FAIRPORT'S CROPREDY CONVENTION
August 13th, 14th and 15th 2026
日本語で読む
3rd Day
The Gerry Colvin Big Band
Rob Jones & The Restless Dream
The Haar
Barbara
Hayseed Dixie
Jenn Butterworth & Will Pound
Fairport Convention and Friends
For some strange reason, I thought I had gone to sleep last night but up at the glamping hospitality tent for an early cuppa this (thankfully, lovely and cool) morning, people were still talking about Richard Thompson’s set as if it ended ten minutes ago. Well, as I wrote yesterday, it was rather good. Gil’s dog attracts the attention of one of the same breed and we make small talk with its owners but sadly for the barkers, as much as they want to play, letting them off the leash would cause chaos so we go our separate ways. Gil and I opt for a stroll into the village for breakfast. We settle on the canal-side, Old Coal Wharf which is has a good selection of scoff and an up-close view of the barges moored along the Oxford Canal. Needless to say, it is full of like-minded Cropredy funsters, dogs and cheery chat, a large part of which of seemed to be about Richard Thompson.
Gerry Colvin has been given the opening slot on Saturday, a place that for over twenty years, has been filled by Cropredy favourite, Richard Digance. Big shoes to fill then but the field is full and so is the stage with more than a dozen musicians who set the mood with a jaunty number called ‘One More Week’. The audience is with him and Gerry is delighted with his reception. He continues through a selection of songs that are lyrically thought-provoking, often deeply personal, occasionally poignant but then lifts the mood with songs that would have raised the roof if the field had one. There is a nod to Mr Digance when he asks the audience to join in with ‘anything they might find in their pockets’. White hankies are produced and held aloft and he ends with the beautiful-beyond-words ‘Feathers Falling From Angels’.
‘Rising With Sun’ has to be one of the best opening songs by a Cropredy debut that there has ever been. It wasn’t even halfway through when I was out of my chair heading towards the merch tent to buy Rob Jones and the Restless Dream’s, one and only CD. Rob’s songs evoke midnight rides after late-night load outs, on the road to somewhere else – Americana if you like but in the North-West of England (he’s from Bolton). The band were on fire. Nobody seemed in the least bit phased that they were on hallowed ground for the first time and each got their moment in the spotlight in the final song, an extended version of ‘Day By Day’ that quite frankly, was probably the best closer by a debut ever at Cropredy. Returning to the merch tent a bit later, I noticed the CD had sold out.
I’m backstage waiting to interview Gerry Colvin. Everyone is happy that the temperature is almost back to normal for this time of the year but we are still huddled in the press tent, enjoying the shade. Gerry arrives, dapper in a pristine white jacket that looks bespoke. He walks up to me beaming with delight and genuinely chuffed that I want to interview him. I tell him the pleasure is all mine and we sit down.
Gerry Colvin Interview
Q: I think it’s fair to say that the majority of the audience were wondering how you were going to fill the spot Richard has made his own for the last twenty years but you did it.
GC: He's a good mate Richard and I was very sad that he wasn't there. Mainly because if he had been, we would have got on at one rather than at twelve (laughs) but it was a tough thing. He's a bit of a legend, isn't he? And he's a great bloke. Funnily enough, my cousin in Ireland, is a big fan of Richard's and he said, “Oh, I love his books, I've got them all!” and so I rang Richard and said, could you please give Michael, my cousin in Ireland, a ring, in Ireland on his birthday. And do you know, he did! That’s the sort of man Richard is. My cousin rang me afterwards and he went, “Jesus Christ, you'll never know who just rang me! I wonder if he rings everyone who's bought one of his books.” (laughs)
Q: Cropredy’s a big family, a great festival.
GC: It is. This is the fourth time we've been here. We've never been with the orchestra and when Peggy rang us up and said, look, Simon (Nicol) has seen the orchestra, and he said it was fantastic. There's normally just four or five of us but this was enhanced with strings and horns from Divine Comedy and beautiful backing singing by Asia Blue, who were a massive band in the 1980’s so they've got tremendous pedigree. So, I knew, well, the guys are brilliant musicians but still a bit worrying, because it's your name up there on the night.
Q: You needn’t have worried. What's all this I hear about a new album?
GC: Yeah, there's a new album. It's called Festina Lente Lives, it means ‘Make haste slowly’ - my family motto. We're not rich, we just adopted it. (smiles) The other motto is ‘Get me a cup of tea’, but anyway, it is nine new songs and two live tracks from the orchestra and we had hoped to have it released at Cropredy but problems with studios, et cetera - you know what it's like - so it's going to be the end of September. It comes out on Crocodile Records but you can get it ffrom the website, which is www.gerrycolvin.co.uk.
