I have to start by saying that this blog would not have been possible without the help of Henry, one of the cooks at the New Sydney Hotel who just gave me the wonderful latte he’d just made for himself (I think I must’ve had a desperately needy expression). It pretty much sums up what it’s all about down here. Within moments of arriving, we were using the owner Al’s computer to hurriedly finish off some of the Russian documents for next week, had pints in our hands and were all ready smiling.

I’m sitting here doing something I really love to do when we’re on the road; I’m sitting in an empty pub in the early morning. Everything is clean, tidy and arranged, and the old lady (the New Sydney Hotel was founded in 1835) is just resting, getting some much-needed sleep before it all starts again and midday, as it has for the past years. In my mind I can still the the ghosts of the hundreds of people that were here last night, singing, dancing, playing instruments. I love this pub. It’s my favourite one in Australia, and about the closest thing I’ve found to a ‘proper’ pub. There’s no Keno, no poker machines, not even a jukebox. It sells locally produced beers and ciders (they even have a Kentish Ale that I’ve fallen in love with) along with drinks we don’t get in Brisbane, like Magners pear cider and even genuine Strong Suffolk Ale, the walls are covered with flotsam that is just fascinating, and the food is fantastic too, so hats off to Henry, and the New Sydney.

As most of you might know, we have a very special relationship with Tasmania, and to say that we’d been looking forward to these gigs at Fleadh Ceol is like saying that I like the occasional coffee. It’s an oft-used phrase, but for us it’s perfect.

It’s like coming home.

In a way, Súnas wouldn’t be the band it is now without the Tasmanian adventures. It was the first small tour down here that really woke us up to the fact that people may actually come out to listen to us (that sounds a bit self-deprecating, and I guess it is, but really, we’d never taken ourselves all that seriously). Tasmania made us re-think that. There’s also the whole Helen factor, and although each of us have different meanings and thoughts there, it’s still very much a part of it. This is our first trip down here since she passed away, and even though it’s only been a couple of months, It’s still very much on our minds, and the people down here that knew her too. Sarah told me she had an odd moment on stage last night where she looked up and really expected to see her out there somewhere. I think she is, there’s just too much joy and happiness for her not to be.

Last night’s gig was brilliant; hot, hard, fiery, fast, unpredictable. But to be honest we had more fun watching everyone else perform. Tonight will be a little different, more relaxed I think now that we’ve got over the initial performance bump with Jamie (who’s standing in for Bridget for this weekend). But then maybe not. We never seem to be able to control these things!

We have been out of radio contact for a while, apologies to everyone. I haven’t really had the motivation to write anything since our beloved Helen passed away. She was a monumental figure in our lives, and will be missed always. Thank you everyone for your wonderful wishes of strength and support –I can’t begin to describe how they held us together at the end. We have all had good and bad moments since then, as I’m sure you can understand.

Since then, we in Súnas decided after an enormous 18 months of festivals and touring to have a quiet six months to renew energies and begin rehearsals for the next album. Judging from our busy gig guide our carefully made plans quite obviously went to pot, didn’t they? The plans are still there, they’ve just been postponed until after an utterly mental March.

This coming Thursday (4th March) we visit our wonderful friends in Tasmania for the Fleadh Ceol at the New Sydney Hotel in Hobart. We’re performing alongside Martin Spurway-Smith and Zac Johnston as well as our good friends the To’rags, Daideo and the Blue Mosquitoes and Mick Flanagan. The last time we gigged at the Fleadh it was 2008 and we had a cracking time, so I mean it when I say it will brilliant to see everyone again!





The following Thursday takes us to Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in Russia for a private St Pat’s gig with the Irish Riverdance crew as support. As you do. We are utterly blown away at an opportunity such as this (and are trying to act cool, but failing spectacularly). I hear Russia is lovely this time of year – in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, on Sakhalin Island, the temperature ranges from -5 to -30 degrees. Can you hear Mannie sobbing from here?

Then, 1 day after we return, comes the madness that is St Patrick’s Day. On Wed 17th we’re performing at Harrigan’s Drift Inn at Jacob’s Well from 12-3:30 and then at the Down Under Bar on Edward St in the city from 7-9. Come and say hello!

And THEN we cap March off with a flying visit to Colo in north-west NSW to perform at Dougie MacLean’s Colo Celtic Festival from 19th – 21st. You can check the details out here. It’ll be great fun to get up with Dougie again and play some songs. Hopefully he’ll bring some of his divine 12-year single malt Caledonia whisky with him!


