May 22
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Ember
Feature Support: The Tuppenny Ceilidh Band
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Over the past six years the acoustic magic of Ember has delighted audiences all over the world, from California to Mexico, and Ireland to Spain. Now based in Wales, where they have recorded all three of their albums, Ember has made waves at Broadstairs, Priddy, Glastonbury, Llangollen Fringe, Big Green Gathering, Warwick, Otley, Fishguard Folk Festival and Sesiwn Fawr, among other festivals, and at folk clubs all over the UK.
Their simple yet moving music centres on the crisp, tight blend of two very different voices: that of Emily Williams from Wales, who also plays violin and sets up chunky rhythms with her nylon-strung guitar, and that of Rebecca Sullivan of Utah, who fingerpicks a steel-string and breaks out the harmonica for a song or two. They have been compared to Indigo Girls, The Be Good Tanyas, Simon and Garfunkel, Tracy Chapman, Michelle Shocked, Rickie Lee Jones and Dead Can Dance.
Emily and Rebecca are engaging and witty performers who think on their feet and build up a good spontaneous rapport with their audiences.
Featured Support: The Tuppenny Ceilidh Band is a duo from Yorkshire, Helen and Richard, who have been together 18 years playing mainly "hyperfast/minor key" Irish dance music with a Gothic edge on electric banjo, mandolin, guitar, bass guitar and mandola - some of which Richard built himself.
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May 29
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Double Header
Pamela Ward and Paul Cherrington
Kate Bramley
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Pamela Ward and Paul Cherrington perform self-written songs in the traditional idiom, many about the environs of Pamela's home town Sheffield. She was a finalist in the "2007 UK Songwriting Contest" with "Sail On By", a songs drawing on her father's experiences in the Second World War when his ship was struck and sunk by the Queen Mary.
Kate Bramley is a songwriter, vocalist and fiddle player, and a regular member of Jez Lowe’s Bad Pennies. This is a second opportunity to see Kate on her own at The Topic, and at greater legth; she was a Featured Support earlier in the year.
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Jun 19
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John Conolly
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John Conolly's name is known wherever songs such as Fiddler's Green, Punch and Judy Man, and The Trawler Trade are sung. A performer on the folk scene since the 1960s his songs have been recorded by hundreds of people and sung around the world by millions. If you've been at a folk club, session or even a tourist-hotel "do" in the past 30 years, you'll know "Fiddler's Green" - a beautifully catchy and singable song of the sea ("Wrap me up in me oilskins and jumpers ... I'll see you someday in Fiddler's Green"). John Conolly wrote it! It is certainly John's greatest hit, but he has since written many, many other fine songs, often of the sea and most recently, often uproariously funny.
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Jul 10
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Ruth Notman
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Ruth Notman started out on the live circuit at just 13 years old performing at folk clubs and venues in and around Nottingham and Derby and soon began securing slots at leading Festivals. In 2006 she reached the finals of the BBC Radio 2 Young Folk Award and shortly afterwards signed a record deal, and she's still only 19.
Her first album Threads was released in November 2007 and got great reviews, including 4 Stars in The Guardian and Mojo, and airplay on several radio stations including Radios 2 and 3.
"A new voice in British Folk" The Independent - ALBUM OF THE WEEK
"Fantastic, really special …….. I was just totally blown away." Kate Rusby
"What sets Notman apart is the disarming beauty of her voice" ***** Rock n Reel
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