Latest Festival Flyer update from Cropredy
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‘A Fan History Of Fairport Convention’
We’re delighted to announce the publication later this year of a new history of Fairport Convention – as told by the fans. We want to hear your Fairport memories – how you discovered the band, the records you’ve bought, the shows you’ve been to, the songs you love most and the landmark moments in your life that are somehow linked to Fairport Convention. If you are writing about a particular concert, please include the date of the show if you can. And we’d love to see your photographs too, whether that’s pictures of your memorabilia, of you and your friends – or of the band!
The best stories will appear in print and the book’s editor will acknowledge receipt of every story. Please send your memories to fairportfanbook@gmail.com.
The fan history of Fairport Convention will be published by Spenwood Books in November 2022.
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Fairport’s Cropredy Convention Official page
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28 Responses
What an absolutely delightful idea!
Great idea. You are part of our individual and collective history
When is the deadline?
Simon, is it now I request that you buy my silence lol?
As most of my ‘tales’ would revolve around professional engagements, I guess that doesn’t really fit the criteria and revelation would constitute betrayal 🤣
I’d love to see photos from the very early festivals
Oh my God…I’ve Just bought Peggy’s Book, Richard’s Book and 2 Fairport bios…Thanks for easter holidays soon😂😂
Great idea. That gives me something to write as I sit here in hospital recovering from a little incident. I’m listening to FC of course!
What happens at Cropredy stays at Cropredy 😂😂😂 Teddy Ashby Cat Dickerson Rachel Whitrow Jennifer Ashby Daniel Ashby
Farnham probably 1986 there was a 23 minute version of Sloth – afterwards Simon said “I got carried away, and when I get carried away the rest of the band go to Mars.”
Simon Nicol it was far to late in the evening and far too much beer had been taken to establish the absolute facts, but somewhere in the annals of time I seem to remember somebody issuing a rather effective headbutt to some unappreciative oik before our dear departed friend Cuttsy unceremoniously ejected said oik from the bar of the White Bear….. Or was that a dream?
First time:Full House tour, Sheffield City Hall.
Memory: Cropredy watching The Incredible String Band whilst standing with Peggy and Robert Plant, discussed the merits of the band, we all agreed that it was great to see them again.
Favourite song: Has to be Golden Glove as Julia and I fell in love to it. However have a real feeling for the live version of Watt Tyler from the Cropredy Box.
Memory:Playing skittles with you all after winning the Cropredy raffle. Think it was the last time you were able to do this. Peggy and I got smashed afterwards and rnded up singing hymns!
Cheers
Rich
at Cropredy with baby in arms and the TV news camera caught us and when they introduced the short piece said ” and this Festival appeals to the young and old” zoom in to close up of us both…Daughter now a folk dance caller in own right!!
Cropredy really does cater for everyone. One of my highlights was The Blockheads in 2011. I danced through the whole set and made an idiot of myself but I don’t care 😂
Just glad smart phones didn’t exist in the early days!! Jane Curtis Phil Curtis Jeremy McNaughton Judy Stocker 😂😂😂😂
Even tales on Simon Nicol giving compliments & being a little flirtatious?! 🤣🥰💕😊
First discovered at a Jethro Tull convention in Worcester with the tag line where ferrets eat lard after buying Cropredy 25th anniversary double cd. Later worked for a Bob Pegg on the Isle of Wight who claimed to be Peggy’s brother. He was about 6′ 8′ tall and had 6 sugars in his tea. Never had the balls to ask Peggy if this was true even while discussing the condition of the Guinness at Ryde Theatre on the Island. Loved Alice Cooper with my young son saying if this is folk music then I’m In.
Not quite band story but back in the mists…Simon and David Swarbrick were playing The Rockingham Arms in Wentworth village for Rob Shaw.
At some point I took our two artistes for a curry at The Slamma (Islamabad) in Attercliffe Sheffield. The following day swarb called Rob to say he’d enjoyed the gig….and the curry. He did however mention he’d burned his fingers wiping his arse….
Hi Guys! Hope you’re all well👋👋👋
Oh I went to cropredy festival every single year from the age of 2 (1986) until 26 and loved every single one of them! Thr most memorable other than being a kid and playing on the inflatables and the big dice was my last age 26 when I nearly died I was stung by a wasp on arrival went into anaphylactic shock ambulanced to hospital but made it back in time for the evening still to see fairport play!