Currently Listening to: 'Eclipse' by Imogen Heap.

The final two Perthshire Amber Tour blogs are up!

Sorry for the delay!

So it looks like we've not updated this news page for a long time, but the blogs from the past couple of months are over at the Tour Blog page. Just thought I'd clear that up for those of you that have been sending polite emails asking!

There are two more tour blogs yet to go up. They're sitting on my laptop waiting to be tidied up and uploaded, something that sounds incredibly simple and quick, and indeed is, it's just since we got back we quite literally haven't stopped. We actually got our first gig call not 2 hours after landing in Brisbane!

We've mentioned this to those of you that have come to the last few gigs, but we're scaling back a bit next year. We've decided only to go to a few festivals and focus mainly on the new album (plans for which are proceeding quite nicely!) and getting a whole load of new material. Because we seem to have spent most of the last 18 months on planes, we've really only brought out a couple of new tunes and songs, and we're beginning to get a little stir-crazy. We've got a whole lot of stuff just waiting to go, but like most things, it's a matter of finding (or making) the time to get together and learn it. Saying that though, in true Súnas style we have a couple of very interesting surprises in store for next year...

Anyway, have Happy Holidays one and all, and hopefully we'll see you in January!

(Oh, just to clear up so as not to be accused of big noting or the like, Bridget, Sarah and Paul will be at Woodford this year, but not as Súnas. After a few massive Woodford Festivals for us, we're on our 'gap year'. Bridget is involved in the Fiddle Club, and Paul and Sarah will be sessioning and generally bumming their way onto anyone who'll have them's stage). But who knows...

5:25pm, Somewhere near Aratula, Qld
So right now, we’re bombing it to Cunninghams Gap on our way to Severnlea which is down on the granite belt near Stanthorpe. Actually, bombing it is rather an optimistic term to use as we’re in Mannie’s van. Chugging it would be more appropriate. A good-paced chug. Despite the rush (it’s a good three hour run from Brisbane), the idiot drivers and utterly disgusting Brisbane traffic towards Ipswich, it’s actually a very cool and chilled out place to be. The iPod is on a random shuffle of a genre it loosely calls ‘Americana’ (Ry Cooder at the moment, though we’ve just had some Matthew Ryan, King Curly and a touch of Sinead -not all Americana, I know, but the Genius list isn’t without its own quirks). The Great Dividing Range is laid out before us, just a magenta silhouette against a burnt tobacco sunset. The sun is going down smoking.



The downs between Ipswich and Cunninghams Gap are usually brown, sunburned to within an inch of dust, but not this evening. There’s been so much rain that we’re literally passing incredible, though temporary, lakes dotted with waterbirds and happy cattle. My fingers are tingling, which they always do on the day of a gig, but I’ve got no idea quite what to expect. We’re playing tonight at the superbly named Whiskey Gully Winery, a ticketed event where we get to play our favourite material in front of people who actually want to be there, as opposed to those that just happen to be. It’s a nice change. I’m a terrible one for trying to predict things. I guess it comes from being a writer; my head never really shuts down. But tonight I’m not. Tonight I shall be a guitary leaf on the wind of the band. And after the roadhouse food we just scarfed, it’s going to be a blustery night….


The Whiskey Gully Homestead

1:29am, Diamondvale (The Big House)
The gig was in an old homestead, all high ceilings, antique furniture and verandahs. We were set up in a little corner of the main room, close to the huge fireplace big enough to roast Mannie in, backed by a wall polkaed with beautiful guitars. I’m resisting the temptation to describe them, but let’s just say there were some gems there. So, two small, cosy sets to a wonderfully attentive, well fed and wined audience that sang in all the right spots, laughed at Sarah’s naff jokes and got on the take-the-piss-out-of-Mannie bandwagon nicely. There was some great support from Terry and Bob, and a handful of numbers from John the owner that mixed up the night wonderfully. It was a lot of fun. We were all very relaxed and firing quite nicely. The kind of gig we love. Outside, loading the instruments it was -2c, and Mannie was almost sobbing, despite being wrapped up in his polar Scott of the Antarctic coat, genuine Sherpa ascent boots, World War Two bomber pilot sheepskin mittens and a rather fetching pair of arseless llama-pelt chaps.


John with Sarah and Bridge (and lots of tasty guitars)

Then it was back to Diamondvale, Dave & Trish’s incredible house for more drams and a wee sleep (with Mannie being acoustically isolated in the guest house of course). Wickedly comfortable beds with nice electric blankets.


