Kilmore Celtic Fest and folkTrain uncovered

Chris from the band filled us in: I wanted to be in a band because I like the synergy, when the sound of a group of people playing together is (hopefully!) so much better than the sound of each individual. And I am much more naturally suited to playing folk music. I like most other music genres, but I think it's better to play what comes naturally, rather than force yourself to play a style that doesn't really suit you. I enjoy listening to rock, opera, jazz and so on, but I'm not going to attempt performing in any of those genres!

Yes, we all write songs and have written songs prior to forming folkTrain in 2010.

One thing I particularly like is that you're typically at a festival for three or four days. This means when you're not performing you bump into people you know, or get chatting to strangers, in cafes over lunch, or in the pub having a few beers. Festivals become their own community, something that doesn't happen when you play a one off gig; where you turn up, play, then go home.

One of my favourite memories is of performing a song I wrote called An Toraidhe (there's a youtube video of the song with an explanation of what it's about) at the Kilmore Celtic Festival. The song starts with a slow tune on fiddle with a guitar accompaniment, then there's a '1, 2, 3, 4' count in and all instruments come in, with Rudy playing harmonica. We were about to start when Rudy said he'd left his harmonica in the green room, and he rushed off stage to get it. After telling a joke to pass a few seconds, I said to Saskia (fiddle player) we might as well start, as Rudy doesn't play at the beginning. Rudy heard us start up, and came tearing back in, up the steps on to the stage, and in front of his mic just as I finished the count in and started playing bang on time, much to the amusement of the audience.

As my Celtic connection is with Ireland (my father was born in Cork) my favourite tartan is Clodagh Cork.

If it's the full band we usually take everything. If Matt, our guitar player, can't make it, I switch to guitar, so I don't take my tenor banjo or octave mandolin - the octave mandolin was handmade for me in Inverness. Other times we might not take instruments that only feature in a few songs and we don't intend playing those songs - e.g. Rudy plays didgeridoo in a couple of songs, but only takes his didge if we're going to play one or both of those songs.