FOLK fans can experience a double bill of traditional music with a modern contemporary twist at the Brewery next week.
On Thursday (February 1, 7.30pm) the Kendal arts centre hosts Shake the Chains, an exciting new touring collaboration from five of the best and most celebrated UK contemporary folk singer songwriters exploring the role songs have played in social change, resistance and protest.
The band comprises an array of top traditional stars, including Nancy Kerr, who is one of the most decorated singer songwriters in English folk having won six BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, including Singer of the Year; Scottish folk artist Findlay Napier and Greg Russell who is a rising star of English folk music and whose university politics dissertation inspired the Shake the Chains project.
Their songs look at current political and social themes such as human rights, the fight for equality for women and modern multi-cultural Britain in the form of a musical response to former UKIP Nigel Farage’s comments on immigration.
The band will also be joined on stage by special guest Martin Simpson, one of the world’s most accomplished acoustic and slide guitar players who has played to numerous sell-out crowds at the Brewery.
Come Saturday, February 3 (7.30pm), award-winning London folk outfit Stick in the Wheel will be heading to town.
The band have won plaudits for their culturally and politically switched on music and working class appraisal of English folk not to mention their skill in telling stories through songs that reconnect modern audiences to the past - drawing parallels between then and now.
Brewery music programmer Gareth Butterworth said that folk was one of the most popular genres of live music at the Brewery and has a great track record of bringing some of the biggest and most popular bands to Kendal. He added: "We are also delighted to give a platform to two bands who are reappraising the genre with a fresh new energy and verve, showing that traditional music can still be vital, relevant and speak to a new younger audience by looking at contemporary issues and subjects of importance in today’s modern Britain."
Brewery box office 01539-725133.
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