To the Sage at Gateshead for some fiddle concerts. Note 1. The Sage’s sandwiches have improved, though not tremendously. Note 2. The programme implied fairly constant entertainment in the foyer — in fact extremely sporadic during the time we were there, roughly 12 to 5. Note 3. There was supposed to be a non-stop “session” in the upstairs hall in a pub-style atmosphere — it seemed like the hope was that this would just happen — in the afternoon at least, it didn’t. It could have done with a bit of nurturing / leadership.
Having said all that, the two concerts we attended were excellent, and both confounded expectations. I know Annbjorg Lien from CDs like Aliens Alive, which is very much the folk-rock end of Norwegian traditional music. However, this was an excellent acoustic solo set of traditional tunes on the Hardanger fiddle, introduced with just enough information. Good to see where the roots are.
And then the Harald Haugaard Trio from Denmark. We’d seen Harald as part of Hoirup and Haugaard at the Cambridge Folk Festival — an engaging fiddle and guitar duo doing traditional music so it was quite a surprise to have an amplified quite wild set here. Good stuff though, mostly traditional based.
