Welsh Wizards Wow Wiltshire With Witty, Wildly Wonderful Work

Venue:

Wilshire Music Centre, Bradford Upon Avon

Date: 08/11/2024

Last year I was lucky enough to join Sam Lee one evening in the woods of Gloucestershire, where we traipsed at midnight to a remote part of an RSPB reserve in search of singing Nightingales. Despite the drizzle and the reluctant avian peformers, it was a magical night. Sam always invites a visiting musician along to these sessions, and on the night I was there we had the company of Patrick Rimes from the band Calan. Around the campfire and in the woods, both solo and with Sam, he sang songs in Welsh in a fine baritone voice, and gave us rousing reels on his fiddle to drive away the cold and damp. I was very impressed, and vowed to try and see his band play live when the opportunity presented itself.

Last Friday that opportunity finally arose, and the Foxymobile took us in fine style to the the rather splendid little venue that is the Wiltshire Music Centre, half an hour from home, manned by volunteers for evening gigs, and a beacon of culture in an increasingly shadowy land.

Beth from Calan introduced the evening – and their support group, The Marcellas, took to the stage for a rousing run-through of their own songs. Two sisters with heavenly voices, plus their brilliant uncle Karl on impressively driving acoustic guitar, the trio gave us half an hour of excellent material sung in both Welsh and English – the perfect foil for Calan’s set to come. They explained that although they had some rather fetching T-shirts for sale in the foyer, they had not yet committed their songs to record, and invited us to support their gofundme efforts if we could.

I was very taken with their performance, and I’m pleased to put a link here to their Farceberk page. Bung them a few quid if you can via gofundme (link on the Facebook page), they deserve the support of anyone who loves live music, and I hope we can collectively make a small difference to their fund raising efforts.

https://www.facebook.com/theMARCELLASthe/

After a swift comfort break, the Marcellas announced the imminent arrival of Calan to the stage; the audience obviously contained some stalwart fans who’d seen them before, as a rousing cheer went up as they walked out – a good omen for the performance to come. And crikey, they were good. I’d bought a single album of theirs after hearing Patrick sing at Sam’s event, but hearing them live took things to another level (that’s after all why I go to these things and scribble enthusiastically about them after the event). What a truly glorious sound they have in full flow. Fiddle, Guitar, Accordion and Harp in perfect combinations. Patrick also plays Bagpipes and Whistle, but explained later in the set that he’d left these behind in Cardiff the night before – it was tempting to imagine that some post-gig over-relaxation had left him befuddled that morning on departure for Wiltshire… but no matter, he simply played the pipe and whistle parts with his fiddle! We heard the band at warp-factor 10, and individual delicate playing that sat beautifully in the hushed silence of the room. We heard beats, igs and reels, and watched open-mouthed as Beth danced to one spectacular number. All in all, a fabulous evening of music.

Calan have a new album out – ‘NEFYDD’ – which is likely to be their last, as they have decided that this tour will be their last tour. I’m not aware of why this decision has been taken – maybe another Afterworder can fill in the details – but what a shame it will be if folk cannot see them play live again in this formation. They played the whole of their new album for us on Friday night, and it is a fittingly magnificent finale to their canon of work. If you fancy hearing some spirited folk music sung in Welsh and English (with a rousing piece in 19/8 time!), this is your place to hear it.

There are only a few gigs left of this tour, so if the above sounds promising, I recommend that you get yourself along to one of them if you can; you may never get another chance.

I’ll put some videos in the comments to tempt you further. If you can’t get to any of the remaining gigs, consider buying their earlier albums, but definitely buy their new one, it’s a belter.

The audience:

Sold out. Enthusiastic. Quiet and respectful. Entertained and delighted.

It made me think..

I should have made more of an effort to see them play before.

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