Solo

traditional English song and beyond

 

Ian has performed in folk clubs, folk festivals, schools, cathedrals,  historical buildings, on radio and on TV. He has been an accompanist for singers, played in bands and in duos, but is most known as a solo performer. 

 

Traditional songs and tunes are played on a range of differently tuned guitars, with an occasional early instrument (see below), lap dulcimer or fretted fiddle. His songs are drawn largely from the English tradition, punctuated with traditional Irish, American and modern folk songs, morris dance tunes and the beautiful melodies of Turlough O’Carolan. Ian makes a point of searching out songs no one else is singing, either long-forgotten treasures or a version that was left behind when its nephew became ‘standard’.

 

For early music (mediaeval, renaissance and baroque) Ian plays period stringed instruments — oud, gittern, lutes, renaissance cittern and renaissance guitar — usually as one half of early music duo The Night Watch.