Fairport Convention

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Fairport Convention

Folk rock band

After virtually creating the British folk rock form in the late 1960s, Fairport Convention proceeded to establish itself as an institution in the genre. During an era when many British bands were exploring blues sounds, Fairport Convention looked to the folk scene in England and North America for inspiration. In 1989, founding member Simon Nicol was quoted by Greg Kot in the Chicago Tribune as reflecting, “We weren’t into the ‘moptop’ or Mersey-beat sound; we wanted something with more meat on it. We also wanted to get away from the 12-bar [blues] format and into something more melodic.”

The result was a fusion of rock instrumentation and traditionally-influenced songwriting that made the group stand apart. Having passed the 30-year mark—after suffering a frequently changing lineup, but only one official breakup—the band released the album Who Knows Where the Time Goes in 1997, and continued to headline an annual folk festival in Cropredy, England.

The band was formed in 1966 by Nicol on guitar, Ashley Hutchings on bass, Richard Thompson on guitar, Martin

For the Record…

Members include Martin Allcock (born January 5, 1957, Manchester, England), guitar, electric bouzouki; Sandy Denny (born January 6, 1947, London, replaced Dyble), vocals; Jerry Donahue (born September 24, 1946, New York City, replaced Thompson, 1972), guitar; Judy Dyble (born February 13, 1949), vocals; Shaun Frater , drums; Ashley Hutchings (born January 26, 1945, London, England), bass; Martin Lamble (born August 28, 1949, London, replaced Frater, 1966), drums; Chris Leslie (replaced Allcock, 1997), violin, mandolin, and bouzouki; Trevor Lucas (born December 25, 1943, Bungaree, Australia, replaced Thompson, 1972), guitar; Dave Mattacks (born March of 1948, Edgware, Middlesex, England, replaced Lamble, 1969), drums; Ian Matthews (born 1946, Lincolnshire, England), vocals; Simon Nicol (born October 13, 1950, London), guitar; Dave Pegg (replaced Hutchings), bass; Bruce Rowlands , drums; Ric Sanders , violin; Dave Swarbrick (born April 5, 1947, London), violin; and Richard Thompson (born April 3, 1949, London), guitar.

Group formed in London, 1966; released its first single “If I Had a Ribbon Bow,” 1967; debut album Fairport Convention, released 1968; other albums include History of Fairport Convention, 1972; A Bonny Bunch of Roses, 1977; Moat on the Ledge, (live album), 1982; Red and Gold, 1989; Jewel in the Crown, 1995; and The Cropredy Box, 1998; officially disbanded, 1979; held a successful reunion concert, sparking new fan interest and led to the founding of the annual Cropredy Folk Festival in England, which they have played at each year, 1980; released first new album since disbanding seven years earlier, 1986.

Addresses: Record company —Woodworm Records, P.O. Box 37, Banbury, Oxfordshire OX16 8YN, England.

Lamble on drums, and Judy Dyble and Ian Matthews, vocals. They named themselves after Nicol’s parent’s home, “Fairport,” where they rehearsed. The fledgling group’s musical influences included Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell. Fairport Convention’s first single, “If I Had a Ribbon Dow,” was released in 1967; it had been recorded previously by Maxine Sullivan in 1936. After performing on the “underground” circuit in London, the group was more prominently showcased at London’s Saville Theatre in 1968, performing with Procol Harum. Several months later, the group released its first album, Fairport Convention. The recording included original material and several Joni Mitchell covers.

Traditional Folk

Shortly after the album’s release, Dyble left the band, to be replaced by Sandy Denny, a singer with a folk background. The switch coincided with the group’s increased use of English folk elements, which were heard on their second album, What We Did On Our Holidays. The new direction displeased Matthews, who quit the band after having only worked on one of the album’s tracks. Amid a growing contemporary-versus-traditional debate, the band lost drummer Lamble in a traffic accident. In May of 1969, the band’s van crashed, killing Lamble and Thompson’s girlfriend. After canceling a proposed U.S. performance at the Newport Folk Festival that summer, the band completed Unhalfbricking, their first recording to appear on the British “hit” charts. Featuring covers of Bob Dylan tunes, the album also included the work of fiddler Dave Swarbrick, who subsequently became a full-fledged member.