Diamondvale.

2:12pm Somewhere north of Aratula
Back on the road again. After nomming a huge traditional musician breakfast of sausages, eggs, bacon toast and Coke, we’re once again on the chug. We have a few hours to get back to Brisbane to load the van before we head off down the coast for tonight’s gig at Harrigans. The iPod is still playing silly buggers, as we’re alternating between Neil Young, Dougie MacLean, the Police, Mark Knopfler, Pavarotti and Roxette. Funny, as I have no memory of ever putting Roxette on my iPod…

The Snowy Mountains of Music Festival. Just sounds exciting doesn’t it? And we certainly were excited to be involved in Dave De Santi’s new vision, the first ever festival to be held in the Snowy Mountains, on the opening weekend of ski season.

So once again we found ourselves at the airport, although at a new and strange time... no 5am flight! Woohoo! We flew in to Canberra (at night!) and were greeted by Sarah’s fantastic Grandad, and were instantly welcomed with some chicken soup (A Dorothy special made just for Mannie) and apple pie. What a welcome! Unfortunately it was a very quick stopover, as we had to be back at the airport the next day to await our bus to the snow.

We were surprisingly organised and arrived with plenty of time to spare (no comments please) so of course the bus was two hours late. After many coffees, and a great catch up with our good mate Enda Kenny (the people you find wandering around Canberra airport), we squashed onto the double-decker bus and were on our way. There was a brief lunch stop –and might I say the best impromptu deli picnic with Lindsay Martin and Enda, red wine, prosciutto, vintage Cheddar and all – then off we went. You could feel it getting colder as we got closer, and although we were separated on the bus, we were all nervously watching the time, as we were due on stage at 5pm and still seemed to be a long way off. We phoned ahead to say we were running a little late, to which Dave said ‘no problem’ and said we could just go on when we got there.  A big thanks to Bruce Mathiske who took our place on stage and performed superbly as usual! We ran on stage at the Smiggins Hotel (to Sair and my horror with no make-up and wearing jeans!) but had a blast and a great start to the festival.
 
Rockstars that we are, we had a quick dinner and found our accommodation, ready to snuggle in to our warm beds for an early night (of course after Mannie dragged his mattress into a snore-proof chamber). We woke up early the next morning, a little disappointed to find that there was still no snow, and headed off to Perisher in search of breakfast, coffee and our first gig at the festival opening.  We were greeted by Dave himself, arms full with a very welcome sight... a tray of butterscotch schnapps :) Yum! From this point on, we were hooked! The opening concert was great, very laid back and a glimpse at some of the entertainment still to come.  We ducked off for a quick grocery shop and then straight off to our next gig at Basil's Bar. We had a schnapps-sponsored gig and had a great time! Sair and I were surprised to catch up with an old friend, Liam Dorney, who we had both met during our pre-folk years at the Brisbane Regional Youth Orchestra (apparently we were there at the same time and had no idea!). Liam was now playing with the uber-cool Gold Coast band, A French Butler Called Smith, who we caught up with numerous times through the rest of the festival.

That night (still with no snow –but a definite drop in the temperature) we ventured up to watch our good friends Humbug, who were sounding as good as ever. We had a great singalong and very brief catch up before heading back to our Smiggins Chalet for a gourmet delight ala Paul. I love travelling with someone who can cook! We give him a sweet potato and some chicken and he whipped up beautiful curry (accompanied of course by the requisite $13 bottle of butterscotch schnapps). Thanks Paul!

Ok... now for the good stuff... SNOW!
 
Mannie came running in to our room pointing at the window (at arse-O'clock I might add). What an amazing sight! It had just started snowing lightly. I sat, glued to the window for about an hour (having never seen it snow before) and then decided we couldn’t possibly sit inside while this was happening outside. We got ready as quickly as possible, and then the others proceeded to watch me run around and take photos with a giant smile on my face. Sairey was just as excited and was willing to pose in a million photos with me (the boys having grown up in snowy weather were slightly less impressed with being asked to wait for photos every 3 steps). The rest of the festival was a bit of a blur. We had some more great gigs, more snow photos, more schnapps, catch ups and pics with the amazing Davidson Brothers, more schnapps, battling snow-covered roads with our fearless transporter Barney, watched a beautiful concert with Enda and Lindsay... and of course more photos and schnapps.