Q: I shall let everyone in Japan know that.
GC: Japan is one of the countries that is on my list to visit. I really, really want to. I was in a tiny band, The Man Upstairs, and Fire Station Records in Germany re-released all our stuff. We sold more in Japan than we did anywhere else and then there was Terry and Gerry, a little tiny band I was in in the 80s. We did a lot in Japan but we didn't play. We almost went but it always fell through and I always wonder what it was like. That was then though, this is now and when you try and do stuff you did in the 70s and 80s, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Obviously, for Fairport, it absolutely works. I'm so grateful to Mike Bell, who's their merch guy, because he got us the gig and Dave Pegg and Simon Nicol, they've been so supportive and they've championed us.
Q: You were ecstatic up there.
GC: Well, what's not to like? (laughs) I mean, a field full of wonderfully relaxed, lovely people, the sound was great; The whole atmosphere at Cropredy is just spectacularly wonderful and if anyone hasn't been, they should really check it out. I mean, there's a lot of other festivals available, but this one…it’s something special. I love your T-shirt… (see pic below)
Q: John Otway.
GC: We used to play a lot with John. He wrote me a cheque once for a million pounds. This was like, I don't know, ‘84? He had this cheque book and it had his picture on it and he said, “Oh, it's because Picasso, used to draw a picture instead of paying for anything”. I said, write me a cheque for a million and he did and then he kind of thought, suddenly, hold on a minute, and he turned it over and wrote, ‘This is only a joke’ on the back. I've still got it. God bless him.
Q Reading through the bio on your website. Pop, Skiffle, Nashville songwriter, TV themes, musicals, film scores, 'Gerry Colvin's Inexperience', a fusion of Soul, R&B and Folk-Country and that’s only up to the nineties! Most musicians’ paths are linear, yours just seems to take off on tangents every now and then. Is variety the spice of life for you or is it more any way the wind blows?
GC: It's just what comes out of my head. I don't chase the fashion that's happening at the time or I don't go, oh, Americana's popular, I'll do that. I just have to do what I feel in my heart. So, in the 70s and 80s, I was really into that sort of French chanson, sort of jazz with The Man Upstairs and then I was really into the kind of attitude, Pogues-ish thing that's what Terry and Gerry came from. We toured with the Pogues and Billy Bragg and were on the Red Wedge tour and then later on, I met various other people, Jerome Davis, who was a trumpet player, and Mick O'Brien, sax player, a trombone player Gail Brand who's really successful - she's one of the best trombone players in Britain and I met Wendy and Chris and we thought, well, hold on, this is really good. People said it was R&B, it wasn't. It was Folk/Soul/Country music. That was great and then I met Nick Quarmby and we started Colvin Quarmby and he loved the fact that it was a duo. We added drums and stuff and wrote songs for that and then Nick died so I couldn’t continue. I knew Trish, Lyndon, and Jerome, who now plays double bass and so I started writing for them. The songs that I was writing tended to be subtler and then, of course, because I'm mad, I thought, why not enhance some of the songs and write new songs that fit with an orchestral flavour.
Q: Yeah, but the thing is, the key is the song, Gerry. It's the old thing about it. If it works on an acoustic, it's a good song and your songs work with any instrumentation.
GC: My wife always says that. I mean, look at ‘Wish You Were Here’. You can play that on an acoustic guitar and it sounds great, doesn't it? ‘Yesterday’, ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’, all the songs that I absolutely love. Any Burt Bacharach song, although he wrote them on the piano and didn't give enough credit for Hal David because I think he's a great lyricist, but you can play that just on your own, and it sounds beautiful. I mean, you're a songwriter, aren't you?
Q: Well, I've done some in the past. I wouldn't say I was a songwriter; a bit of a lyricist.
GC: I love lyrics. That's the main thing with our band, and that's the most important thing for me.
Q: Some of those lyrics you sang today were divine…
GC: Oh, thank you. Which ones?
Q: ‘I Killed A Flower For You Today’…
GC: Oh, thank you. Unfortunately, a true story. (laughs) That's on the jazz album. Case in point, I met Elliot Rooney, who's a great jazz pianist, just by fluke and he played me these lovely little riffs that he does. He's got a very special way, like Ralph Sharon who plays with Tony Bennett; he plays that really lazy piano. I went home and I wrote ten, eleven Jazz songs and played them to the guys, and Lyndon went, ‘I can't do that. I won't do that justice’. So, I contacted Elliot, and we did a whole jazz album. I don't know where it came from but it was just hearing something. I like that, when things take you in a different tangent but the main thing is live. Live is never going to be replaced with AI. Being in front of someone and them liking a song that you've written in your bedroom, that's the best feeling in the world.
