Folk music treat at Rhyl

Jan 7 2010

TRELAWNYD Memorial Hall near Rhyl will be hosting big names from the world of folk over the coming months, thanks to local resident Kelda Manley.

She decided the hall had great potential for concerts, so she’s organised a roster of events after the success of her first show, featuring fiddler player Bella Hardy and Scottish singer-songwriter Dean Owens.

Jim Moray is the first show of the new year, with a concert on March 6.

His debut album Sweet England, when just 21, was hailed the most significant new development in English folk music since Fairport Convention’s Liege and Leif.

Now 26, his latest album is Low Culture, 10 songs that define where English traditional music is at in the 21st century.

Managing to accommodate guest spots from both folk legend Roy Bailey and Jasper Future of NME darlings Art Brut, Low Culture plays on Moray’s skill for picking bits of the past and present and re-imagining them for the future.

On April 3 it’s the turn of acoustic guitarist Gareth Pearson to make the trek to Trelawnyd from his base in Cwmbran.

When just 17 he was invited to the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society in Nashville and to perform at a New Year’s Eve concert in New Jersey.

Gareth has also appeared at Montreal Jazz Festival and regularly conducts guitar workshops at festivals.

And you can catch his reworking of Michael Jackson’s Thriller on YouTube.

Other bands due to appear are the Mercury Prize nominated Eliza Carthy Trio in May, vocalist and fiddle player Dougie MacLean in July – his melody The Gael was used in The Last of the Mohicans – and Scottish player Lau in October.

Tickets from 07899 024162 or therecord journal.co.uk