 

I will take a moment to describe one of the funniest parts of a festival in the snow. Our beloved Mannie. He alternated between grumbling, shivering and complaining (quite a sight with his beanie pulled down low and his giant army coat – thanks Bernie)... and then pretending to ski (highly entertaining and surprisingly he didn’t fall once!) and making snow angels. And of course the boys had an ongoing snow-ball fight every moment we were outside.

 

This was a truly amazing festival and one I will never forget! Despite the bus having some dramas on the trip back, we were still buzzing when we made it back to Sarah’s Grandparents' place for a couple of hours sleep and then you guessed it... back at the airport at 4.30am.

What is there to say about Wintermoon?
 
Could it be the lush tropical rainforest location and the deliciously relaxed surrounding areas?
 
Or maybe the gorgeous green eco-vibe that permeates every building, tent, stage and communal gathering area, from candles in the restrooms at night to Jenny Drake’s untamed chickens casually wandering the grounds to the organic freshly picked bananas in the Chai House every morning.
 
Or the talented, humble and inspiring musicians we met along the way and were so fortunate to share the stage with; people who, fuelled by cider, beer or nothing at all would happily natter about anything and everything while relaxing between gigs in the communal area behind the Lunar Stage. The entire weekend was peppered with conversations, jamming, rehearsals, and writing. Wintermoon is the first festival I have performed at where I have come away more relaxed than when I got there.
 
And what of the incredible people who organise this amazing festival and go out of their way to make you feel at home? So many were offered use of Jenny’s shower & use of her car to travel into Calen to buy supplies; sharing tables during meal times with beautiful people along the likes of Chris Cann, Ira from the Perch Creek Family JugBand & Campbell the gentle Swaggie; the amazing sound crew smiling through intense pressure to deliver the best sound for their tent with only ten minutes notice, while happy volunteers greeted me with a smile everywhere we met and then paid us the biggest compliment by dancing at our shows – this festival wouldn’t happen without all of you.
 
But mostly, to the festival attendees who allow us the opportunity to perform and share our passions with you. There are no words except thank you for your support!
 
Highlights for me, other than the ones described above and in no particular order were pulling Paul’s former bandmate and stunning singer Nadia Sunde up on stage to sing Dreams with us, catching every Barleyshakes gig (they ROCK), meeting Richard Kaal, the awesome guys from Swoon & Wishing Well, Bridge & I sharing songwriting tips with Enda Kenny, meeting S. Sean Tretheway and reading his wonderful book ‘The Roadless Traveller’, and relaxing in general – what a luxury!
 
The last Wintermoon concert featured JigZag, and in true folkie style, they pulled every available player (Bridge & I, Lindsay Martin, Erin from Barleyshakes, Richard Kaal, Sarah from Wishing Well, Campbell the Swaggie, Dave Flower, Jay Bishoff and Sally from Dev’lish Mary to name a few!) up to play some solos on a few songs. I shared a mic with Lindsay Martin, and it was brilliant! After we all performed on Stronger the Tree and One Love, the crowd decided we weren’t getting off that easy and demanded one last song for the finale. And what a song! We did crowd favourite ’30 Seconds of Happiness’, which featured scat singing, Aretha Franklin, fiddle solos and the best crowd participation I have ever witnessed.
 
What a remarkable ending to a wonderful weekend!
 

Listening to ‘Kindred’ by Swoon

It's official!

Wintermoon is one of those festivals that we’ve heard so much about but never actually been able to get to. It’s a smallish festival about an hour or so into the mountains near Mackay in Queensland, and despite the name, it’s pretty warm...

We had a nightflight up to Mackay, which meant one of those wonderful take-offs over Brisbane, then a quite mysterious bus ride out into the tropics courtesy of the magnificent Jim (who waited very patiently at the airport as we were quite delayed). We also got to meet the very cool and suave Ira from the Perch Creek Family JugBand


Have you ever seen Brisbane from a 737 at night? (sorry Mr Kelly)

So now I’m sitting here, on an old couch backstage, on the verandah of the chai house listening to the wonderful sounds of Dev’lish Mary. The acoustics are just incredible. If we were to ever record a live album I'd want the mics placed right here. Every nuance, strum, breath, I can hear it all.


