On the road again....

And so we're back once more. 

Landed at Heathrow yesterday afternoon in a fog of sleeplessness and geographical dislocation. Immigration/customs (both official and strange local), then car, drive, hotel, food, shower, pillow slam.

Awoke to find the outskirts of Hounslow as inviting as ever.  Ah, Costa!

A long slow breakfast, slightly quicker packing of the car and then on our way.  Google said 6 and a bit hours so of course bank holiday Friday saw us arrive at Susan and Malcolm's just South of Alnwick Castle just shy of 11 hours after we left.  The sign that said "Queues Likely Until August 2015" seemed prescient.  An all-too-brief stop at Jacey and Brian's helped us to maintain reasonable caffeine levels.

Another bed beckoned but the lag of the jet sees me up and sort of about at the unfamiliar hour of 7 in the morning.

Slowly becoming used once more to the ways of the road.  

We settle in now for a for a spell of recovery, unsheathing the instruments and the employment of loin-girders for what lies ahead. 

More to follow.

John

Cloudstreet: Artist of the Year

We were delighted to be presented with the Artist of the Year Award at this year's Mount Beauty Music Festival in Northern Victoria. The award was decided based on audience surveys from the 2010 festival. This win led to us returning to the festival this year.

A great time was had by all.

The Last Night of the Tour!

The last night of the tour is upon us!!

This Cloudstreet tour has had a bit of everything, long drives, sightseeing, friends, festivals, teaching, sessions, art galleries, three countries so far, shopping, and of course, long drives bear another mention. But two things have been missing so far: narrow boats, and respiratory illness. We normally encounter both on a tour. And while we still haven't been on any narrow boats, Nic has managed to develop a cold in the last few days. Her vocals are still ok, but not perfect, so we've taken her solo pieces out of the set for the last two nights, as her harmonies are still fine, and she can still play the flute, whistle, fiddle and percussion. It happened as the weather turned colder, and autumn really took hold, about four days ago.

Its been a whirlwind end to the tour, with lots of gigs end to end and lots of people to catch up with. In the last news we were about to do Maidenhead Folk Club, which is held in the beautifully resonant skittle alley at the Seven Stars. One of the highlights of the floorspots that night was Terry, a regular, playing The Entertainer on the tin whistle, a creditable interpretation on a single melody line instrument of a piece written for ten fingers.

We were in Southampton next night for the Fo'c'sle Folk Club, a wonderful night in a very, very warm room. For Nic this is bliss and her flute loves the warmth too. For John this is a chance to visibly melt. Before the show we visited the pleasant village of Hamble-le-Rice for a glass of wine, and on the way to the show we could see the new Cunard liner, Queen Elizabeth, which was named that day by the Queen. She (the ship, not the monarch) was lit up like a city.

Our day off was spent driving to Essex and getting the washing done, very rock n roll. We stayed once again with good friends Vicki Swan and Jonny Dyer, and Vicki and Nic spent the evening having a nyckelharpa session. Vicki tuned one of her nyckelharpas to viola tuning, and taught Nic two Swedish tunes. Google nyckelharpa to see pictures of this beautiful keyed Swedish fiddle with sympathetic strings, its a wonder of cabinet-making.

Next night we played at the Hoy at Anchor Folk Club at Leigh on Sea. From previous visits we knew there wasn't much dinner available right near the pub, so we employed the Magic iPhone, solver of problems and oracle, and discovered a website called Sarfend which told us Hamlet Court Road in Westcliff, about a mile away, was the source of many restaurants. We parked the car, and practically the first restaurant we found was a soup noodle house, which was like a dream come true. Westcliff Noodle House. Try it, you'll like it.

The Hoy has just celebrated its 40th anniversary as a folk club and have a bright new backdrop declaring this milestone. Its a fascinating club with posters of amazing gigs from over the years framed and hung all up the stairs and in the anteroom.

That night Nic's cold really hit, and we spent the next day resting and taking every cold remedy - vitamin c, salt gargles, hot bath, sleep, panadol. And Dad, you'll be pleased to know, Throaties!

