Music > Live Reviews
Spiers & Boden
Maddermarket Theatre
05/03/24
Spiers & Boden, the dynamic duo of English folk music, returned to Norwich's Maddermarket Theatre last night, a third of the way through their 18 date Spring tour, which takes them from Exeter in the South West to Hexham in the North East.
They are also well remembered for being co-founders of the mighty Bellowhead, the rollicking folk juggernaut of a band that released five studio albums between 2006 and 2014, and who played at Norwich Open as well as Latitude. However, melodion and concertina virtuoso John Spiers and his much taller fiddle-playing partner Jon Boden have been performing together much longer, recording and releasing their first album in 2001. Twenty years later album number seven, 'Fallow Ground' was released to critical acclaim.
Not surprising, therefore, that the Maddermarket Theatre was sold out for this eagerly awaited visit. They begin their first half set with 'Adieu Sweet Lovely Nancy', a traditional song collected by Rottingdean's renowned Copper Family, and lifted from Spiers & Boden's debut album 'Through & Through'. Also from that album comes traditional instrumental reel 'Rochdale Coconut Dance', topically renamed, just for tonight, as 'The George Galloway Coconut Dance'.
Jon Boden switches from fiddle to guitar for what is described as a 'small-scale domestic song that got slightly out of hand' – 'The Birth of Robin Hood', taken from the 2008 album, 'Vagabond'. Spiers' 2003 instrumental 'Dawn Chorus' leads neatly into another Copper Family song, 'When Spring Comes In', with its lovely line about daffo-dawn-dillies, birdsong and lambs. After three more lively dance tunes taken from latest album 'Fallow Ground', the Australian folk song 'Bluey Brink' concludes the first half - a song from Norfolk's Peter Bellamy about a hard drinking sheep-shearer who gets served something far stronger than beer. Time for a quick drink and a peruse of the merch stand.
During the second half we are treated to a somewhat stripped down version of 'The Outlandish Knight', featured on Bellowhead’s 'Burlesque' album; 'Fallow Ground', the title track from Spiers & Boden's excellent most recent album; 'The Cheshire Waltz (from the 2005's 'Tunes' album); 'Bold Sir Rylas' (from the accompanying 'Songs' album); an abbreviated version of the lengthy, 18th century ballad, 'Kinghorn'’ (re-imagined and presented in three minutes as 'Hind Horn'); two hill-based tunes ('Bailey Hill' and 'Wittenham Clumps') from 'Fallow Ground', and a Bellowhead instrumental medley featuring 'Frozen Gin', 'Vinegar Reel' and 'The Sloe'.
By this time the audience is normally on their feet and dancing, but the layout and slope of the Maddermarket Theatre does not really allow for it, so instead we are all clapping and stamping our feet to the Bellowhead classic 'The Maid Freed From The Gallows', before demanding, and getting, a lively encore in the shape of the lively polka from Bellow heads ‘Hedonism‘- the rip-roaring 'New York Girls'.
A scintillating and crowd-pleasing set from folk legends Spiers & Boden, and wonderful to see the Maddermarket Theatre filled to the rafters, but such a shame that we could not get up on our feet for a little dance. We will just have to wait for the festival season to get under way!
(Spiers & Boden will be performing at Folk In A Field, at West Acre, near Swaffham, on July 6th)