The Chai House. Inside it's like an old, wonderful barn

Alas I have a bit of a whiskey head on me at the moment, the result of a rather late and most excellent evening of tunes, laugher, candlelight and half a bottle of Glen Morangie. Our performances are over, except for tonight’s finale where we’ll get up with everyone for one last hooley. It has been just a lovely experience. I wrote last time about my perceived differences in festivals, and rather than go over old ground, I’ll just say that Wintermoon has to be one of the nicest I’ve been to. Maybe it’s the tropical environment, but everything here runs at a lightly slower clock. We’ve actually had a lot of time to sit, talk and play with people (and work on some material for our new album and some special stuff for the joint gig with Jigzag in a couple of weeks). It’s a very recharging experience, and after the hectic start to the year, it’s almost been like a beautiful little time-out. 


The wash basin, complete with one of Jenny's Chickens (and yes we couldn't resist playing the tune!)

Except for the shows. They’re a mass of dancing, heaving bodies (often led by the ever-enthusiastic Alan Kelly from the great Barleyshakes). Saturday night’s show on the main stage was really grand, as what I thought was a low rumble through one of the mics actually turned out to be rain on the tarpaulins, not that that stopped anyone, in fact, it was almost as if a lot of folks had been waiting for just that moment to step out and dance dark in the rain.

One aspect of this festival that I really loved was that they fed us. Not because I'm a guts, but more because for three times a day, most of the musos and performers were brought together around the chai house. This was conducive to some very interesting conversations and no small number of impromptu jams over the truly wonderful food. It's something only a smaller festival could do (can you imagine the logistics behind say, Woodford, feeding 1500+ performers?), but it really made a difference to us.


The Amazing S. Sëan Tretheway holding court with his magic

Some other highlights:

Sarah being slightly tipsy and shining the torch into the sky and yelling, ‘Look at the size of that spider web!’ only for us to point out it was a powerline.

Having a wonderfully ambient pee in a spooky, candle-lit toilet then turning it into a drunken Phantom of the Opera reenactment (probably the sort of thing you had to be there for).

Chatting to Campbell the Swaggy (who actually lives here!). What an incredibly interesting and erudite man. He was nearly always asleep upright in a chair by the open fire in the Chai House, empty tea mug in his hand when I crept in for my very early morning coffee.


Sarah and Campbell

Having our dear friend Nadia Sunde singing with us on ‘Dreams’, then leading the early morning crowd on a few choruses.



Having the amazing Nahm paint a mural of our album art over alongside the other artists that have passed through.

Chatting to all the wonderful people who queued to buy a cd, then waited in the sun while we ran around looking for a signing pen.

Meeting too many new friends to mention here. Festivals have turned into these wonderful reunions for us now, and it's wonderful to be part of the family.

The final evening here was something very special, and I think I'll let Sarah write about that (I'm adding this little extra bit back home in Brisbane -I'm not psychic!). But here's a small taster of the final concert


Sarah and Bridget join in the brilliant finale

So, next stop, the Irish Club, then it’s the Jigzag gig (details on the Sunas Gigs page). The next festival is a bit of a contrast to this one. It’s in the snow...

Maybe I’ll finally get a chance to wear my velvet jacket!

Listening to: 'Insides' by Jon Hopkins

Yep, it’s my first National. I’ve been to Canberra before, and despite the uninspiring architecture and the reason for its existence (pollies), I’ve always quite enjoyed myself here. And of course we’re in autumn, so all the beautiful oaks, silver birches and maples are on the turn, something which I love (and makes me a bit homesick!). It’s still warm here during the day (and it’s that dry air that sneaks down from the mountains) but the nights are lovely and cool. It’s always a nice moment when I have to pull my big brown jacket out of the cupboard.

The thing I’m discovering about Australian folk festivals is that they all seem to have their own personalities, and that’s a very special thing. Woodford is a week long side-step into another realm, Port Fairy is a beautiful, gentle seaside adventure, and the Tasmanian ones are like coming home. A lot of people regard the National as the Festival, but that just depends on one’s perspective I think. So far (and I’m writing this very early on a Sunday morning with the infamous Canberra magpies chortling outside my window and a couple of day to go) it’s been great; intense, saturating, exciting, almost overwhelming.

We’ve had some moments. The gig at the Troubadour was wonderful, as it always is, and it was great to see a lot of familiar faces (as well as a many new ones) in the audience. Thank you to everyone that has come up and had a chat or bought a cd. I’m really not lying when I say it took us three hours to get from one end of the festival to the other because we were either stopped or had bumped into someone we knew. We have another gig at the Merry Muse this afternoon that we’re really looking forward to as well. We’re actually in quite good company here as ‘stealth’ performers who are not on the official program. Kavisha Mazella is here, half of our good mates the To’Rags, and John & Nic from Cloudstreet did a glorious set at the Troub last night (complete with John borrowing my guitar as he’d left his at home –it was quite surreal sitting in the audience watching)

But there have been down moments too.

