepted as the official birthday of Lot Lorien.
With the course of time, the band’s specific sound and style started to evolve and take shape with the great contribution of band’s
songwriter Kiril Georgiev and the non-standard use of instruments:
acoustic guitar, violin and gentle female voice were successfully
combined with synthesizer, bass guitar, drums and different folk
instruments like tapan, tabla, djembe, darbouka, didgeridoo. Unique
handmade instruments crafted by the band members themselves also found a place in the compositions.
In 2000 the band started touring abroad and was warmly accepted by
international audience and promoters.
After numerous successful concerts and demo records (some of them
broadcast on the air), it was time for the band’s first album “Eastern
Wind”. The album was recorded in the summer of 2002 in
Balkanton studio (Sofia/Bulgaria) with the legendary sound engineer
Deyan Timnev and with the special support of Rudolf Carrera – founder
of Falcata-Galia Recordings and president of Carrera Linn Cultural
Exchange (USA). Renowned young opera singer Ina Kancheva was guest
performer in one of the compositions included in this album.
New events and shows followed, and the creation of new compositions. At the
beginning, Lot Lorien were experiencing strong influence from
classical music and English folklore and later their style and sound were enhanced by inspirations of jazz, progressive rock and Bulgarian
folklore.
Theodosii Spassov
2003 started with one of the most interesting collaborations of the band
with the great musician Theodosii Spassov *. The first result of this
collaboration was the participation at the Mobimak Balkan Square 2003
festival in Ohrid, Macedonia where Lot Lorien played their rearranged
compositions with the serious contribution by the great Bulgarian
musician. This and the following shows enjoyed great success. The
concert in Ohrid was recorded and part of it was later released under
the title “Live in Ohrid”, the second
album in the band’s discography. * Theodosii Spassov plays kaval – chromatic end-blown flute
traditionally played throughout Azerbaijan, Turkey, Bulgaria, etc.
Unlike the transverse flute, the kaval is fully open at both ends,
and is played by blowing on the sharpened edge of one end. The kaval
has 8 playing holes (7 in front and 1 in the back for the thumb) and
usually four more unfingered intonation holes near the bottom of the
kaval. The name kaval may once have been referred to various Balkan
duct and rim-blown flutes, accounting for the present day diversity
of the term’s usage.
In 2003 Lot Lorien also became a member of IOV – a UNESCO affiliated
International Folk Arts Organization.
Gradually the band started touring abroad more frequently, presenting
its original compositions and interpretations on Bulgarian folklore
tunes. By that time some music videos were created by the famous
Bulgarian director Todor Chapkanov – friend of the band. The first
music video was for the song “Mari Mariiko”
– based on folklore song from the Strandja mountain region of
Bulgaria.
“Lot Lorien”
The end of 2005 set the beginning of an ambitious project of working
title “Lot Lorien and Friends”. The band
purchased their own professional equipment and established a home
studio, which provided them with creative freedom for
experimentation. At the end of 2006, an album including 12
compositions was a fact: recorded and mixed in the band’s studio.
Featuring in this album were numerous guest musicians whom Lot Lorien
had met and worked with in Bulgaria and abroad: Roman Stolyar
(Russia): flute; Latif Bolat (Turkey/USA): vocals; Nikolay Yordanov:
flute; Dragni Dragnev: bagpipe and kaval; Petya Dragneva: folk
singing; Maryana Cvetanova-Milanova and Dilyana Cvetanova: violin;
Christian Nedelchev: rebeck; Snajen Kovachev: vocals; 84-year old
Kiro Dikov from village Brodilovo: vocal; Georgi Konstantinov:
lyrics; Rey Gonzales: lyrics. The album was released at the beginning
of 2007 under the title “Lot Lorien”. One
of the most interesting collaborations included in this album is the
song “Ballad for The Lost”, based on
improvisations with certain ideas and gradually upgraded with
numerous instruments, including small string orchestra, bagpipe and
tabla (used for the first time in band’s composition). The “icing
on the cake” is Latif Bolat, a long-time friend of the band and
renowned Turkish composer/musician living in the USA, famous for his
collaboration with George Lukas on the soundtrack of “Young
Indiana Jones”. Latif and Bora (vocals) produced an interesting
multi-language vocal dialogue: Bulgarian lyrics by Lyuben Karavelov
and Turkish lyrics by Turkish medieval poet Yunus Emre. Tunes from
Turkish folk song are incorporated at the beginning and the end of
the composition. This song becomes one of the award winners in the
contest for intercultural dialogue “Other songs” of
Euromedcafe (held under the auspices of the Directorate for External
Relations at the European Commission, Anna Lindh Euro-Mediterranean
Foundation for Intercultural Dialogue and Fondazzione Mediterraneo).
In 2007 Lot Lorien decided to join “You Are Not Alone”
initiative to support the Bulgarian nurses retained in Libya. Apart
from a series of concerts in connection with this initiative, with
the support of Stefan Sofiansky and the Union of Free Democrats, Lot
Lorien released a special edition of their latest album of which each
member of the European Parliament received a copy.
In 2008, after a couple of concerts, the band split with its
long time manager Yasen Kazandjiev. At the end of this year the band
celebrated its 10th anniversary with a grand concert in Varna Opera
House where the musicians present their recent and earlier
compositions and create a conceptual multimedia and special lighting
for each song.
In 2009 Lot Lorien continued their work with composing and arranging
songs for their next album. They had some participations as well,
one of which was at the prestigious Spirit of Burgas festival, rated
among Europe’s 10 best summer festivals for 2009.
