Kyuss, Mary Wilson and Smoke Fairies are turning up in town, tasty jazz names are arriving by the Coltrane load, Bristol Folk Festival’s back after 32 years, and avant-strand Elektrostatic’s birthing a festival of its own... who said it’s going to be a quiet year? Venue’s Music squad are on full alert. 

ROCK

Right, so, we’ve been poring over a decade’s worth of data and extrapolated the following: at 2.57pm on Thur 15 Sept, the last remaining BrisBath coffee shop/pub/bar not already attempting to lure in punters with promise of ‘live music tonite’ will unveil four breeze blocks, a 5’ x 3’ board of two-ply, and call it a ‘stage’. The same data suggests there’s a 12% chance the venue will also install a half-decent PA, sympathetic sound engineer, and even offer a token payment to the performers helping increase their takings.

Less hypothetically, the effects of Austerity Britain™ are set to leave their mark on this year’s Harbour Fest (29-31 July). For one thing, no fireworks. Instead, they’ll be saved to set off on the Downs on 5 Nov to mark the parkland’s 150th anniversary. Of more concern to music types, concerns over stewarding costs means that the stages will be closed down at 7pm. Plans are afoot to then shift the whole thing into central music venues a la BrisFest’s Rave On Avon (or, indeed, the ‘fringe’ element of recent Harbour Fests). While we’re in festival world, a couple more dates for your diary. Expect many a treat as Bath Fringe Fest celebrates its 30th anniversary from 27 May-12 June, and a big splatter of variable quality indie-leaning acts to hit Bristol on 28 May for Dot to Dot. Glastonbury Festival, meanwhile, will be run from 22-26 June, before taking a fallow year out in 2012. (Incidentally, all those stories – reported across the board as fact by a gullible media – that it won’t be running because of an Olympics-related portaloo shortage? Bollocks. Sharp-memoried readers will recall that, as far back as 2009, Mr Eavis was telling Venue all about his extensive plans to travel round the UK in the year off. Smart profile-raising PR, mind.)

A few upcoming gig highlights. And one low. On 27 June, Ashton Gate will welcome the return of Bon ‘We’re-successful-because-we-never-sold-out-what-time-are-we-playing-with-the-X-Factor-contestants-again?’ Jovi. Altogether more excitingly in rock-out world, and prompting a welter of “I always said they were better than Queens of the Stone Age” revisionism, the reformed Kyuss play the Academy on 6 Apr. Mary ‘Supremes’ Wilson at the Colston Hall on 11 Mar should clearly be filed under unmissable, likewise Joan As Police Woman’s return to Thekla on 5 Feb and the unutterably lovely Smoke Fairies at the Fleece three days earlier. Those with a ‘tomorrow’s stars today’ penchant should note that BBC Sound of 2011 poll-makers Esben and the Witch will be at the Louisiana on 31 Jan. Best confirmed Bath booking to date? The sweetly cooing/heavily riffing Japanese Voyeurs, dropping into Moles on Valentine’s night. (Julian Owen)

JAZZ/WORLD

New year, new programming and St George’s launches ‘Take The Coltrane’, an ongoing series celebrating the legacy of one of jazz’s true geniuses, starting with Andy Sheppard (13 Jan) and including Denys Baptiste Quartet (17 Feb) and, memorably, international post-bop sax star Joe Lovano’s US Five (29 Mar). There’s tasty jazz names at Colston Hall too, with bass legend Jack Bruce bringing The Ronnie Scott’s Blues Experience (18 Mar) as well as visits from Tim Garland’s excellent chamber jazz outfit Storms/Nocturnes (10 Apr) and the new quintet from very hip young pianist Kit Downes (23 Apr). Suave vocal diva Juliet Kelly comes to Chapel Arts Centre (19 Mar) and the venue will also welcome world-fusion guitarist Nicholas Meier in well-matched collaboration with inspirational saxman Gilad Atzmon (20 May). And, of course, Bristol’s Future Inns jazz club continues to offer regular treats, including Loop collective’s Ivo Neame Quartet (9 Jan), Mike Westbrook’s Village Band (23 Jan) and the aforementioned Gilad Atzmon. appearing, this time, with cool vocalist Sarah Gillespie (13 Feb). On the world music front, keep your diary free for spell-binding vocal traditionalists Lo Cor De La Plana (St George’s, 24 Feb), Balkan dynamos Moishe’s Bagel (Chapel Arts, 27 Feb) and Malian megastar Baaba Mal (St George’s, 21 Mar) as well as Colston Hall favourites Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club (featuring ace singer Omara Portuondo, 9 Apr), Ladysmith Black Mambazo (25 May) and another African Soul Rebels tour (19 Apr) with Nigerian beatmaster Seun Kuti and the legendary Egypt 80 band headlining. (Tony Benjamin)