Pierre Bensusan stole my shirt.

It’s true. We were both in the same shop trying on clothes and he took the last XXL (we are about the same height). Of course he did offer it to me first but who am I to refuse one of my truly lifelong inspirations (Pierre is probably the greatest master of DADGAD guitar tuning alive. This is a man that can effortlessly play jazz in any key in this tuning). In exchange for the shirt, I asked for a photo, but in his ineffably cool French accent, he said,

“Non.”

Unless he could have a picture with Sarah and Bridget first. For some reason the girls didn’t mind! And so it was that we ending up spending much of the first night wandering around with him shopping and introducing him to the now legendry Súnas ‘numpty shot’ (and a very special 'Numpty Gallery' is coming soon!).

The next evening, we bumped into Pierre sitting at a table in Central Park. While I went off to get us all a round of coffees (and the coffee here is most excellent) and meet Bridge, Sarah lingered. We returned to find the two of them jamming along to ‘My Lagan Love’, Pierre on his breathtaking Lowden, Sarah singing. Nano Stern and his lovely manager Brian joined us, the great David Hyams, and pretty soon the jamming was on for all. It was also great craic altogether to watch Sarah’s face as Nano and Pierre spoke to each other in delicious French/Spanish accents.

And so we get to my favourite part of the festival so far. Liz Frencham and her partner Steve wandered past, caught one look (and listen) of the table, stopped, Liz said, “I am SO getting my bass!” and hared off to the lockup. I just cracked up! What followed was one of the most eclectic sessions I’ve ever experienced, everything from Liz’s originals to Etta James.



Wish you could have been there. It was grand.

Learning a new tune while waiting for the festival bus.

The support crew at Port Fairy very kindly arranged for a car to take us the 25kms to Warrnambool station, where we’d get a train into Melbourne central to meet with the bus that would ferry us to the airport where we would pick up the hire car that we’d drive to the Burke & Wills festival in Mia Mia. It was a bit more of a palaver than it should have been because it was a public holiday, but I had a nice rock and roll moment chugging through the streets of Melbourne in a bus with my instruments. Don’t ask me what it was exactly, but I’ve always wanted to see Melbourne and to be there after a great festival on the way to another one was quite a nice feeling.

The drive from Melbourne to the Burke & Wills Festival north of Melbourne was an eye-opener for me.
 
I, like most of Australia and people around the world had watched the news reports in horror and disbelief on the bushfire tragedies in Victoria. It was one thing to watch on TV, but it was quite another to be confronted with the aftermath driving through the Victorian landscape to Andrew Pattison’s winery. No-one said how dry the land is. Parched, brown, dusty grass. At times I likened it to the surface of the moon and this was even before we saw what the fire had done.
 

 
Enormous stretches of blackened trees with orange leaves. It was quite surreal. We had heard reports of a fire headed towards Andrew & Heather’s winery but thankfully the firefighters contained the blaze. Victorians have assured me that once some decent rains fall it’s astonishing how quickly things green up again, and I hope this happens quickly for them.
 
Soon after we arrived a gorgeously healthy dinner was served (by healthy I mean salad, grilled zucchini, roast potatoes & grilled chicken breast, but these were leftovers according to Andrew. It was wonderful!) and Bridget & James Fagan decided to have a photographer snap-off, eg, Bridget took a photo of James while he was taking a photo of Paul & I taking photos of ourselves. Musicians are mental, no explanations are required:
 

 
After witnessing a spectacular sunset and full moon rising simultaneously, we were onstage performing.
 

 

Look closely and you can see the full moon!
 
The only downside to this gig was that Mannie wasn’t with us as he headed back to Brisbane for work earlier that morning. Still, it went pretty well. I have noticed that when we perform my song, ‘Drink Up Me Boys’ the audience tends to become rather teary, so I have now decided that this song requires a disclaimer that tissues may be required.  As we had completely sold out at Port Fairy we unfortunately had no CDs to sell, however Bridget found a lone one buried in her suitcase and Andrew graciously offered to donate his own copy to sell, so we actually sold two. Big thanks to Martin Pearson who manned the merchandise table and sold our two CDs!
 