That afternoon we packed up and drove to Ely, where Ruth and Robert looked after us with an onion-free vegetarian dinner involving yummy lentils. Its so rare to have lentils that haven't been paired with onion, Nic almost never gets to eat them.

We drove across the fens to the club, under the shadow of Ely Cathedral, for a lovely show, supported by Winter Wilson, a Lincolnshire duo (www.winterwilson.com), who sounded great. John took on some extra lead singing at this gig, and we put in a little more instrumental stuff to rest Nic's voice.

It was exciting to have Hemlock Morris attending the gig from Bedford, and some of Nic's relatives too.

The next drive took us to Dungeness. This remote shingle spit at the bottom southeast corner of England overlooks the cliffs of Dover, and on a relatively clear day reveals the coast of France on the horizon too. At the end of the spit is the eerie sight of a nuclear power station, and the stark shingle environment is home to rare lichens, a steam railway, a couple of pubs, a lighthouse and the former home of filmmaker Derek Jarman.

A.S.Byatt's novel, The Children's Book, is set in this area of Romney Marsh and Dungeness, and it's fascinating to place the action in the wild landscape.

The Drum club at Folkestone was a delight, with many friends coming out and everyone having a sing!

And now its the last night, in Guildford. See you after the show!

A Typical Night at a Folk Club.

And here's a picture drawn on our mailing list!

A typical gig night for us goes something like this: first we spend the day aware that we have a gig, and trying not to wear ourselves out too early. We drive to the gig, which has been anything from half an hour to five hours' drive. After a long drive, Nic likes to have a little nap to get body and soul back together. This can be as short as 20 minutes, and often happens in the car. At this point John likes to read the Guardian. He says he could read forever and why isn't the Guardian bigger?

Then we go in search of a sustaining dinner and eat about 6.30pm. We both really need to eat before gigs, as the concentration uses up a lot of fuel. The food choices are limited by Nic's inability to eat onion, and some places that we know are excellent in a hurry include Pizza Express (where they do a great salad with torn chicken, avocado, beans, egg, potatoes and some strips of cooked pizza dough), and Wetherspoons which is reliable and well priced. Sometimes we can eat at the venue, which is often a pub that does food.

If there is a p.a. for the gig, we go in to the venue early and set up our gear, say hello to the organisers, and do a sound check. When there is a p.a., Nic uses her stomp box and flute microphone. We do line checks on everything and get the sound as clear as possible, so we can hear the vocals in particular. Clear vocal sound means we can sing in tune, hearing each other's harmonics.

Everything else gets a check, and the list includes concertina, guitar, percussion kit (tambourine on a stand played with brushes, cymbal), stomp box, wooden and silver flutes, whistle, fiddle. Nic has to make sure the shaker egg and f-whistle are in reach, not in a bag..... If there is no p.a., we set our gear up and check how resonant the room is, which dictates how much we need to face towards each other to hear.

Sometimes there is a support act who also sound checks, more often there is a selection of resident musicians from the club or floorsingers who have asked for a spot, and this starts the night. Residents and floorsingers often do amazing songs.

Then Cloudstreet is introduced, and we do our first 45 minute set. For us, 45 minutes is seven songs, with some chatter in between. If we try to squeeze more in, the show is not as relaxed and flowing. We like to start with a couple of songs that are very strong, so that people can relax into a good night, knowing we are safe up on that stage. We took this idea on from Kristina Olsen's performance notes, and its true, you don't want to worry that the performer up there is a bit shaky, you want to immerse yourself in the music they make.

We have been finishing the first half with Bill and the Bear, because its a good spot in the set for Nic to put on extra costume - that corset and tutu from Thailand have been getting a real workout! And it's an uplifting and fun song to take us to the break.

In the break we replenish our drinks, make sure the mailing list is passing round the room, talk to people about music, ideas, songs, sell them cds if they would like them, and give away postcards.

