RIP

In the midst of Covid (but not from) we also lost dear friend performer John Francis who had been a critical part of many realms of performances through the years including The Supper Club in early 2000s and Brigalow/ Tamarisque since the 90s. We miss him dearly! Lavinia from Frances Folk Gathering here with John & I – pic from 2005!

Change in the air

There really has been quite a gear change of sorts of course this year. Some time to sit on the porch and ponder life, time to hang with the grandkids & daughters (we had a wedding during Feb for the youngest), time to take in a few newer and older friends as distance allowed or as in SA, simply felt more confidently at ease for.
Even some mini folk gatherings around campfires despite some curly -6 degree temps at the time! Let alone helping assorted friends and ah – Tuning/ Fixing pianos to “some” degree!! Usually ones trad Tuners won’t touch lol.
See here with Tony Schick here also well entrenched with his “operated” hand!

So I felt, in lieu of the usual touring, (on Covid pause) and the originally planned post fires “free” tour for the sooo hammered south east coast, another approach was to take this kinda forced “long service leave” gap, to put together a collection from the videos folks had offered me from concerts I’d made through the years, which were in my patiently waiting hard drives! Well I’ve made the extensive Totally Gourdgeous & Supper Club DVDs through the years so I’m always plenty keen to explore the medium ever further!

However I do also have a plan to head to the south east corner of mainland Oz during August and do a visit/ catch up tour with my dear partner Sharn Rocco,

To Give !

– an extensive Youtube Library of the last years of diverse performances !
You won’t have been able to see all of them so …

Andrew Clermont’s recent you-tube world to share
versus the earlier years here featuring more Totally Gourdgeous and Dya Singh World Tours

Here I have sorted into various themes or groupings, from some captured House/ Hall Concerts, to the fairly detailed years of my Supper Club Concert weeks at Tamworth.
There is also an extra listing under the Golden Fiddle Awards Youtube site (filmed at The Capitol Theatre, Tamworth), which not surprisingly gained a certain cross-pollination from The Supper Club, as well, for the 14 piece or more across stage pieces & finales! In fact another near fifty vids herein!
In total I’ve put up around 150 Youtubes !! From short stabs of how some “projects’ went, through to over
hour long concert captures ! Huge thanks to Jude Heytman and Peter Cooke for a rather large slice of them!
The latter include the Apostle String Band Tours (captured at Tamworth/ Calala’s Enrec Studio) which I took almost everywhere in the October/ Novembers of the last years –

– here The Apostle Tour with Pete Fidler/ Paul Wookey/ James Gillard/ & tall self
(also included Rod Coe, Lawrie Minson (who feature in the Videos) & Paddy Montgomery)
Then there was this last summer’s story filled Bluegrass – Made in Taiwan (25 year re-union) which did a brief but intensive MountainGrass Festival (VIC) to Moruya (NSW) to Wirrina Bluegrass (SA) lap last

November including Jenny Lester from BC Canada plus Aron Maclean & Jack Melbourne – here at Sussex Inlet House Concert NSW – yay! Ronnie & Sue’s place.

Thankfully I found what was about the last concert I did with Cellist extraordinaire Rachel Johnston, “All Corners Covered” at Rose Sexton’s house ala Mt Beauty. We were in fine form indeed!

There are also a few most recent captures with Goldheist (Hester Fraser) on Piano & stellar songs & voice from Sussex Inlet House Concert (thanks Ronnie & Sue) through to within the wondrous
Blanche Cave – Limestone Caves @ Naracoorte (below)! Plus a few grabs with BluGuru let alone a most surprising archive of this year’s Supper Club which long time fan/ friend Judy Heytman collected patiently (30 hours), which I then distilled/ cherry picked and then some quite artfully edited into clips of feeling like you are right there if in fact not lost in a dream too!

So I do heartily hope you will avail yourself to the library of Vid Clips/ Films to get a sense of not missing out! Plus a chance to see the larger or more ornate version of everyone’s collaborations through these creative years!
Andrew Clermont’s Supper Club & Golden Fiddle Awards Shows
A special note in regard to my diligent and contributing much time, players – and well above the call of duty – who made, in particular, the orchestrations (there be a separate grouping list for them in the youtubes).
The benefit of both – leading up to our January Supper Clubs – which also related very strongly to our Woodford Supper Club years (the last gathering there saw 36 hours of rehearsals within the 6 day festival!)
It truly humbled me to see that come together and (ah ha!!) luckily captured during the Golden Fiddle Awards Showcase 2018 which followed in January – much of that astonishing 74 minutes CD can be attributed to the refinement via the epic Woodford Folk Festival rehearsals, to then “flower” in Tamworth!
And for a point in history – much of the earlier years of “rehearsals” happened at Phil & Michelle’s Fine Earth Foods, Woodford Folk Fest and bonus mention of Andrew & Heather Pattison of The Troubadour/ Wine Bar which gave early venue time to my eventually called “Supper Club” endeavours!
I must mention our Tamworth local sponsor support from Clearview IT
plus Just Better Care NSW helping in particular with Jude Iddison’s return flights from Albany WA to Tamworth each year of late!