We then proceeded to have one of the most magical, intimate and memorable evenings I have experienced in a long time. I am giving my personal detailed opinion of each of the performers here, as a broad opinion simply would not do them justice. With glasses of wine, lovely lighting and an audience of 30 or so, I had the absolute pleasure of watching Irish folk singer Enda Kenny, who literally had us all spellbound with his achingly beautiful songs & stunning melodies. His performance was so pure and honest that I decided to buy his albums two songs into his set.
 

 
Enda was ably followed by Nancy Kerr & James Fagan, performing in their element and absolute best form. Nancy’s current songs written while staying in Australia for the past few months are the finest I’ve heard from this incredible duo thus far, and I can’t *wait* to hear the album that captures these. ‘Sweet Peace’ and ‘Queen of the Water’ are still rolling around in my head; testament to Nancy’s songwriting ability and their ability to consistently perform and deliver.
 

 
After Nancy & James was Nano Stern from Chile. There is nothing more endearing for an audience member than watching a talented performer crack jokes and charm the pants off you in your own language. Nano decided to play a softer set than usual and concentrated on beautiful South American folk songs. He may have been singing in Spanish, but we all knew exactly what he was saying. A wonderfully earthy performance by a mesmerising guitarist and singer (who also plays a mean harmonic flute!).
 

 
Martin Pearson rounded the night off by performing songs cabaret style. I had fun watching him – he truly loves to sing, and does a brilliant job. Martin was backed by Alex Legg and Chris Pain, accomplished musicians themselves on guitar and harmonica. The evening progressed into a mad drinking session and telling of odd and peculiar tour stories with more than a few sore heads at breakfast the following morning!
 
We spent the night in Killara, a huge B&B just down the road that Andrew had booked out just for the artists and hit the road the next morning back to Brisbane and the mundane world of phone calls, trash emails, junk mail and preparing for St Pats.

Huge thanks to Andrew and Heather for inviting us to play at this amazing festival, putting us up and generally looking after everyone. It was a fantastic night and we felt so privileged to be a part of it.

For us, the Port Fairy Folk Festival started in true rock and roll style; getting into trouble at Brisbane airport at 4am.
 
When we fly, Mannie and I have to check the guitar and bouzouki into the over-sized baggage area (long gone are the days of carrying our treasures onboard with us). Before the instruments disappear down the conveyer, they’re checked for explosives. A yawning security officer swabbed Mannie’s zouk and the machine started beeping. Nonplussed, he did another swab and again, the machine went  nuts (I nearly wrote ‘ballistic’ there but that would’ve been a really crap joke!). On the third time it came through clean, and the guard explained they’re sometimes twitchy in the mornings. I guess machines need coffee too. But then as we went through the personal gate, Mannie was singled out for the search, and once again the swabs turned up positive. By now, we were wondering if perhaps it was something he worked with to do with carpentry, and were getting worried, but again, after a couple more runs it came through clean. The security people didn’t seem bothered in the slightest, but it was fairly amusing to me as the officer had a strong Russian-style accent, and there was Mannie with his Belfast brogue…
 
We caught the Port Fairy bus with a bunch of other similarly tired-looking musos including most of Shooglenifty (whom we seem to always bump into no matter where we are) and settled in for the 5-hour long, flat, brown bus ride. Thank heavens for iPods and airport novels!
 
Port Fairy is an utterly gorgeous town. Streets tunnelled by huge Norfolk pines, old kooky-looking buildings, the sea… It’s just lovely. It reminded us a little of Ross in Tasmania, except with the ocean. The festival itself is huge. The whole town gets involved, and for one weekend of the year this affluent sleepy seaside town is transformed utterly. The festival encompasses the town, using local venues, the main street, the surf club, church halls etc, with the central festival area taking over the vast sports/cricket ground. This part of the festival is separate, as it contains the paid venues, and it’s a bit like a country fair; big tents, stalls, performers etc, but the genius here is there’s a lot of free entertainment outside of the main event. Someone told me the tickets for this festival sell out so fast, they’re done through a lottery system. Judging by the great crowds, I’d believe it. The concert venues are great, and the organisers really go to town decorating the stages (something other festivals might want to take on board as some of the venues really did look special). The biggest of the tents looks like something out of Cirque de Solei and is really massive.
 
We were put up by the wonderful John & Del, in a very cosy B&B style environment. Beds were made mysteriously while we were gone, and chocolate biccies and tea bags were magically replenished. It was grand.
 
So, five gigs in four days. As this was our first time performing in Victoria, we really had no idea how we’d go, especially as there was a strong Celtic contingent including the aforementioned Shoogles, Nancy & James Fagan, Seamus Begley & Jim Murray, Alan Kelly, Colcannon and more.
 
