We are delighted to reveal our programme for Spring 2025. As usual, it features the very best in traditional and contemporary folk, roots and acoustic music, and we hope that you will agree that it’s one of our best yet.

We kick off after Christmas with THE BROTHERS GILLESPIE on Friday 17 January. Described by Folk Radio UK as "weaving an especially compelling magic", and "showing British acoustic music in its best possible light", the Northumbrian duo make music that is animated by lyrical songwriting, fine fingerstyle guitar playing, multi-instrumental musicianship and "the glorious tones of their blood harmony" (Sam Lee). Opening the evening will be LIZ SIMCOCK, whose songs – often autobiographical and highly personal – are immediately accessible to audiences and injected with poetry, emotion and splashes of humour.

SAM SWEENEY makes a welcome return to Downend to headline our concert on Friday 21 February, when he’ll be joined on stage by special guest LOUIS CAMPBELL. Sam is a veteran of the mighty Bellowhead, former and inaugural artistic director of the National Youth Folk Ensemble, founder member of the acclaimed instrumental trio Leveret, and "Britain’s premier fiddler" (Songlines), at the forefront of the revival in English traditional music. Bristol-based singer-songwriter LOU SHEPHERD brings the powerful energy of the folk revival firmly into the world of experimental indie-folk, and she will get the evening underway, with the concert also live-streamed in partnership with LIVE TO YOUR LIVING ROOM.

Friday 21 March will see THE ROSIE HOOD BAND headline our monthly concert. A Horizon Folk Award nominee, Rosie is known for her powerful, clear vocals and captivating performances combining poetic writing with honest interpretations of traditional English songs. Rosie is joined by fiddle-player Nicola Beazley, melodeon-player & percussionist Robyn Wallace and fiddle-player Rosie Butler-Hall. With songs of epic journeys, rural pastimes and loves lost and found, the BRISTOL FOLK SINGERS will open the evening, and this is another that we’re partnering with LIVE TO YOUR LIVING ROOM on as we live-stream the concert.

Our Spring programme draws to a close on Friday 25 April. HANNAH SCOTT went down a storm with a solo support set last year, and she returns to headline with her trio. Her music is shaped by human stories, with family, in all its chaos and glory, sitting at the heart of her work. Her lyrics are powerful and poignant, and her voice feels strangely familiar, though you can’t quite put your finger on why. CORUJA JONES is a songwriting project from Manchester-based musician and songwriter Dan Jones, originally hailing from Dudley in the West Midlands, and he will get the evening underway with some dreamy, melancholic, indie-folk. Please note that this concert is a week later than our usual third Friday slot due to the church being unavailable for the Easter weekend.

All four concerts will take place at CHRIST CHURCH DOWNEND as usual, and seating is unreserved. The concerts are all priced at £14 in advance, £16 on the door, but you can also buy a season ticket for all four concerts for £50, which saves a few pounds as well as booking fees! All tickets are non-refundable. They are available online HERE, and they will also be available from MELANIE’S KITCHEN in Downend ahead of each individual gig. Please note that Melanie's Kitchen can only take cash payments and season tickets are not available at the shop. There will be a full bar at all concerts, as well as a prize draw, all proceeds of which go towards booking our support artists. Doors open at 7.30pm for a 7.45pm start. 

We're really excited about this season, and we hope you will be too. Keep supporting live music, it’s never been more important!For further information, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or find us on FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM or X.

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It is perhaps a marker of the quality of artists that Downend Folk & Roots has a reputation for programming, that a visit from a member of folk supergroup Bellowhead comes as no real surprise, for a concert that will also be live-streamed in partnership with LIVE TO YOUR LIVING ROOM.
 
RACHAEL McSHANE is a renowned folk singer, cellist, fiddle and viola player from the North East of England. She gained fame as an original member of Bellowhead, touring with them extensively and making a number of television appearances. The band recorded five studio albums and, together, they won a staggering total of eight BBC Folk Awards. Parting ways in 2016, the band returned in 2022 for a series of ecstatically-received performances that reminded audiences of their unique alchemy, energy and talent.
 
 
Away from her Bellowhead fame, Rachael is a much sought-after performer and recording artist. Her debut solo album No Man’s Fool arrived in 2009 via Navigator Records, establishing impressive credentials that eventually led her to signing with the prestigious Topic Records, the oldest independent record label in the world. She also is the leader of THE CARTOGRAPHERS, a band that features the exceptional talents of guitarist Ian Stephenson (Kan, Baltic Crossing), and melodeon player Julian Sutton (Kathryn Tickell, Sting). Their music is a powerful blend of traditional folk and contemporary sounds, with Rachael's stunning voice and instrumental skills leading the line. The Cartographers have garnered a loyal following thanks to their impressive live performances and critically acclaimed debut album, When All Is Still (2018, Topic Records).
 
Opening the evening will be Johnny Campbell, who emerged onto the UK folk scene writing self-penned material and delving deep into Northern English folk song and story.
 
 
The album From Hull & Halifax & Hell (2020) took him to The Faroe Islands where he recorded a live album on the island of Nolsoy.  Since musical instruments hadn't arrived on the islands until the 19th century,  this is perhaps the first time Northern English traditional song has been recorded on these islands.
 
