The Brothers Gillespie

The year so far has brought several offerings to us. We are a few weeks back form playing at Sidmouth Folk Festival, an amazing convergence of folk music, dance and culture on the barmy South Devon coast. It was a pleasure to spend some time there imbibing the spirit of the festival and to catch up with some musician friends along the way.

In July we caught the train down to Provence to work with fabulous ladies of Trio Mythos, (a classical string trio) and the elemental and wonderful Tant que li Siam (a polyphonic trio from Occitane) on music and potential future collaborations culminating in a concert in an ancient church in the hills which broke into spontaneous singing and dancing outside after the concert when wine and cheer were alive in the night and the frame drums and bells joined the fiddle and flute. On the way home we soaked in Marseille's edgy and smokey glory, Algeria was winning the semi-final of the Africa Cup and smoke and fireworks and flares were everywhere in the crumbling city.

The Summer also saw us begin to engage with the musical and story traditions of Dragon's in the North of England due to a very auspicious collaboration between ourselves, Professor Barbara Ravel Hoffer of Durham University and two puppet making, leather working magical artisans Emma Berry and Andy Bates, so far this has led to two theatrical concerts with volunteers from Durham Uni in Durham Cathedral and at Ushaw College.

We are now turning our mind to organizing tours for next year, including our first trip to Netherlands and Gemrnany and Czech in March/April and further UK and Ireland tours throughout the year. If anyone would like to discuss hosting us for a house concert or put us on in a venue somewhere please get in touch. We also hope for some hibernation time this Autumn and Winter to work on new music.

In late Sept early Oct we are on tour in England and will be filling gaps in our itinerary busking in towns along the way and seeing who we meet.

Thanks to the support of everyone who helped with our crowdfunder we were able to finish creating 'The Fell' and launch it with a concert at Hexham's Queen's Hall which was for us a hugely enjoyable night. We have had two subsequent launch concerts in Newcastle and Edinburgh which were a joy. It feels a relief to have finished bringing the album into the world. We are hitting the road in Feb for a string of concerts in the North East, Scottish borders, London, Devon and Sheffield. We just received our first review of the album which was very positive from Folk Radio UK. Thankyou again to all of you who have made it possible for us to create this album through the spirit of the gift. https://www.folkradio.co.uk/2019/01/the-brothers-gillespie-the-fell/

Autumn is here with its rains and mists and sudden goldenings in the trees. Life brings unexpected challenges and the earth turns into its colder side. Our album held by the spinning fell under the stars comes closer to its time of birth. We have a launch date in Hexham on the 11th December and a pre-launch in London on 1st December with more dates to come. We are having a crowdfunder to help us get this creation into physical shape, to call the midwifes and fellow travelers of our soul family to help us birth this little album of hill songs. Looking forward to the long roads of Winter and the hearth fires, praying for more music and inspiration and for the unexpected but timely success of our collective movements towards compassion and justice and that we become more poetic even as we deconstruct our social conditioning and walk in cities thick with green space. How to speak over the ocean with a tongue that is inside the rain and broken out into the moor and yet aflame with a spirit of internationalist love? And equally importantly how to develop the strength and skill to listen to the voices on the wind speaking of another place in another language. How do we move en masse confidently and efficaciously without abandoning poetry and succumbing to the simple tyranny of abstraction and utility?

We are in the midst of recording an album, of songs we have been carrying with us for a little while. When walking through Wall village, after a wedding party on the village green a couple of weeks ago we were struck by the vision of the hill above the green.  Such a generous presence in our lives going back to childhood. Such a refuge. As George Makay Brown said, if he had been born in a city he would never have written a line, without the fell we wouldn't have these songs to sing.

So the album is called 'The Fell' and we are loving the process of recording these songs in th dreamy studio of Tim Lane in the borders. We'll be releasing the album to the world in December with a launch in Hexham and will be setting up a crowdfunder in the next few weeks. If you'd like to welcome us for a show as part of our album launch tour in December please get in touch whether it  be it a big venue or an intimate house show you have in mind.