At this time of year, those artistes talented enough (and privileged enough) to be invited to perform at certain Summer Folk Festivals begin to get rather excitable. They seem to find some kind of perverse pleasure in crowing about how many Festivals they are invited to. And about how popular they are: about the pressures of endless public performance and about always being in constant demand. Which is all rather lovely for them, but is a little insensitive for the rest of us being kept permanently at arms length from such jollification.
Warwick Folk Festival, for example, starts next week. It promotes itself modestly as " A Folk festival of the very best in traditional and contemporary folk." Having viewed this year's Guest List, I couldn't possibly comment. It is noticeable however, that only a few "locals" are involved each year. The rest of us are annually excluded.
Black Parrot Seaside won't be appearing at Warwick Folk Festival next week. It's been going for 34 years now, and it's a measure of interest in it that their Facebook page currently has 796 members. We weren't there last year, or in any of the years since we last reformed in 2006. We weren't there between 1978 and 1982 during which time we recorded our first album, ran Brinklow Folk Club and played support to bands like East of Eden, The Darts, Cosmotheka and Mad Jocks and Englishmen. In fact, we haven't appeared in any of the Warwick Folk Festivals so far. We will be appearing (once again) at Bedworth Folk Festival this November. Also in Warwickshire. Also a three day event ,spread over several venues..
We're not boycotting Warwick-far from it. We've just never been invited. It seems the odds are stacked against us ever doing it. However thick-skinned we may be, we've got the message. Our contacts previously have been ignored and we know now, not to trouble the organisers annually by pestering them. We won't be appearing at any Warwick (or Alcester) Folk Festivals in the foreseeable future. Or apparently until Hell Freezes Over, as the Eagles once put it. If invited-we'd be delighted to accept. But we never are. We haven't a clue why, so if you need answers, you'll need to ask the organisers.
We can only hypothesise-conjecture is all we have, in an information vacuum. Maybe it is one (or several) of the following reasons:
1. not good enough.
2. Not local enough
3. Not popular enough
4. Not experienced enough
5. Not talented enough
6. Unsuitable material
7. Too old.
1. Well, taste is an individual thing, and so we have to accept that selection committees and Festival organisers have the right to exercise their own judgement on grounds 1 and 5. Some presumably can't stand us. Not a view shared by the majority of our audiences.
2. Would be nonsense. All three of us were born and educated in Warwickshire. (I can trace my roots there back to 1650!). We all still live there-we have done so virtually all our lives. We feel we have an affinity with the place. This is reflected in our own songs, such as "On Bedworth Bank" " Coventry Lullaby" and " The Wag of Shop 14." But what WFF definitely isn't, (even though it's one of several Warwickshire-based festivals), is any kind of showcase for the considerable local talent regularly to be viewed performing within a 20 mile radius of the area. We know this, because we mix with many of them regularly. We play alongside them, and we watch and enjoy their acts. Only a few we know will be at Warwick.
3. We always get a good round of applause. We get asked back to venues. We get to do encores. People bought our first and second albums. We've been on local radio, on foreign radio and on BBC Radio One. John Peel liked us. He said so,when playing our single on his programmes. New Musical Express liked us. We can't complain about Press coverage and reviews of our last album. All very positive.
4. Just plain Stupid. 35 years with the same basic format. Two albums. Radio interviews and Airplay of our songs. Folk Clubs, (OTHER) Folk Festivals, Pubs, Theatres, Universities, Colleges, Beer Festivals, Open Air Gigs, Charity Balls, Working Mens Clubs, Galas,Carnivals, Miner's Welfares, CND Benefits,Charity Concerts, the Club Circuit and Arts Festivals? Come on!
6. We do Blues, Traditional Folk, Contemporary Folk and some Comedy. Around 40% of our current set list is self-penned. Our instrumentation includes acoustic,steel and electric guitars, banjo, mandolin, mandola, harmonica and accordion. We also do some close harmony singing and some acapella. (That's actually quite versatile, isn't it? )
7. Besides being illegal to discriminate against people on the grounds of age-we are not the oldest band on the circuit. Though we've been together longer than many. (We suspect that this is what really grinds a few gears!).