Q: There are your royalties right there.
GC: (laughs)
Q: Now, I've got a couple of very quick questions for you. What guitars do you use live?
GC: It's a Takamine. The Takamine that I absolutely loved was nicked from the back of my car, and the replacement is much, much better but it has all that technology in it and I hate it. Lyndon uses Takamine as well.
Q: Your book…
GC: The Rabbits of Zakynthos
Q: Yes.
GC: Published this year. It was supposed to come out just before COVID by Bruin Books and they went bust because of COVID. I don't quite understand why, because I would have thought people were buying books online but yeah, I'm really pleased with it. Actually, I'm glad it hasn't come out yet, because I've been able to write another, which is short stories and poems and as you like the lyrics, you might like it. My dad used to say “Don't write lyrics, write poetry and turn them into lyrics” and I don't know whether I am. I'm not pretending to be a poet, but I really like lyrics. You've got to make someone have little pictures in their heads when they're listening to the song. All the poets that I admire, like Simon Armitage and John Cooper Clarke who we used to play with a lot.
Q: I love John’s stuff…
GC: He used to be on with us, him and Little Brother, who's also a great poet. They were just really cool and he'd just say, (Gerry does a good impression of JCC ) “You know, I'll just make little pictures, you know, I'll just do whatever. I don't care if they don't like it” and 99% of the time they didn't. They’d throw stuff at him until he became this iconic genius. I saw him recently. He's still absolutely the same - except clean. (laughs) God bless him.
Q: This is a completely off the wall question. The Prisoner…
GC: Oh yeah!
Q: What the hell was that last episode all about?
GC: Good point! I absolutely love it. I've met Patrick McGoohan’s daughter at several conventions, and I wrote some songs about Patrick which I sent to her and she was kind enough to reply. She said he did have an idea and it was, ‘This is where the world is going’. It's completely confusing. You've got authority, and you've got an individual, and you've got society, and none of them link together. Now, whether or not that's her interpretation, I just think, well, what I would say, it doesn't matter but it was a fantastic development from Danger Man.
Q: Yes, it was.
GC: Those first episodes, ‘Arrival’ with Guy Doleman as Number 2 were amazing. I think it does sum up the confusion of the world. It's still haunting. Nobody would make a programme of that any more. And if they do, it would be forgotten. People don't talk about Mad Men any more. They don't talk about Breaking Bad. They're kind of, ‘Next one please’ but The Prisoner is seminal in its writing, the music by Ron Grainer and Don Caffey’s directorship.
Q: You should do a gig at Portmeirion.
GC: Oddly enough, the convention's been in touch with me. It may be a possibility. I'm going to write a whole set of Prisoner-esque songs.
Q: If you do, I might even fly in for that.
GC: Oh, bring it on! Please do try and make it.
Q: Absolute pleasure Gerry, thank you.
GC: No, not at all. Arigato. Is that how you say it?
Q: Yes, it is.
_JPG.jpg)
Gerry Colvin
Backstage at Cropredy, is that there is no backstage bar so those musicians that you have just been watching on the stage, should they feel the need for post-show liquid refreshment, have to stroll up to the bar in the field. Thus, you will quite often find yourself mingling and chatting to those who have just performed or as in this case, me sitting down with Gil, Terry and Jean and Dave Pegg walking past with a decent supply of Hooky beer. He gives me nod and a smile as I catch his eye and just then, The Haar are announced. They have a reputation for instinct, trusting each other where they go with their repertoire of traditional Irish songs and the instrumentation of violin, accordion, bodhrán. Add onto that the voice of Molly Donnery and you have a unique quartet in the true sense of the word. The guys are dressed in black; Molly is in white with hair so flaming red it has to be seen to be believed. The contrast is startling but nothing compared to what followed musically. In their hands, they take such standards as ‘The Galway Shawl’, ‘Wild Rover’ and ‘Whiskey In The Jar’, from the familiar into the unfamiliar. I tell Terry about my conversation earlier with Gerry about a song being a good song if it can work in any format. He nods in agreement and suggests a pint, his first of the day. I smile and he gets a round in for us all after which, I have to pop backstage again.