Then we're into set two, and it can be shorter or longer than set one, depending on the club's timing, but is usually another 45 minutes. We move our songs around each night, because we have more songs than we can perform in one night. We design the set to have a dynamic flow, changing pace, making sure we don't put two slow, thoughtful songs together, making sure we change key a lot to keep the ear fresh. We put in requests from the audience as much as we can, which sometimes redesigns the set completely!

There is often time for an encore, and we usually do something acapella as a way of rounding out the night.

Then there is a period of socializing and a few more cd sales, during which Nic tries to pack up her collection of instruments and not lose anything. At last night's club, the mailing list on a clipboard which we lost at Fylde festival over a month ago, was returned to us!

And we load the car, say farewell, and drive to the accommodation, slowly losing the adrenalin from our systems and getting tired. We usually get to bed between 1 and 2am, sometimes earlier, and try to get enough sleep to do it all again tomorrow!

News in from the last week: after the Red Lion we had the pleasure of staying with Vin and Pat Garbutt up on Teesside for a couple of nights, and found out just how comforting an Aga stove in the kitchen can be. Vin's discovered a new bird called the Great Grey Tunkle, so he's very pleased with himself.

From their place we went to do our gig at Guisborough, and we had trouble finding the venue (driving up and down the street going, no, not that building, what about that one), so we worried that no-one else would find it, but they did, and it was a great night with a singing club. The only worry was when Nic wore that tutu into the general bar, full of squash players, to buy a drink. "One of the singers, are yeh?" said a man at the bar, in a very understated way, glancing sideways.

We had a look round Saltburn, and Vin pointed out the chimney of the steelworks that made the steel for the Sydney Harbour Bridge, north at Redcar. We walked down the pier past the funicular railway and watched the brave surfers.

The drive from there to Southport was long, about 4 hours, but spectacular, as we drove over the high moors into Cumbria, on a sun and showers day with sunlight picking out glorious pieces of the view.

Southport is a fun place to go shopping, and we hit the charity shops next day and got some flash winter gear for the next few weeks. Not sure if it will come back to Australian summer with us. The Bothy Folk Club there is a beauty, wonderful resident musicians and a lovely room.

Next night we were in Runcorn, not too far away, at a club with a lot of heart, in a tiny venue where we played in front of the door. Once again, impressive resident singers led the way.

And we followed that with two nights with Dave and Linda, who used to live in Townsville, North Queensland, but happily for us, now live near Northwich! Nic had a walk down the cut and found a late fruiting damson tree to raid. We went from there to our show in Blackpool, at the Clarence. W

e have played there three times before, and its always a good night. Eddie does lovely sound and is a luthier. Last night Richard, the support act, was playing a most delectable guitar that Eddie made for him. Nic has tried Eddie's mandolins in the past and continues to covet one. He hasn't made any this year yet.

And now we prepare to drive to Maidenhead.

Skeletor the sheep, in Skipton, Nth Yorks.

A sign in the toilets at the motorway services.

Dartford, Romford, Isle of Wight. Doo dah. Doo dah.

We started yesterday with a walk up to the site of an ancient roundhouse and fortification on the headland at Porth Beach, in Cornwall. The views in every direction were spectacular, from the Victorian seaside town of Newquay to the wild, untouched Atlantic coast with cliffs and rolling breakers to the north.

We tottered and plunged in the stiff breeze along with the swirling gulls and rooks, back to the beach, and up to our budget room. Deciding to forgo the breakfast there, we packed up and returned to a lovely Newquay cafe, which we found yesterday.

Cafe Irie, at 38 Fore Street, Newquay, www.cafeirie.co.uk, has a yummy menu, and for Maleny people, is like a tiny 

combined version of the Club and the Co-op. Ecover bulk refills and calendula deodorant deck the shelves, handmade jewellery and felt seagulls hang decoratively, and there are comfy old couches and a piano. The menu includes the Canadian Deluxe: Cornish bacon, pancakes, maple syrup, blueberries and scrambled eggs (£5.95). Great idea, yummy, although the pancakes were, surprisingly, a little tough! Other choices include Organic Porridge: organic oat flakes and warm milk served with a blob of cornish clotted cream and a dollop of honey (£2.65), or eggs benedict, including thick granary bread, thick cut grilled ham, two poached eggs and home made hollandaise (£5.95).