ROOTS/COUNTRY

Roots music looks set to have a bumper year in 2011 with acoustic music of many styles gaining in popularity. The really big news for the forthcoming year is the return of a Bristol Folk Festival after a gap of 32 years. A full three-day event to be held over the May Day bank holiday weekend, the festival will take place in the various venues within the Colston Hall complex. Artists already confirmed include Show of Hands, Seth Lakeman, Bellowhead, Irish band Dervish and the hugely popular West Country shanty singers Fishermen’s Friends. All the other regular festivals (Chippenham, Priddy, Trowbridge Village Pump etc) are set to go ahead as are The Gloucester Cajun & Zydeco Festival at the end of January and The Cheltenham Folk Festival in early February. More unusually, The Intervarsity Folk Dance Festival, a celebration of folk dance in many styles, takes place at the Students’ Union in Bristol in late February. A wide range of great acts are already booked into the region’s venues, including songwriter Richard Thompson (Jan), US bluegrass band Special Consensus (Jan), legendary folk rockers Fairport Convention (Feb), ace guitarist Martin Simpson (Feb), Steeleye Span (Mar), John Renbourn & Robin Williamson (April) and Australian guitarist Tommy Emmanuel (Apr). On a more local note, Bristol band Spiro play Colston Hall’s Hall 2 in February, while the same month sees the launch of a new album from the amazing Scoville Units. (Tony Slinger)

CLASSICAL

Ah, those cuts! Last year Bath Festival went on a diet, slimming its timeline to 12 days; this year Cheltenham follows suit. But Bath and Cheltenham are evidently doing the ‘Atkins’, with protein-rich offerings promising themes Celtic, Russian Orthodox, Civil Rights and Latin American (Bath 25 May-5 June) and percussion meets ‘doing the maths’ (Cheltenham 29 June-10 July). Wolfi continues to provide the starting point for Bath Mozartfest (11-19 Nov), and the same month St George’s Bristol dips a toe in festive waters with the first in a biannual festival of Music from the Natural World. Other worlds ‘natural’ to the St George’s habitat include a Paul Lewis Schubert cycle which opens on 4 Feb, the English Concert (15 Feb) takes a stroll with ‘Mr Corelli in London’, and the OAE is in strictly ‘classical’ cahoots with Artur Pizarro (28 Apr). New departures include residencies by Charles Hazlewood’s Army of Generals, the ground-breaking Aurora Orchestra (starting in Oct) and an Elias String Quartet ‘Approaching Beethoven’ series which carries on into 2012. Down the hill the BSO promises Mahler’s most enigmatic symphony, the 7th (3 Mar), the Bolshoi Symphony tantalises with Tchaikovsky and Prokoviev (18 May), and Elektrostatic spawns its first festival (8-10 May) including New York ensemble Eighth Blackbird. Operatically, WNO proposes a feel-good ‘Fledermaus’ and ‘Trovatore’ revival (Bristol Hippodrome 30 Mar-2 Apr), Opera Project dishes out the hankies with ‘La Boheme’ at Tobacco Factory (11-22 Oct), and at Iford (17 June-13 Aug), ‘Don Giovanni’ – a man who knows a thing or two about choice cuts of his own (ask the Commendatore!) – cruises the cloister in the company of ‘Hansel and Gretel’ and Handel’s ‘Rodelinda’. Plenitude or what? (Paul Riley)
 

Copyright Julian Owen, Tony Benjamin, Tony Slinger, Paul Riley 2011

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