We were just overwhelmed by the response.







Our first gig inside the festival was so packed the MC had to come on halfway through and ask everyone to move in more. This brings me to a wonderful festival institution called the Port Fairy Shuffle. Most of the venues have very minimal seating, and patrons are encouraged to bring their own chairs (the small baby deckchair things –there’s a height restriction). This sounds clumsy, but it works very well, as for gigs like the Shoogles or The Waifs, there’s always lots of good dancing room. When asked, the whole seated audience will shuffle over to make more room. It’s quite something to behold. No grumbling, complaints, people just do it. It’s also quite odd to see folks wandering around with deck chairs slung over their shoulders. I doubt it would work somewhere like Woodford, because of the heat, but in temperate Western Vic, it works a treat! After the gig, we’re allowed to sell our cds from the side of the stage (there is also a well-stocked shop).  From an artist point of view this is brilliant because it’s immediate, and despite what I thought, it didn’t get in the way of the next performer at all. After that gig, we had a queue across the floor for cds. Now this is my only negative about the weekend, but really it’s an amazing thing. We sold out of cds by the third day. I packed an entire caseload, and each of us had a load stuffed into bags. But hey, that’s a brilliant thing, and we ended up taking orders. I had an incredible moment, taking the last batch of cds into the store only to literally have them taken from in front of me one by one while I filled out the extra paperwork. By the time I had signed them in, they were gone.
 
The other wonderful ‘downside’ is that we are now very nearly sold out of our first pressing of albums. The second pressing will be delivered soon. It’s a very nice feeling!
 
We had the most amazing time. It’s an incredibly-well organised festival, and the support crews were just fantastic. Not once did we have a grumpy driver or an unhelpful person. In fact one of our drivers went out of her way to give us a guided tour of the town and the beautiful headland, and the crew even managed to organise a lift for us to Warrnambool on Monday, 25kms away (more about that and the Burke & Wills festival in another blog).  We got to see a lot of great acts (in addition to those already mentioned), including Lior, The brilliant Scared Weird Little guys (I nearly lost my coffee over the country singer skit), the Waifs, Gibb Todd, Mark Seymour, The Audreys, and the awesome Nano Stern from Chile.


And the coffee was great too, although being a bit cool in the mornings, the queues were often huge!
 
It was a smashing weekend, easily worth the 2am departure! But it wasn’t over yet, as on the Monday, we hopped a car, a train, a bus then a hire car and made it to the extremely intimate Burke & Wills festival…

The smashing Pirate Brides playing at the very last session of the
Madass Folk Club in Brisbane. We're short of something wonderful after
tonight...

We got this lovely email today:

Your Name: Confused

Your Email: (Was fake)

Subject: National?

Message: So, when you say you have a gig at the National, are you performing under a different name?  Because under the "complete list of acts and artists", I don't see Sunas.  Or perhaps you just mean you're going to the National as paying patrons?  You don't actually have a gig there do you?  It's just bignoting isn't it.  And you probably thought nobody would check.


Dear Confused,

We tried to reply to the email you left, but there must have been a typo as it was immediately bounced back 'Sender Unknown' (and the address was rather silly). So in the Súnas tradition of attempting to answer all mail, here's your reply:

"Wow, thank you 'Confused' for your message & in depth sleuthing. It's true, we're not listed to perform at the National Folk Festival on the official program or the "complete list of acts and artists".

But we are however, performing. The brilliant Andrew Pattison of the infamous Troubador tent fame has given us the opportunity to play a concert at the Troub (which is privately booked independently of the Festival Proper). As yet we don't know when or what time (this is why our performance times aren't up yet); we will be informed when we arrive at the National. Needless to say, we're utterly thrilled about this.

So in answer to your question, no, we're not going as paying patrons, although Sarah did last year & had a fantastic time and Bridget has been going for many years. Even if we were going as paying patrons we would still aim to perform blackboard concerts and do our best to advertise it on our website (which we will also be doing anyway) and on posters around the National festival, as we have many friends who would be keen to see us after we performed at the Canberra  Folkus Club last year. I don't seem to recall any Sunas blogs screaming that we're playing at the National, apart from our Gig listing. If artists are performing at the National, is it bignoting to list their gigs? If so, we're guilty as charged.

I hope this has helped clear things up. Thanks for spending your time checking up on this (and every other gig listed no doubt) and then spending the time to send such a nice email.

Yours, as always,

Súnas"