So what jewels and excitement have filled the past week?

On Sunday we played at "A Shed Full of Folk" in Bedford. Organised by our friend Andy Miller, it was a mini-festival, a whole afternoon of acts, with Cloudstreet finishing the evening. Andy's Morris side, Hemlock Morris, gave us some mighty sticking and viciously self-deprecating humour in the true tradition of Morris. Their dance with one long stick and one short stick each was breath-taking, the likelihood of finger removal, while palpable, was never realised.

After this tantalising taste, we spent our night off with Jonny Dyer and Vicki Swan, rewatching that cult film classic, "Morris - A Life With Bells On". We first saw it with all the Dance Up the Sun crew in Brisbane last May, and it was worth another viewing just to see the improvised French morris dancing fueled by Wookie Hole cider, the American Morris spectacle, and to see Derecq offered a second chance to complete a Threeple Hammer Damson. Enough!

We played in Dartford on Tuesday. Staying in Thurrock, we discovered a kind of shopping suburb, just beside the Dartford Bridge, with food venues, cinema, huge retail complexes, and roads joining them all up. The times I've driven past here and had no idea all that was going on.

My cousin-once-removed (we decided in the end that must be the title as she's my gran's niece), Sadie, and her husband Frank came to the Dartford gig. It is always a great pleasure to talk with Sadie. Frank had a sad story - the model engineering society to which he belongs has closed because the power station, whose land they used, wanted the land back after many years.  When I first visited Frank and Sadie, I was immensely impressed with Frank's steam engines, miniature, working locomotives, which he had built from scratch in his shed. They were exquisite.

From Dartford, it was a short hop to our next show in Romford. Because it was all in the London area, I took the opportunity to have an art excursion. I went by train to Whitechapel Gallery, and saw the Alice Neel retrospective. I was introduced to the work of Alice Neel, an unflinching portrait painter from New York, only a few months ago. Seeing it 'in the flesh' was a feast. I saw the whole exhibition just to get to know her subjects first, and only later went through again studying her expressive technique. She seemed to capture spontaneity in her subjects by drawing them quite quickly to begin with, then working up the painting from there, combining areas of i

mpasto and blending with areas of totally blank canvas. Google Alice Neel images to see what I mean.

Our Romford show was in a 15th century pub. It was a pleasure to play to such an appreciative crowd who hadn't seen us before. Our friend John Hare attended unexpectedly, and did a floor spot too. He saved the day when our van was stolen all those years ago.

The next part of the journey was all new to us. We took the ferry to the Isle of Wight. Everything about it was fascinating, beautiful, and lovely in the sunshine. We were accommodated at a comfy old hotel in Ventnor, which is a pretty town with an enticing beach. We played in St Mary's Church, refurbished and light, a stunning backdrop to a concert. And the show was filmed for UK Entertainment channel by the local film crew. We did costume changes, we changed pace and instruments. It was a bit nerve-wracking. But everyone in the audience was into it, and we had quite a long chat with people at interval over cups of tea. After our second set, and packing up, we met quite a few of the same people at the evocative Spyglass Inn, right down on the beach. 

We saw a little bit of the footage, and it looks pre

tty good, so we'll let you know where you can find it as soon as its available.

Next day (after the obligatory paddle down the beach in the sparkling sun), we did an interview to complement the concert. Then Rodney, the producer/cameraman/organiser, suggested we perform a few more songs outdoors, to get a completely different feel, and possibly create content for another show. We did seven songs in the end, and really had to rush to catch the ferry.

The whole experience was way too quick, and told me I'd like to get back to the Isle of Wight and explore it. One small experience that I loved happened over breakfast at the Eversley Hotel. As soon as I entered the dining room I was aware of the wonderful paintings on the walls. I wasn't expecting quality art in a hotel dining room, and these were spectacular. The largest was a painting of a sky, with a view of Ventnor from the beach. The feathered clouds 

and blue sky was the dramatic focus of the work. And then I met the artist, Kerrie Stritton! She was working in the hotel. Trained at the Royal Academy, she seems to be getting established, and her work was an inspiration. You can contact her at kerriestritton[at]hotmail.com.

