It was a joy to hear so many people in one place keeping our musical traditions with such enthusiasm and variety of instruments and styles.  Thanks for a great day. Neal, participant

The sun shone all day and music seeped out of the Great Barn, Studios and Church all day and into the evening.  There were three workshops each of 1.5 hours that ran throughout the day and a lunchtime session with an evening concert featuring all tutors. 

Lunch was provided by the wonderful team at Wingfield Barns and supper by Brooks Cooks. The daytime events provided the perfect opportunity for two of our podcast and film trainees to trial their newly found skills around the site under the watchful eye of Jake Lee Savage.  Jake has produced a short film of the first song workshop which includes an interview with tutor Janet Koralambe. This was filmed as part of the Vaughan Williams’™ Folk project (funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fun), which is now in its final few months.

The evening concert kicked off with a selection of Janet Koralambe’™s morning workshop students who sang an arrangement of a rarely heard version of Lovely Joan (collected by Vaughan Williams in Southwold, Suffolk) and Janet also encouraged the audience to join in with the singing of ‘What am I Rushing To’ song written by Canadian Folk singer Wendy Luella Perkins.

Next up were concertina tutor Andrew Collins and our ‘Playing Together’ Session Style tutor Jill Parson who performed as a duo and delighted us with a mix of traditional and contemporary tunes.  Mossy Christian was the next tutor to take to the stage singing us a variety of traditional songs and playing traditional and contemporary tunes on concertina and one row melodeon (but not together!).  Mossy ended his set and the first half by inviting Megan Wisdom on stage and they treated the audience to a song.

James Delarre on fiddle started the second half off with a rare solo performance with self-penned and trad tunes and songs.  Following on from James was Andy Cutting who delighted the audience with a selection of traditional and contemporary tunes including several of his own self-penned tunes.  To end the concert, Andy invited James back on stage and together they rounded off a very successful day with a couple of lively sets of tunes.

Thanks:

Judy and Eammon Andrews
Anna Fielding™Farrell and the Wingfield team;
St Andrew’s Church Wingfield
Vaughan Williams Folk Team: Nicky Stockman, Jake Lee Savage, Gayle Wade & Candida Wingate
Tutors: Andy Cutting, James Delarre, Mossy Christian, Andrew Collins, Jill Parson, Janet Koralambe
Volunteers: Alan Helsdon, Mark Bartholomew, Megan Wisdom
Food: Brooks Cooks:  Sonia and Simon & Wingfield Barns
Social Media co-ordinator: Faye Gosling
Funders: Mid Suffolk District Council and Acorn Instruments
Stall holders: Mike Acott concertinas and PJ Music
And to everyone to took part in the workshops

Photographs courtesy of Eammon Andrews, Mark Bartholomew, Nicky Stockman and Suzanne Williams