Changes
2010 was year of dramatic changes for the band: Bora and Galina stepped out but their withdrawal was compensated by Yordan Danev, a virtuoso
accordionist who joined the group – a perfect team player and inspired
composer and arranger. Yordan Danev contributes to the band’s richer
and more diversified sound. Of course, the band would be incomplete
without suitable vocals and after a long search, at the end of 2010,
Lot Lorien were happy and proud to welcome Gergana Velikova, a young
singer who instantaneously fused in the band with remarkable vocal
range and technique. With Yordan and Gergana on board, Lot Lorien were
active once again and started preparations for their successive album
and concert performances.
On February 14th 2011, the band’s 13th anniversary, the new members were officially announced and a new webpage and video was launched.
Тhe video was created by the team of the young movie director Stoyan
Yankov after the instrumental composition “Different faces”
from Lot Lorien’s forthcoming album “Elsewhere”.
It is the beginning of a new great collaboration.
The main engagement for the band during 2011 was creating and
finishing the compositions for the forthcoming fourth album. At the
end of the year 11 compositions were recorded.
At the beginning of 2012, the band started mixing the album. During
the summer of 2012 Lot Lorien won the audience’s prize at Golden
Spring Festival – a competition for new Bulgarian pop and rock
song, produced by the Bulgarian National Radio.
The new album “Elsewhere” was mastered at
the end of the summer and after a competition made by the band, the
visual design was created by Dilyana Delcheva – journalist at Metal
Hammer magazine for Bulgaria and professional designer for bands like
Sonata Arctica, Dreamtale, Absinthium, Gothmog, Leviathan, Amaseffer,
etc.
At the middle of September, the band participated at the Festival for
new pop and rock song Sofia 2012, where they won the audience’s
prize, after voting with SMS messages. The earnings from the SMS
messages were meant to support the National charity campaign “Let’s
be better” which is initiated by the municipality of Sofia for
building of a Center for treatment and rehabilitation of people
injured in accidents and people in “awakening coma”. Lot
Lorien won the prize with “Gypsy song” –
composition from the new album, which had its video released soon
after that. The video was created by Stoyan Yankov’s crew again. At
the end of September the band started a small tour to promote “Elsewhere” around Bulgaria.
In May 2013 Lot Lorien won “Varna” reward (Music category)
– prestigious reward given by the Municipality of Varna for great
achievements in the fields of culture and education.
A few months later Gergana left Bulgaria and she was replaced by
Hristiana Dynkova – young, charismatic and very talented singer,
winner of many international rewards and student at the Bulgarian
Music Academy – Sofia/Bulgaria. With Hristiana on board, Lot Lorien
released one new song and won two prizes at the International Music
Festival Discovery 2014.
British career
The summer of 2014 marked a serious change. It was time for a new
beginning in the band’s career – Kiril,/songwriters
in the West Midlands, well known for her enigmatic voice and
charisma…
New singer – Justine Watson
Zlatomir and Alexander move
to Coventry / United Kingdom. The area is well known with its music
traditions and connection with folk bands like Pentangle, Dando
Shaft, Fairport Convention, etc – some of them are recognized as a huge
influence on Lot Lorien. Soon after their arrival, the musicians were
joined by Justine Watson – one of the best folk-singers
…
To be continued…
Selected rewards
2007
– Award winner in the contest for intercultural dialogue “Other
songs” of Euromedcafe (held under the auspices of the
Directorate for External Relations at the European Commission, Anna
Lindh Euro-Mediterranean Foundation for Intercultural Dialogue and
Fondazzione Mediterraneo);
2010
– Nomination for “Varna” reward / category “Music”;
2012
– The listener’s reward – 43-th competition for new pop and rock
music “Golden spring” 2012 – Bulgarian National Radio /
Horizont program;
2012
– The audience’s reward – Sofia 2012 Festival for pop and rock
music;
2012
– On top of the weekly music chart by the Bulgarian National Radio,
03.10.2012;
2013
– “Varna” reward / “Music” category. Official and
prestigious reward by the municipality of Varna (Lot Lorien’s home
town) for the original album “Elsewhere”, created in 2012;
2014
– “Music Innovation Prize” – XXIII Discovery International
music festival – Varna / Bulgaria;
2014
– Winner of the Discovery International Radio Voting in Ukraine –
XXIII Discovery International music festival – Varna / Bulgaria;
Here is Lot Lorien Video with Coventry singer Sean O’Connor
Below with the current line up based in Leamington Spa.
Jake Wilson – (ex Fairport Convention) vocals / vocal arrangements Lot Lorien: Adam Jurewicz – Spanish guitar / arrangement Kiril Georgiev – Steel-strings guitar /arrangement Lyrics: traditional Original music: Kiril Georgiev Recorded and Mixed by Adam Jurewicz at Red Diamond Recordings, Royal Leamington Spa, UK (2016/2017)
At a time when young Teesside folk acts like Megson, Cattle and Cane, The Younguns are reinventing what folk music can be, filling venues around the country, and getting write ups in the Guardian and Independent, the Coventry folkscene is fighting back and celebrating its own historic and dynamic folk culture that has attracted the likes of Joe O’Donnell, Dave Swarbrick and many others to the City and boasts a range of singer songwriters giggling around the country. With Selecter star Pauline Black as patron, Pete Willow is working hard to put Coventry folk on the map!