Sent to Coventry.

Coventry Cathedral area - the cathedral was destroyed by a firestorm in WWII.

Quote from John: "I realise why that sign says 'Drive Safely', but wouldn't it be nice if sometimes it said 'Bang into each other for fun'?

Last blog we were just about to play in Nottingham, and we went on BBC Nottingham in the afternoon of the gig. Alan, the announcer, managed to get us talking about the relative merits of yeast extracts and how our parliament is more hung than his. The Carrington Triangle club was well attended and the floor spots (singers who do one or two songs, for those uninitiated or overseas) were excellent; some good singers and guitarists.

Next morning we went to the new Nottingham Contemporary Art Gallery, just because I wanted to go and see what it was like, and we were treated to the biggest collection of Diane Arbus photography ever put together. Fascinating and moving, they were a sharp observation of people. Have a look here to see most of the show: http://diane-arbus-photography.com/

One night later, Cloudstreet went to Coventry. We played at Maudslay Thursday, a folk club started by our friend Chris Green, from the band Isambarde, because he wanted to see if he could do it. And he can! Cabaret style table seating, in a barrel-ceilinged upstairs room at the Maudslay pub, welcomes his crowd of mainly local residents to  his concerts. 

Chris opened the night with his new duo with Becky Price the accordion whiz, and their repertoire is uplifting and well-arranged renditions of 18th century tunes which they have meticulously researched, but play in a lively way. Check out their myspace at www.myspace.com/chrisgreenandbeckyprice, which is worth it just to read what they say about themselves and nice beer.

Our show went over a treat (as they say) and Chris did great sound. The corset and tutu are very popular. Our thanks go to people we know who travelled a long way to be there. And brought us fine examples of English wine.

Chris went to Swanage next day to play the festival with Isambarde, and we stayed for two more nights with Sophie, his partner. Sophie is a multi-instrumentalist with a passion for heritage instruments. She took us to an Irish session in the barn-like, half-timbered attic of a pub called Whitefriars, and she played some tunes on English mediaeval bagpipes. Some Melbournians we know arrived at the session, which just goes to show you can't get away with anything, no matter where you are.

In the morning, Sophie was working at the Guildhall, demonstrating a wide variety of instruments while dressed in spectacular Tudor kit. We popped by for a look at the impressive Guildhall (Mary Queen of Scots was housed here for a time, there is a great hall lined with armour (helmets and chest plates), and the roof bosses all depict wonderful musical angels and crazy creatures).

I also saw the art museum, and printed out some photos at Boots, making use of the opportunity to be in a big shopping town. We 

went for a pub meal wiith Sophie for dinner, and I went to show her some of the photos I took... and that's when I realised I didn't have my camera any more. Some brain-racking made me suspect I might have left it at Boots.

Boots' photolab wasn't answering the phone, so I just went in there next morning. I wanted to cheer for the generous city of Coventry from the rooftops when they gave my camera back to me at Boots, 49 Lower Precinct!

Two muso, two clubs, two festivals, two days off.

I know all about driving while tired! Six hours from Glasgow to Birmingham, an extra hour because there was a car fire on the M6 and the whole motorway was stopped for 45 mins, so we broke our rule (always stay on the big blue roads even if they're really slow, because they're quicker than the little green roads. Make a cuppa. That's what the thermos is for) and diverted along A roads. Took forever. We were less stressed than we might have been, and practised cloudstreet songs as we drove along.

The last time we played at the Black Diamond in Birmingham, we were stopped midway through our third song by the fire brigade. It had just come to their attention that the folk club room, upstairs in the pub, didn't have proper fire escapes, and they kicked us out! Undeterred, we did a deal with the dominoes players downstairs and squeezed the audience into a small downstairs room where we finished the show singing in the doorway. When we got to the club this time, everyone remembered the goings on of last time, and in a bid to tempt fate, we put that same song, Miner's Washing, second in the set just to see what would happen. But no firemen materialized and the gig went smoothly.

