The first Friday of April saw Folk Club Bonn up to it’s chin in women’s names. It was certainly one of the easier themes for musicians to find a song title under. Would ‘Jock Stuart’ be elbowed out at evening’s end in preference to ‘Goodnight Irene’ I wondered? As is famously known – at FCB anything could, and quite possible will, happen. As long as it’s not plugged into an amplifier when it happens.
As always John Harrison started the evening, and immediately got the name quota off to a flyer with ‘Alberta, Alberta’ (that’s two names already!) A blues by The Mississippi Sheiks and NOT Mr E. Clapton I hasten to add – that MTV unplugged concert last century has a lot to answer for. Christoph Thiebes was on hand to add some tasteful Blues harp. ‘Zeppelina’ is also a girl’s name – well, John made it one when he named the duck of his song thus. ‘The Green Man’ broke the woman’s name theme good and proper but is a perfect song for April telling as it does of the (Pagan?) symbol of Nature. John knows a couple such songs, and this evening he has chosen Malcolm Guite’s lively and louder one over Martin Donnelly’s quieter example. This proves to be an inspired decision as the sunny weather has tempted a large crowd to the balcony of Dotty’s whose chatter finds its way somewhat disconcertingly through the open patio doors.
Hans Ihnen got the female name theme firmly back on track. ‘Suzanne’ from Leonard Cohen? check. ‘Annie’s Song’ by John Denver? check. Paul McCartney’s ‘Hey Jude’? check. The latter got such a keen response that we managed to rebound a little of that noise from outside with loud renderings of “la, la, la, lalalala!” which was not to be the last bit of spontaneous audience participation this evening.
The acapella quintett Pentarmony from Westerwald had both familiar and unfamiliar faces to me. To be exact they are Katrin Waldraff, Alex Haag, Sonja Daniels, JuttaSpeilmann und Edgar Kind and they were tone perfect with their delivery of familiar pop songs ‘I can’t help falling in love’ and McCartney’s ‘Ebony and Ivory’. If I tell you the third number they sang was ‘Words’ then you would be forgiven for pointing out that’s three international pop hits – but you would be wrong dear reader. In this case ‘Words’ is a song written and recorded by Swedish acappella quintett The Real Group and was not a worldwide pop hit. It sounded like a tricky one for a choir to handle, but they did so with aplomb and left me thinking that this ‘Words’ deserved also to be a pop classic as much as that one from the better known brothers Gibb.
Wolfgang Schriefer was first act due onstage after the break but called in sick. Fortunately though, Wolfgang being a poet meant that John could read his planned contribution to the evening sans-Wolfgang. “A small poem in honour of women’s names” was how he presented the idea to John – but ultimately it’s a homage to his own favourite lady and name Brigitte!
Despite it’s international flavour I can’t recall FCB ever having a guest from the Ukraine before. Evgenly Nesterenko changed all that in a most agreeable fashion. He was, by the way, also the first to perform sitting on the edge of the merchandise table. Two ‘firsts’ then! Three firsts if you count that no-one succeded in noting the song names or was able to ask in Russian. He did sing beautifully though and if we couldn’t follow the words we could feel their emotions.
I don’t think too many of the audience were able to follow the lyrics of Moustafa Osh and Saico Balde either but that didn’t stop them from going down a storm two Folk Clubs ago and again this evening. John discovered the duo, who hail from from Guinea-Bissau, playing on the street in Bonn and dropped not just a coin but a Folk Club visiting card into their hat. We are so glad he did so. There is such an air of unbridled enthusiasm that emanates from both mens faces and the tunes are guaranteed to capture ears and hearts. Which led to still another ‘first’ as everyone in the room joined in Moustafa’s request to wave their arms and sing. So they did! ‘Zimbole’ strikes again.
Daniel Habermann was a new face at FCB but will hopefully become a familiar one. No songs with women’s names, but two excellent self compositions including a lengthy part spoken/part sung ‘Vital Questions’ which pointed out very lucidly that “We are more. More than hate and war. We are More!” Dylan’s ‘Masters of War’ was also a fitting inclusion in Daniel’s set. More please!
As always, I’ve sandwiched the main guests two slots into one review. Today we were privileged to have Johannes Epremian from the ever popular Cajun Band Le Clou joining us. Part one of his set was largely given to French titles that are also Le Clou staples, and part two was a veritable smorsborg of english folk gems – but both sets shared one common ground – the absence of a violin/fiddle. It’s sort of like seeing Dylan without a guitar or Phil Collins with one. Johannes and fiddle. He even apologised for the absence, explaining that he just decided to do something different. Wasn’t that what Dylan said before plugging in an electric guitar to an explosion of booing at Newport in 1965? Johannes didn’t get an explosion of booing though – as long as nothing was plugged in to electricity he was safe.
He kicked things off with a Le Clou number ‘Corsaires Du Soleil’ (Pirates of Summer) which, to reduce the instrumental disappointment, he says he will sing completely without instrumentation. He proves to be almost as good a singer as he is a violin player. Switching to guitar he proved more than proficient too. All in all, it took Johannes Epremian three songs to be forgiven for leaving that violin behind.
The second set saw Johannes take on Don Mclean’s ‘Vincent’ and, my favourite part of the evening, Tom Paxton’s ‘Leaving London’. I’m already a die hard Mclean fan, going back to seeing the man many years ago at Portsmouth Guildhall, but Johannes inspired me to check out Paxton’s song catalogue and I will certainly be raiding it for future guitar evenings. As far as the missing violin goes I remember seeing Johannes playing a beautifully beat up National Steel guitar on the Kunsthalle roof once, and seeing it once more on the stage behind him tonight I was happy to hear some real blues again, being rewarded with Jackson C. Franck’s ‘Blues run the game’ and Ray Austin’s ‘For a while’. Two more talented songwriters to be checked out after the show. To loud applause, Johannes rounds off his magical musical evening with ‘Jambalaya’ as a sure fire way to get audience participation – it’s one of those songs that people seem unable to stop themselves singing along to. Almost a pity, since Johannes added a beautiful singing voice to his many musical talents this evening and I for one woulkd have been happy to hear Johannes sing without ‘backing’ – but you can’t stop a Folk Club audience in full swing…
Violin? What violin? by evenings end all that mattered was crawfish pie, file’ gumbo and having some fun on the bayou – or at Folk Club Bonn even!