Drummer Dave Mattacks joined Fairport Convention on the album Liege & Lief, on which six of eight tracks were traditional folk tunes. Both Hutchings and Denny were unhappy with the band’s artistic focus, with Hutchings leaning to the traditional side and Denny preferring more contemporary music. Both left the band in 1970. Denny was not replaced, but bassist Dave Peggjoined the group. When Thompson left the band in 1971 to pursue a solo career, it left Nicol as the last remaining founding member. In later years, a number of former members would rejoin or make reunion appearances; and after some 20 years, 20 different members had belonged to the band. Denny and Thompson left perhaps the most important legacies behind them—Denny for leading the band further into folk music and Thompson for his jazzinspired style of guitar playing. Kot remarked that Thompson was viewed as “the Coltrane of rock guitar.”

Cropredy Tradition

In 1979, Fairport Convention officially disbanded, but only a year later gave its first “reunion” concert. Nicol told Kot, “More people showed up for [the first reunion show] than the farewell gig.” The program became an annual tradition, and grew into the largest folk festival in Europe. Called the Cropredy Folk Festival, the show is held in Cropredy, England, a village known for being the site of a 1644 civil war battle. It hosts as many as 15, 000 Fairport Convention fans each summer. The program is unusual because it is shaped by the whims of Fairport Convention members. Nicol described the show to Kot as “an orgy of self-indulgence” where the band plays as long as it wants and invites whomever it likes to perform.

The reunion concerts led to a more permanent recreation of Fairport Convention in 1986, when Mattacks, Pegg, and Nicol decided they wanted to create some new music together. They recorded the album Gladys’Leap and toured with Jethro Tull as “Fairport Friends” with new members Martin (a.k.a. Maartin) Allcock on keyboards and Ric Sanders on violin. In 1989, the quartet recorded Red & Gold, a collection of story songs that frequently shared political themes. The title track was Ralph McTell’s imagined account of the previously mentioned battle at Cropredy. In a review for Rolling Stone, David Fricke praised Red and Gold, saying “the astute choice of tunes, full-bodied arrangements and delicious [guitar] picking … sound like the work of a Fairport half—nay a fifth —its age.” He further noted that it was the first Fairport Convention album that didn’t “beg comparisons” with work from the Thompson-Denny era, but rather stood on its own merits.

Where the Time Goes

In 1989, the video It All Comes ’Round Again provided a documentary look at the first 22 years of the band’s existence. The title repeated a line from the band’s 1968 song, “Meet on the Ledge.” The production included interviews with band members, clips from television performances and concerts, and the only known footage of Denny performing. Writing for Video, John Walker deemed the film “both a fan’s dream and a stellar example of musical documentary,” with its greatest asset being its uncut and rarely seen archival material.

For the 1995 release of Jewel in the Crown, the Fairport Convention roster repeated that of Red and Gold: Simon Nicol, Dave Pegg, Dave Mattacks, Ric Sanders, and Martin Allcock. Because none of the members considered themselves songwriters, this quartet looked outside the band for songs and did so quite successfully. Like the band’s previous recording, their selections for Jewel in the Crown often addressed political issues. Mike Joyce commented in the Washington Post that Jewel in the Crown showed “an impressive level of songcraft that never flags.” He also found that “true to form, the band’s melding of folk and rock styles often seems as natural as its wit, charm and bite.”

By the end of the decade, the band had adopted an almost exclusively acoustic performance format, and in early 1998 Mattacks decided to leave in order to pursue other projects. Chris Leslie had replaced Allcock the prior year, playing a variety of instruments including violin, mandolin, and bouzouki. With the 1997 release of Who Knows Where the Time Goes, Fairport Convention marked 30 years since its first recording. The band’s longevity—in one form or another—is certainly remarkable, as is its lasting contribution to rock music. As Fricke noted, “Having plugged into one tradition, Fairport unwittingly created another, siring a nation of electric folk bands.” Fricke went on to characterize the band’s impact on contemporary music as “the small but significant way that Fairport Convention changed rock & roll.”