The next step, Birmingham to Wallingford, only took about 2.5 hours. Wallingford was fantastic, the first gig was in a sports club which had been recruited at the last minute when another venue fell through, and although there was a stage, p.a. and lights, it wasn't set up as a venue, and people were in dribs and drabs around the walls, or walking in, looking at the uninviting room and leaving again. There was also a rugby game going on outside.

I spoke to the MC, and when the act on stage finished, John and she and I zoomed around and set up 6 rows of seats in front of the stage, and it made the hugest difference to how the audience behaved. We then removed a few tables and chairs further back in the room to discourage groups from sitting and chatting at the back, and it worked well. The next act went on and people moved up to the chairs and listened. By the time we went on, we had a full crowd and people were creating more rows of chairs themselves. I knew they'd get the idea if we but showed them the way....

Our set was fun, a number of fans from our mailing list showed up, and some whole families who were fans. We sold a few cds afterwards, then hurried off to soundcheck for our next gig. It was in a church in the centre of town. The church had been refurbished inside to let in lots of light, and it was the most perfect singing environment. They used a p.a., but only to lightly boost the sound. Did the soundcheck, which took a while, then found a Pizza Express, a particularly reliable and delicious restaurant chain. Not cheap, but worth it.

Got totally costumed up for that one, tutu, corset, the works. The cameras came out when we walked on. The sound was so perfect in there, we were singing into condenser mics, and I could hear so clearly, we could play around with the dynamics in a way that is often impossible. Wonderful! Stayed to the end of the next act, our agent's band, Artisan. By that I mean, she sings in it, as well as being our agent. In fact, she seems to have taken on all our friends lately, so Isambarde and Vicki Swan and Jonny Dyer are all now on Jacey's books, plus a troupe of Zulu singers and dancers, all of whom were playing this festival. Artisan's harmony blend was sublime, delicious three part harmony and firmly tongue in cheek banter.

We had an accommodation malfunction at this festival, and so did the guys from Isambarde. The room we were offered actually had no bed at all. Although there were camp beds in other rooms, we weren't confident two of them would have our names on them by the time we managed to return to the room, so John talked to some people and managed to secure a billet for us.

Wallingford was full of friends and we caught up with lots of musicians after our show, including lovely Leeds songwriter Tom Bliss, and Chris, Em and Jude from Isambarde. 

We were up at 6 next morning, left at 7 and drove for nearly 5 hours to get to the next gig, Fylde Festival in Lancashire. Sunday morning, the traffic wasn't too bad, but it was a long drive. We took turns driving and napping. Got there, got wristbands, put flyers on every second seat in the main theatre, then went to our first gig in the hotel bar. Big crowd, big Balkan band on before us, did a quick set up and had a very breezy chat with the audience throughout the gig. So glad this low key gig was our first job, it warmed up those tired voices and made a strong connection with the audience which carried through to our later and much more formal gig on the main stage. We hurried over to the Marine Hall after the first gig, and soundchecked very efficiently. Had a dressing room here and everything!

And finally, we got to see our great friends Jonny and Vicki. We've been here nearly a month, we've stayed in their house, but this was the first time we'd laid eyes on them. They are two of my best friends in the world. And they were playing with another dear friend, George Papavgeris, who has toured in Australia a couple of times. They mainly do George's songs, as his band. Vicki plays double bass and flute in this lineup, and Jonny plays lead/rhythm guitar, piano accordion and piano. They also do harmonies. George had teed up with us to come on and do several songs with them, and this meant we had to be totally ready for our set before they started. John was nervous. I was not, but I made sure I was very organised. We walked on during the second verse of George's song "Friends Like These" and joined in the chorus. George knows about symbolism.

Our gig went like a dream, sound was good, vibe was good, we were relaxed. Bill and the Bear is going down a storm with audiences, and my drumming is improving, I think. For the last song we did Green Man, and we asked George, Jonny and Vicki to come up and play. So we did it with guitar, bass, accordion and 5 voices. It was big.