My first meeting with the Band took place back in 1973. I was following a musical program on SWISS TV, entitled MATCH BOX, in which new singers and above all groups of various kinds were proposed. The Incredible String Band- Pentangles etc etc. and eventually I happened to listen to Fairport Convention nine line-up. It was like an electric shock. Always a fan of the Beatles handle I found myself blown away. This Band had something different, magical for me. The first song was POLLY ON THE SHORE and it left a mark on me as if it were ZORRO’s sword. In the following weeks, two more songs were also broadcast: The Examshire Lass and The Brillancy Medley. The video is also present in the 1987 VCR IT ALL COMES ‘ROUND AGAIN. So I start my spasmodic search of all the discography produced by the band and in the end, my perseverance and determination was rewarded. It was very difficult to find the various LPs in Italy in those years but I had many friends and working acquaintances in England and thanks to them I succeeded. However, I had to wait until 1979 – during the Farewell tour to be able to attend one of their concerts. On 25 July 1979 – in Milan – Vigorelli Stadium – there were 10,000 people and I also have the recordings of that concert. Two hours with another of the line-ups that I loved the most. The last two LPs (the Bonny Bunch and Tipplers Tales) had thrilled me a lot. I decided to go and see them in 1981 at Broughton Castle in Banbury and it was on that occasion that I met Peggy personally. I began to have a good correspondence and telephone contact and the following year it was like a great return among friends. In 1983 I managed together with other fans to combine a couple of dates in Milan and I think I was present until 2012 at all their Italian concerts near my area. I have many memories with both SWARB and MAART to whom I lent my Martin guitar in 2004 because his guitar broke on the plane – thank you Simon for asking me to introduce them to the 2007 TOUR to briefly tell their story – thank you Peggy who he always replied and sent me material. I have so many things to tell but I want to reiterate just one: Without Fairport my life would certainly have been different. They have always kept me company making me feel among friends. Ciao from Italy Maximo 😃
Just sent mine in.. 😊👍
OMG……Where to begin !! I could probably write my own book !!
I have to blame Dave Trivett who dragged me along, somewhat reluctantly to my first Cropredy festival somewhere in the late nineties, I danced in the rain to Richard Thompson and cried my eyes out to Meet On The Ledge (which I still do to this day) and have been back every year since.
I am lucky enough to work at the festival with the awesome Bounty Crew and couldn’t imagine not being in the field with the sign crew…
What a privilege… Thank you
Simon Nicol’s sharing of this post suggests he wants the more “interesting” stories, so here goes. I call it “The Day We Almost Had Fairport’s Groupies”.
In the early 90s I was a grad student at Oxford and had become very involved in the vibrant Oxford folk scene of the time. A number of us, usually at least 15 musicians and singers in any given week, played weekly folk sessions at the Temple Bar on Sunday afternoons and evenings, and there was a large crowd of regulars who loved to listen who were there every week. One Sunday lunchtime, two young ladies we hadn’t seen before turned up. Most people who weren’t regulars who wandered in ignored the music but these two ladies sat there listening intently, applauding after each song or tune. After it had gone on for around 3 hours, one of them shyly approached one of our number as he bellied up to the bar for another beer and said, “So what do you do with Fairport Convention?” Apparently they had heard some sort of story that FC held an open rehearsal at the pub every Sunday and somehow thought we were them. Sadly, the guy they asked was newly married and was at the stage where marriage is hot and cold running sex. He immediately told them that there was a mistake, and nobody in the bar was a member of FC. They left so fast they looked like they had been shot out of a cannon. When our friend got back from the bar we asked him what he had said to make them flee. When he told us, we were saying, “Are you serious? All you had to do was tell a little white lie and we could have taken Fairport’s groupies home!”The sequel took place a few weeks later when Fairport played the Apollo Theater in Oxford. A few of us went to the bar across the street before the concert and ran into a few of the band. Their reaction to the story was remarkable (“We have groupies? Where? Are they in here now? Can you point them out?”). Good times.
Being on the cover of In Real Time is a memory to last all my life. Such an amazing weekend.
Even got a wave off Peggy in Banbury centre.
I don’t have email ..but I found out about them as some of the band used Mary Wincotts tea room in Banbury ( she also lived just outside Croperdy ) and so went to the festival when they started .. and Dave moved to the village next to where I lived and he road around on a little Kawasaki dirt bike I had a triumph Bonneville and work at the garage he used so we talked bikes .. got to meet the very funny Billy Connolly when he came to compare the festival and stayed with the Peggs … Just part of growing up .. then later in life my oldest girl was at school with daughter of another member of the band ..
First time I saw you guys was at an acoustic gig at the The Mill, Mansfield in November 2005. Been hooked ever since
The newish St Davids Hall in Cardiff in 82. The band signed my double LP ( from A&M with a photo of Stonehenge on the Cover) and Swarb said “l don’t remember us doing this one”,🙂. Talking with Simon at Cropredy in 2012,, he remembered the green dressing rooms.
Will send my memories to the Link🙂