Since March 2020, Johnny hasn't relented, releasing three singles; Hard Times of Old England, Winter Hill Trespass and A Right to Roam. 2024 sees Johnny releasing True North, an album of Northern English traditional songs recorded on their respective county summits.
 
Tickets for the concert, which takes place at CHRIST CHURCH DOWNEND on Friday 18 October, are available online HERE and from MELANIE'S KITCHEN in Downend (cash only). They are priced at £15 each in advance or £17 on the door. Doors open at 7.00pm and the music starts around 7.45pm. There will be a bar, stocking cider, soft drinks, wine, hot drinks and real ale from locally-based HOP UNION BREWERY. Audience members are encouraged to bring their own glass/ mug/tankard, as well as reusable bottles for water, as part of the drive to be more environmentally aware; there is a 50p discount for those that do. There will also be sweet treats available at the bar courtesy of Radstock-based THE GREAT CAKE COMPANY, as well as a prize draw, which helps to fund the support artists for each concert.
 
The concert will also be live-streamed in partnership with LIVE TO YOUR LIVING ROOM, so if you can’t get to Downend, you can watch from the comfort of your own home. Further information and tickets for the live-stream are available HERE.
 

For further information, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or find us on FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM or X.

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After a fantastic tenth birthday party in July, Downend Folk & Roots took a well-deserved summer off. Last night they returned to remind us, once again, just how important it is to be a part of something bigger, part of a community.
 
Both FILKIN'S DRIFT and the jaw dropping support act MICHELLE HOLLOWAY form a small part of fourteen-piece folk soon-to-be-superstars, Filkin's Ensemble. While the Ensemble have a massive, utterly addictive air, the smaller bits are more gentle, more subtle but the individual strengths are more obvious.
 
 
Chris Roberts and Seth Bye are the driving force behind Filkin's Ensemble, it was their ambitious lock-down project. They have created what is, quite simply, the most exciting folk band around. Tonight, though, it's just the two of them. A fiddle, a guitar and two voices. Remarkably they still manage to fill every corner with their songs and tunes that are rooted firmly in place.
 
The two sets that they play straddle the borders of the South West. Roberts brings Welsh songs, redolent of home and family, while Bye's fiddle conjures dance tunes from Gloucestershire. Both are wonderful.
 
On Hiraeth, Roberts is gentle and delicate, his voice fragile, that heart-sick Welsh yearning beautifully evoked. His guitar playing is fluid, a tumbling mountain stream, notes nimbly glittering from impossibly long fingers until they join Bye's fiddle in a celebration of home. 
 
Adar Mân y Mynydd has the same sense of delicacy, plucked guitar and violin bird-like until the fiddle gently bouys the song, lifting it into the air. A breeze blows through Bugeilio'r Gwenith Gwyn as instruments and voices flutter, Roberts and Bye carefully sketching fields of wheat in muted colours, flecked with gold.
 
 
All of the songs have a graceful quality, they feel feather-light, enveloping you like mist. The tunes, however, work as the perfect counter-balance, they tap their toes and swirl around, giddily. The Girl I Left Behind Me is a Cotswold's Morris tune that is brimming with dusky warmth, Bye's fiddle scattering sunbeams, casting light. Touch Paper/The Gloucester Hornpipe is a little more sedate, the fiddle spiralling around Roberts' heartbeat guitar, the pace of the dance languid, but happily so. 
 
A couple of years ago, Filkin's Drift decided to walk to work. They walked the Welsh coastal path for two months, playing gigs as they went. From this experience came a whole bunch of tunes, one of the best being St Tudno’s. Starting with Roberts’ classical phrasing, before he hurtles into a helter-skelter insistence, Bye joins him and the two instruments face off, almost confrontational in their intensity. They spin around one another, touching and then dashing off before racing upwards, looking down on the church on the Great Orme peninsula. 
 
As the September chill creeps through the church, Filkin's Drift have one more comforting, warming treat. Richard Thompson's Beeswing is one of the great modern folk songs and this version is gorgeous. As with everything else that they play, it is understated, gentle, exquisite. Roberts and Bye harmonising as if it's the most natural thing in the world.
 
 
There's a sound that the Downend audience make as they fall in love with an artist. It's a breathy mutter, a satisfied sigh. Just as Michelle Holloway finishes her version of Karine Polwart’s Come Away In, the sound of falling in love whispers around the pews. Holloway sings entirely unaccompanied and has a voice that reaches out and warms the heart. It's incredible. 
 
Each song she sings comes with enormous emotional heft and the lack of instrumentation forces us to pay attention to the words. Nancy Kerr's Dark Honey has an incredulous sense of disbelief that humans could be so destructive, so careless. Jon Wilks’ Mary Ashford's Tragedy highlights the dangers that women face walking home at night. Holloway's warmth draws us in, then the words smash you between the eyes. It is the classic folk-y one-two. An iron fist in a velvet glove and so easy to fall in love with.
 
If there's any justice in the world, Filkin's Ensemble will be the “next big thing” in Folk, until then the individuals that emerge from the collective are very special too. They are a community creating remarkable things.
 
Words: Gavin McNamara
Photos: Barry Savell
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