Brought to life (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Brought to life

11:15am Monday 1st September 2008

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You can’t beat live music, can you?

Thousands of fans had a rare old time this weekend in Bingley’s Myrtle Park rockin’ on to two days of great bands.

It may have rained, there may have been mud a-plenty, but the buzz they got from real live music carries you through, and maybe even makes it even better.

I wasn’t among the legions of pop fans at those gigs, more’s the pity, but I still had a great time at two functions over the weekend, both with living musicians strutting their stuff.

The first, at a wedding celebration evening, was two young musicians tackling some quite intricate stuff, cover versions mostly, but it had everybody up and rockin for most of the evening.

To be honest, when I first walked in, and I had heard the singer not quite hitting every note pitch-perfectly I feared the worst.

But the element that no DJ can ever replicate for me is the fun element, and these two were up for plenty of that.

And, to boot, when they played some of their own material they seemed to grow in confidence, and played a really good set. (I think that’s the official terminology for these things.) The second function was a smallish garden party/ music quiz fundraiser at a relative’s house down south.

There, we had four ‘seasoned’ musicians rattling out a torrent of cover versions of great old familiar numbers, all done in brilliant Bluegrass mode.

The weather fluctuated between sunshine, torrential rain, thunder and lightning and steady drizzle.

But tucked away in our ancient scout tent marquee, the live accompaniment to the day kept everyone in a great mood and hopefully a substantial amount of cash was raised.

Two functions, two very different live bands. But the same great buzz from ‘real’ music.