Jake Byers Interview
Q: This one is for Japan Jake…
JB: Oh, wow. I've always wanted to go to the Orient. We've never had an opportunity and I said this was back when we were young, but let's just go and busk. Let's just fly over there and turn up and we'll meet somebody. (grins)
Q: A quarter of a decade of the band. Did you ever envisage it would go on that long and how's the journey been so far?
JB: It's been fabulous. I mean, I feel like I'm living a dream. You know, I always wanted to be in a band that toured around and when this started, I thought it would maybe last a year or two, you know because it was sort of a drive time radio, morning radio, chuckles and silliness. But here we are. It's got a lot more serious now but not serious as in, ‘Oh, we could do something with this’. I think as well, the United Kingdom, is full of people that understand that sort of self-deprecating humour. A little bit of silliness, a little stagecraft, I just really enjoy that.
Q: Rockgrass Outlaws sees you go back to your roots, before your roots, actually. There are so many outlaw songs. How did you whittle them down?
JB: Oh, songs about drinking or life, disparity, angst… That was sort of the ethos of what we were looking for. You've got ‘Two Doors Down’ from Dolly Parton and she's singing about her anxiety, but we'll just cut loose and have fun on the Waylon songs ‘Mama Tried’. It gives us an opportunity in our set which you'll see to juxtapose these against rock tunes. So ‘Mama Tried’ and then we'll sing, Judas Priest’s ‘Breaking the Law’ so there's similar kind of thematics. We also did ‘I'm the Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised’. It's down that same avenue of, you know, people try, but I just can't help myself.
Q: It's easy to listen to your records and enjoy the party that's going on but deep down, taking the music apart and listening to it you do really respect the actual music and parts of it.
JB: Yeah, absolutely.
Q: Have you met any of the people that you've covered and if so, what have they said about your stuff?
JB: Most of them are very appreciative. There's never been anybody that's said, no, I hate this. I think it was Gene Simmons from Kiss that said, I can't wait for the royalty check to turn up. (laughs)
Q: That's Gene.
JB: Yeah!
Q: Your version of Holidays In The Sun; genius because you've completely flipped the song into a whole different genre.
JB: Right.
Q: The harmonies you've worked out, the pace, the feeling, the emotion and everything. What inspired you to do it that way?
JB: It was the essence of the song and thinking how would we approach that sort of thought and instead of just rocking it out like they did, we thought, you know, let's make a ballad out of this. Then when we tried it, it was like, that's actually brilliant. We thought so, so I'm glad you agree.
Q: Any more along those lines in the works?
JB: Not from us. There’re many other guys out there like Steve ‘n’ Seagull's that are kind of going down that same vein but I'm not mad about it.
Q: There's no shortage of great classic Rock songs and you do Pop brilliant as well. What other genres would you like to try? Is Prog Rock one too far?
JB: No, actually. We did a Prog festival several years ago and I thought, yeah, we should do more of this. We've done some Pink Floyd. I've always wanted to do – and this was years back when we first were getting traction here in the UK - I thought we should do Pantera, we should do Metallica but then after we went to Finland, the Steve ‘n’ Seagull's came out and they're kind of handling that heavier side but that also opened us up to thinking, well, let's do some more Pop tunes We try to at least tip a hat to the originals, especially in the format. We're not going to edit out or add parts and if there is any sort of signature riff, we'll try to put that in there to really show respect.
Q: Do you do all the arrangements?
JB: Well, we just kind of, we approach it from many different avenues and just keep playing at it until we think it clicks. We’ve always said playing songs in a bluegrass vein with mandolin, banjo, acoustic guitar and a bass and vocals, it's a really good measure of whether the song's good or not. So, yeah, with good lyrics and some good chord changes, you'll be able to try anything.
Q: Thanks Jake I'm going to go and have a beer and watch you tear the stage up.
JB: Yeah! I'm going to go have a beer and tune up my strings. Thanks Glenn.
_JPG.jpg)
Jake Byers
A recipe for Barbara. Put 10CC, Fischer Z and Sparks into a bowl. Add generous portions of happiness and charisma, mix well and bake in a hot field on a summer afternoon until your cheeks hurt from smiling. Their first song, ‘The Lycra We Live In’ is as uplifting as can be with a happy-go-lucky melody, glorious backing vocals and that ‘get off your bums’ feeling. Led by the Tydeman brothers, John on vocals and Henry on the keys, the band as a whole are something to behold. They ooze confidence, clearly enjoying the atmosphere they are creating. ‘Rainy Days In June’ has you swaying without you realising and an irresistible singalong for the coda. By the end of the set, they have played half their debut album and a handful of singles. The members of the audience who had not seen them before were well and truly won over and I had another CD in my bag.