We sold lots of cds afterwards, we actually had a queue!

And then we stayed in the hotel from the dawn of time... it was like Fawlty Towers. Inexplicable architectural features (enter the door of your room, and you are faced with the end of a wall, weirdly dividing two doorless rooms), slow service, super-creaky floors, pathetic shower, a drop of blood on the wall, filthy carpet, three televisions, no space. There were two single beds in each tiny room. It turned out I got the firmest bed. John came back later than me and said he actually giggled when he lay on his bed, it was just like a hammock. The hotel was very convenient for the venues, though!

The last time we played Fylde, we stayed in single rooms in the Nautical College, and they were austere but very clean. I liked them better.

So after two days of recovery in Yorkshire, tonight we play in Nottingham, and we're singing on the radio this afternoon!

Gleanings.

Day two of the singing workshop week at Gleanings, in Shropshire, and we are working hard on harmonies, and technical singing issues, with our small but intent group. The venue is utterly gorgeous, and John and Yvonne who run it make wonderful food and are also running a smallholding. In practice what that means is that after singing yesterday, we both went down to the hayfield to give a hand, because yesterday's clear weather would not last, and John stayed down there for several hours to give a hand. I came back to the house to prepare for the next day's workshop, and saw him carting hay bales, riding on the back of the trailer, and at one stage backing a full trailerload of hay up to the barn.

We have sung a variety of songs in three languages in the last two days, including Allez Allelujah ( a three part processional we learned from Margret Roadknight), One More Day (a hopefully four part capstan shanty we first did at Music Under the Southern Cross), and Suo Gan (a Welsh lullaby in two parts so far, taught to us by Vicki and Trefor Williams, and both times we've taught it we've had a Welsh speaker in our group to guide us!).

Above is a rather delicious picture of the cottage in which we are staying and the car we have hired for the 10 weeks of the tour. And John, in the Gleanings, which is the teaching space, totally fabulous. More from the road soon.

Nicole

Before you can tour overseas, you have to get there.

We've packed up our house and stored our stuff. We've put upon our kind friends to help us cart things and clean things. I've finished a major painting and delivered it to its new owner. John has put on a beautiful concert, "An Intimate Evening with John Thompson" at Clovelly Cellars in Red Hill, with lots of guest musicians. We pared down our luggage to a minimum (but mine still contained two flutes, a drum, a stomp box, a pair of curly-toed boots, a tutu and a sleeping bag, just the essentials really).

And then that journey ended, and the new one began. As the plane pulled away from the airbridge into a dark, wet Brisbane night, we stepped into our 6th UK tour, and headed for Brunei.

Royal Brunei has upgraded their fleet, so the plane was new and comfortable. I slept most of the flight to Brunei's capital, Bandar Seri Begawan, and we arrived there at dawn. Very straightforward customs and immigration, followed by the short bus trip to Orchid Garden Hotel, where we spent our 14 hour stopover. Our voucher said we could have the hotel room for 6 hours, but in a wonderful development, we were checked in overnight, so we could stay there all day, sleep, shower, and eat yummy roti chanai with beef rendang and dahl. Hotel prices, always inflated, were $5 per curry. I'll be back for more!

On the plane again, John had booked me in for meals without onion, which I can't eat, and I got super-healthy food, and lots of fruit.

When we arrived in London, at dawn again, we jumped on the tube into town and organised to go to our friends' house in Essex. We could have planned this a bit better, and ended up walking from Piccadilly station to Charing Cross Station, right round the picturesque Trafalgar Square, before deciding we needed more information to get to Liverpool Street Station.

We also needed a cuppa. I perversely chose the Blue Onion cafe in a barrel-vaulted laneway near Charing Cross Station. I chose it largely because it had tables away from the traffic and we could sit there with all our luggage. We had an espresso each (£1.30) and two-toast baked beans (yes, with two bits of toast) (£2), and then a big cup of tea, and chatted to Hassan who runs it. He's from Cairo. He's been in London awhile though; he says things like "innit". His cafe was perfect.