Now, “some” of the critical Supper Club players of around that time, and that you’ll see perhaps through the youtubes were (are!) Jude Iddison (WA Fiddle), Quentin Eyers (SA Bass &…), Paddy Montgomery (VIC – multi), James Church (NSW) & Pete Fidler (VIC) on exchanging dobros, Paul Cooper (SA Banjo), Brookie & Daniel Gillett (Tamworth Vocals, Ukulele & Bass Clarinet), Shenzo Gregorio (QLD Fiddle), Garry Steel (NSW Keys incl Accordion), Robbie Long (Newcastle Guitar & Drums), Willy Qua (QLD from Galapagos Duck !) Glenn Skarratt (NSW), String Loaded (NSW Jen & Ray plus youth Olivia, Gabi) –
Jude & mid teens Gabi wrote out a large portion of the orchestrations to the tunes/ songs going back at least 5 years now!

Add to that the bands and/ or the influences through their earlier appearances of Totally Gourdgeous (VIC), BluGuru (VIC), The Cartwheels (VIC), Tamarisque (SA), Siskin River (NSW), One Up Two Down (USA & OZ), and artists like Leslie Avril, Kavisha Mazzella, Taylor Pheiffer (our most repeated guest artist!), The Beez (Germany), Bennett Sullivan (North Carolina – Banjo – this year) plus Jenny Lester this year (Canada), Brendan Radford (QLD Guitar & Songs), Tony Eyers (NSW Harmonica), Chloe Nott (Tamworth Banjo youth), Daniel Watkins & Tom Kendall (VIC) and even Gerry O’Berne (Ireland) – plus …
eg – one January there were 100 artists appearing @ Andrew Clermont’s Supper Club – to put full name to it 🙂

Thus it seemed very important to present these rather unique gatherings & captures in a reachable forum – hence on Youtube – so it could in fact be a present/ gift to those who were unable to make it to these often one-off events!
Let alone re-see with different eyes!
Future Tours?
Not surprisingly, pretty much what all we musos have been building this last decade of touring has suddenly been put on ice or ethereally online, for possibly quite a while.
My initial hopes after the Bushfires had been, to do some support tours through the southeast corner of Australia and give back to the many who have been there supporting the music through the years, let alone those struck with such bad luck of circumstance.
Well perhaps that is not too far off for some communities – you can let us know when things are looking settled enough!?
Tours for me with Paul Wookey or Goldheist or Penelope Swales, who all expressed fine keeness as soon as happy gathering levels are reached again will certainly be on the cards!
Most 2020 festival thoughts from October onward are still juggling with the yes/no of Covid condition at this point.
However in the meantime – an Ask – with options!
Should there be a few folk still in mostly normal life mode and able to appreciate financially, the offerings as well!?
It certainly would be appreciated. I’m not putting up a “gofund” site but simple methods are on my contact page –
http://www.andrewclermont.com.au/contact.htm
And there’s a bunch of New Releases including the 5th Totally Gourdgeous CD – Gourd in the Act and
3rd DVD – The Ripe Stuff ready to go!

In case you were wondering why … ?

The new Totally Gourdgeous single, “I Have a Dream”
(a musical rendering of Martin Luther King’s speech),
was released last December through MGM distribution:
https://TotallyGourdgeous.lnk.to/ihaveadream .
More about the song at http://malwebb.com/ihaveadream.html
The huge 17 track album, “Gourd in the Act”, was released on Feb 14,
https://www.thegroovemerchants.com/Product/85593
Also available on Bandcamp: https://totallygourdgeous.bandcamp.com

However hard copies are also easily sent to you – just email me back!
– $25 per CD – Bank Details are at
http://andrewclermont.com.au/contact.htm

Also recent, is the Golden Fiddle Showcase 2018 CD
– a whopping 74 min wonder! $25

THE Supper Club Book!!

Three years work went into the 120 page 20 year Photo Almanac of Andrew Clermont’s Supper Club available as A4 size $95 and A3! $160
Pages from salubrious single photos through to collages with a few stories & “your” thoughts added in –
I’m very pleased with the resultant quality!!
My whole shop/ info page is at
http://andrewclermont.com.au/sounds.htm
CDs are $25
DVDs are $25 to $40 (double)
Tuition DVDs $30 Didg – $50 the rest

Next Year ! 2021 or just as likely 2022
We can hope there will be some return to “normal” but it seems still little conclusive decisions for a while!
Just as Covid was kicking in I was at the Sandford Bush Festival which in it’s third year was/ is (just over the border in VIC, showing wonderful promise. Full solid plans to keep right on going there – Labor Day (VIC) in March and followed 2 weeks later
with the Penola Coonawarra Music Gathering (stepping in after Frances Folk Gathering pulled up this last year)
Supper Club @ North Tamworth Bowlo realm I will hope we can roll with the flow there with the now usual preamble mini Fests at Nowendoc (now moved to March) and the Chicken in the Window Friday 15th Jan 2021 in Murrurrundi the day before we go for the week’s Supper Club in Tamworth Sat 16 to Sat 24 – 2021.
Yes we did infact run the Supper Club right through the “Pho” Fest of 2021!
Yarra Junction Fiddlers (just east of Melb) Feb and Sandford Bush Fest put off till March 2022

Then there is The National Folk Fest at Easter in Canberra, followed by St Albans Folk Fest 3 weeks later in April with assorted time for tours to spread between – all moved to 2022
Well I hope the spread of pictures made the lengthy catch up all the more reasonable! Looking forward to seeing a few of you in August for a cuppa or cooee, as we saunter passed, if you let me know.
Let alone – give a hoy on the videos you liked!

Tall & musical, real & virtual hugs
Andrew Clermont & realms