Gil and I were now rather hungry so I navigated my way through the throng for sustenance. I’m navigating my way back with a couple of buckets of chips when Hayseed Dixie kick-off their set with ‘Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap’. You’re never too far from fun with this band and they’ve trod the boards here a couple of times before so know how to please. Mixed in with the Heavy Metal covers they are famed for, are several from the Rockgrass Outlaws album which, as frontman John Wheeler explains are all about the only things worth singing about, namely, “drinking, cheating, killing and hell.” The juxtaposition of the outlaws and rockers that Jake mentioned in his interview makes you realize just how close Rock ‘n’ Roll and the Wild West are. On a different note, it’s not often that their musicianship gets written about as the party usually overshadows their ability but they are phenomenally fast and tight. Watching a Fast Eddie Clarke guitar solo played on a mandolin, faster than Eddie did, is quite mindboggling. I’m sure it defies physics.
Will Pound and Jenn Butterworth get to frantic level very early on in the set - their first number. The English (Will) and Scottish (Jenn) duo are virtuosos to say the least, Will blowing harp with endless lung power and lightning speed whilst Jenn is just not content with playing the same chord two strums in a row. Both have the hand and finger dexterity of a brain surgeon and play at such a pace, it’s impossible to follow visually in real time. They play jigs and reels, throw in a couple of ballads (for a breather) and then, for good measure, Will changes to a melodeon for the bourrées; Jenn also sings beautifully. Honestly, they have a ridiculous amount of talent, far too much for two people.
They are adjusting instruments, checking mics, and doing things musicians do before they start a gig. Peggy says something to Chris, Chris nods and smiles. Simon is tuning up and chatting to Dave Mattacks, Dave is nodding as he tweaks his drums; Ric is ready, itching to get going. Fairport Convention are about to close yet another weekend of wonderful music. Gil, Terry, Jean and I discuss the possibilities of the opening song. We decide our hosts will open with ‘Walk Awhile’ even though it has been dropped on recent tours in favour of ‘Come All Ye’ and no doubt, they will close with ‘Meet On The Ledge’ but what of in-between? We then turn our attention our favourites over the last three days * and then, right on time, after the intro music of ‘Fiddlestix’, as we guessed, ‘Walk Awhile’ starts the show.
Having attended as a fan and worked at festivals all over the world, big and small, in many genres, I can assure you that Fairport Convention at Cropredy is unique. I don’t know what happens at 9.30pm on that Saturday but the coming together of six thousand people with those five guys on stage, at that moment, is extraordinary. I can’t explain in words what happens, you just have to experience it. Billed as ‘Fairport Convention and Friends’, we are only four songs in when Steve Ashley makes a long-overdue return to the stage. The octogenarian, as cheerful as ever, performs ‘The Rough With The Smooth’ from his Family Album after which Dave swaps his drum stool for the keyboard and a gorgeous rendition of ‘Fotheringay’. A few more from the folk fab five and then Ralph McTell steps up and performs ‘One Too Many Mornings’. This was stunning. Ralph’s voice perfectly suited to Dylan’s poignant lyrics of lost love, it goes without saying that Ralph sang and played it better than Dylan ever did.
The guests keep coming. With a bonus Fred Thelonious Baker on bass, Vikki Clayton, resplendent in a white dress, sings another song we haven’t heard for yonks, ‘White Dress’. James Wood pops up to sing his ‘Cider Rain’; Jenn Butterworth is recalled to the stage when they perform her song ‘Little Sparrow’ and annA rydeR adds her accordion to Chris Leslie’s ‘My Love Is In America’. These magic Cropredy moments are mixed in with Fairport’s own of course and whilst ‘The Hiring Fair’ and ‘Portmeirion’ always go down a treat it’s the rare outing for ‘Rosie’ that drew the breath of the audience. The word ‘fervour’ doesn’t do the performance justice, suffice to say, Dave Swarbrick, Sandy Denny and Gerry Conway were channelled.
By now we had moved towards the rear of the field to take in the full warmth of it all – the magic of it all to quote Dave Cousins. It was hugs all round when Terry and Jean left to get their taxi back to the village, leaving me and Gil to listen to one more from the closet, ‘Mercy Bay’, before the home run of ‘Matty Groves’ and ‘Meet On The Ledge’. Lord knows how many people were onstage for the latter but as per usual, in the field, there was only one – one massive one of six thousand that linked arms and swayed and sang.
Marvellous, simply marvellous. Goodnight Cropredy, see you next year.
*It doesn’t matter.