Eventually we managed to navigate various tube stations and jump on a train at Liverpool Street, which took us to Witham in Essex. We got a cab to our friends' house, and at about 3 I thought I might have a lie down for an hour. Six hours later I woke up, feeling just about ready for a good night's sleep!

ps, you can see the painting I finished on my blog, nicolemurrayartblog.blogspot.com!

Nicole

Showcase part the 3

How to run a showcase room

Chris Pickering in action on Thursday night

The whole idea of a showcase room is pretty strange -  you in effect run a tiny mini-festival in your hotel room, charging other acts to come and play, with everyone hoping that everyone else's audience will rub off on them and produce a fun, memorable and musical result.

(Apparently the private showcase rooms developed out of the desire by a number of those attending Folk Alliance conferences to develop opportunities to strut their stuff beyond their official showcase performances.  And so "guerilla showcases" started to be produced in people's rooms.  The idea mushroomed and eventually became a semi-official part of the conference programme.)

Although total newbies, we had 6 shows to put on (evenings Wednesday to Saturday, with Friday and Saturday afternoons thrown in), and were really grateful to our neighbours across the hall, James Moore and Chicago Mike, who ran “A Little Bit Marvelous”, for giving us tips here and there. We set up our room, which involved leaning one of the two beds up against the wall, collecting a dozen chairs from the ordering place in the lobby, and setting them up invitingly, and a bit of rearranging the furniture. Then we looked at how James and Mike set up their room, which seemed somehow lighter and larger than ours, and we rearranged the beds again, shortly before we opened the doors for the first time! We draped our Australian flag and Eureka flag, and as the week progressed we collected flags from other performers to decorate the room. By far the largest and therefore most eyecatching was the beautiful Scottish flag which Lorna Brooks brought. We pinned it to the curtains, and it was joined by a stars-and-stripes, a Quebec flag, and a Newfoundland flag.

I got some fresh grapes from a store on Main Street, because I was dying for some fresh fruit and they proved to be very popular with visitors to our room.  We also supplied bottled water.  (While some rooms offered free booze as a way to attract punters, we aimed our room at the listening crowd - having learned valuable lessons from Andrew Pattison and the Troubadour crew).

We put postcards everywhere we were allowed to, telling people when we were showcasing, and we put fold-up cards on the tables with the International Showcase Room programme on them, so everyone knew who was on. We had a poster on the door with our programme and our logo!!

And then we waited to see who would turn up…

Well, loads of people turned up, because three floors of the hotel were set aside to be little concert rooms, so they were awash with people sauntering down the corridors and peeking into every room. And by wandering and peeking whenever we could, we got a picture of what everyone else does.

Some rooms are very plain, and are all about getting a taste of the music and nothing else. No decoration, a few chairs and the bed to sit on, no hospitality, and in some cases you can’t even use their bathroom. I didn’t stay long in those rooms. At the other extreme were full suites, using a p.a., catering from the small kitchen, set up as a concert hall with rows of chairs, couches round the sides. Canada seemed to be particulary keen on these rooms, which were absolutely jumping. In the East Canada Suite they had platters of cheese and fruit and free beer to help you enjoy a wide selection of Canadian artists at maximum volume.

Then there were the quirky, atmospheric rooms, decorated with whimsical and personal items to create a friendly atmosphere. Lots of people favoured fairy lights, one room had a string of leaves decked round the door, many of them went for low lighting, and most rooms used one of the beds for sprawling on while listening. Some rooms removed all the beds and they were fun to sing in because there was some reverb.

The noise in the corridors, and often in the rooms, was unbelievable. But people didn’t mind if the door was almost closed; it didn’t stop them coming in to listen, and it did deal with the noise spill a bit.

We managed the noise, everyone pretty much turned up on time, the artists' contributions helped us out a little with expenses, and best of all, we got to hear some fabulous music from musicians we admire and came to know just a little bit.

A mad thing to do for a week, but the most fun in ages!

J&N

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