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Saturday 6 & Sunday 7 September 2008
The Hop Farm, Paddock Wood, Kent, England
Set in 400 acres of the Kent countryside, The Hop Farm is one of the South East’s most popular event venues, the spectacular Oast village providing the perfect setting for a great family day out.
We’re delighted to be holding Gypsy Arts Festival South East at The Hop Farm. Gypsies and Traveller historically played a major role at The Hop Farm by helping to bring in the harvest and many still live and work in the region. Our Festival comes at the end of a week long Hop Festival at the Hop Farm.
The Festival will feature live music, dancing, storytelling, open fire cooking demonstrations and tastings, Gypsy Traveller crafts, such as, basket making, lace work, wagon painting, peg making, paper flowers. The Festival will also feature music and art workshops, and Gypsy Traveller film screenings.
Plus live performances by The Orchard Family, The Jaipur Kawa Brass Band, Parno Graszt, Hai La Drum, The Walking Wounded, and Sarah the Singing Gypsy. And Flamenco and Step-Dancing workshops
There will also be a large temporary display of beautifully restored Edwardian and Victorian Gypsy wagons on site.
And, of course, once you’ve bought your ticket for the Gypsy Arts Festival, you can take advantage of all of the fabulous regular facilities and attractions at The Hop Farm: www.thehopfarm.co.uk
Saturday
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Jaipur Kawa Brass Band
the delectable Gypsy brass band from Jaipur in Rajasthan, has wooed audiences from Glastonbury to Paris. And anyone who saw them atthe Gypsy Arts Festival in Suffolk last summer will know that they’re in for a magical musical feast. Aside from the concert in the Big Top, which includes a contortionist and a Gypsy faquir, the band will give a roaming performance through the Festival site, plus a brass workshop. So it’s time to pull the bassoon out of the attic and give it a polish!
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Flamenco Flow
Dance workshop, Flamenco for Kids, and live performance
For anyone who’s ever wanted to run away and dance Flamenco, Flamenco Flow is flamenco at its very best: high energy, authentic and contemporary. Ricardo Garcia and his FamiliaFlamenca will give a Flamenco workshop and performance celebrating the evolution of this passionate art form. Mesmerizing and masterful, it’s an absolute winner.
Link: www.flamencoflow.com
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Hai La Drum
is a collaboration of four versatile musicians that play everything fromDjango-style Gypsy swing music and Romanian tunes through to Balkan and Russian classics. Romanian Gypsy violinist VasileStanescu was born in Bucharest into a family of Gypsy musicians going back, he says, some 250 years. He started playing aged seven and had some classical training alongside his Gypsy tradition. The rest of the band includes accordionist, Pete Watson, guitarist Jonny Hepbir, and double bassist, Dan Sheppard.
Links: www.myspace.com/hailadrum
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The Orchard Family
Tom, Jean and their son Ashley make up The Orchard Family, a legendary English Gypsy band who play old traditional songs mixed in with some modern folk that they’ve picked up along the way. They come from a long musical tradition, their ancestors having lived in Devon and Cornwall for more than 400 years, the chief purveyors of Gypsy music in the area providing irrepressible foot tapping, melodeon- laced entertainment at all the local Gypsy fairs and weddings etc. |
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Walking Wounded
Walking Wounded is a 5-piece band from East London playing a wide variety of original material from Rock to Arabic, Reggae to Balkan, Celtic to Ska and more … They feature accordion, guitar, harmonica, bass, percussion and 3 part harmony vocals. Don’t be fooled by their eclecticism, the Wounded retain their distinctive sound that makes them instantly recognizable and rock with an energy that many an electric band would envy. |
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Sarah the Singing Gypsy - UK
Sarah "Sings Country" and is a regular on the UK’s Gypsy Traveller scene. From Appleby to Stowe and beyond, Sarah sets up here CD stand and sings to sell. She will hold you spellbound with her beautiful voice and personality. |
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Parno Graszt
‘The Source of Gypsy Music’ according to Songlines Magazine, the 9-piece Hungarian Gypsy band Parno Graszt (meaning White Horse) are making their debut performances in the UK exclusively for the Gypsy Arts Festival. A real treat because Parno Graszt has been wooing audiences across Europe for the last 20 years, its original blend of traditional Gypsy folk songs combined with some of its own compositions providing an exotic musical banquet that includes acoustic guitars, double bass, tamboura and the spoons. And then there are the bewitching Gypsy dancers...
Link: www.myspace.com/parnograszt
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