Introducing the Penland Phezants
Hullo. You won't have heard of us. Yet. We formed at the end of 2017 to write, perform and tour a show about Hereward the Wake Hereward the Wake video clip and comprise multi-published bard Gareth Calway(voice and drum) folk musician Andy Wall, (acoustic guitar and vocals) and Vanessa Wood-Davies, a Welsh Romani-influenced folk harpist (harp and vocal harmonies). With lyrics and stories written and researched by a published poet/ novelist/ playwright and set to exciting music by two highly acclaimed players, we offer a unique and high quality folk experience: dramatic storytelling both true to life and larger than life, spellbinding harp from an ageless bardic tradition and lots of (tragical, magical, comical, historical, elemental and romantic) singalong folk ballads full of rousing choruses.
Gareth and Andy have collaborated previously on the story of the 1816 Littleport and Ely Riots' 'Bread or Blood' and Vanessa and Gareth have collaborated previously as Waywood, a harp and verse duo, best known for The Ballad of Susan Nobes . We also have long track records as solo performers in our own fields. But in 2018 you will see a lot of us in the same field - and sometimes it really will be a field.
Our First Review!
"Entertaining and refreshing" Liz Franklin, Blues&Roots radio
We bring a proven track record as composers to our shows. In a previous incarnation, Gareth and Andy were commissioned to write and perform historical shows for city councils and folk festivals and Gareth and Vanessa to write and perform for borough council commemorations. Gareth and Vanessa have also written and recorded The Ballad of Susan Nobes which has just accrued 900 Soundcloud plays worldwide.
Here are some dates to look out for us in 2018:
Feb 24 Wisbech Library. Our latest performance of 'Bread or Blood" as part of the Cambridgeshire Libraries Presents Live... project and the first to feature Vanessa on harp and harmonies. Our maiden performance as a trio.
Feb 24 Launch (at Wisbech Library) of the Penland Phezants' first album, "Bread or Blood live at The Babylon Arts Gallery, Ely" (recorded 2016) an 80 minute CD which includes Vanessa's "Elegy for the Littleport and Ely Rioters" (2017).
Feb 27 The Station Social Club, Bury St Edmunds. We will be performing our two new compositions "The Ballad of Freeborn John" (Gareth and Andy's upbeat folk ballad about the English Civil War) and "Awake for Hereward!" a 3 minute prog-folk show trailer about a great English hero (composed by all three).
May 23 Bury St Edmunds Festival* premiere of our new 90 minute touring show "A Very English Resistance; the True Story of Hereward the Wake."
July Festival* performance of "A Very English Resistance; the True Story of Hereward the Wake." (*festivals will be named here when their programmes are published)
Sep 22 King's Lynn. Material written by the Phezants performed in a new play by Liz MacDonald about the 15C heretic-visionary Margery Kempe of Lynn. (Margery - a housewife and mother of 14 - broke many of the rules of her patriarchal society, including writing the first ever autobiography in English and going on unlicensed pilgrimages all over the world. We like her.)
More to come. Watch this space.
It's fitting that our waywoodwall musical adventures as a live trio start with 'Freeborn John', which was once considered as a name for the band, a song about a great English rebel. Try the digital download (with notes and lyrics) here - The Ballad of Freeborn John