Norfolk and Norwich Festival

Before this entry gets into full flow, a heartfelt and rapturous ‘thank you’ is due to the organisers of the Norfolk and Norwich Festival this year, whose inventiveness and exhaustive effort gave the fine city an enormously enjoyable fortnight! From Fanfare le S.N.O.B. at the beginning, to the Vagaband at the end, a tremendous time was had, by all who attended. The Spiegeltent made a splash in particular, as a wondrous venue for the various events it hosted, from bluegrass to ska to burlesque.

What a venue it was, fabulous enough to warrant hopefuls queuing outside in their hundreds, hoping to make it in before the evening’s entertainment ended. I queued for over an hour on one evening, and regret nothing: on the final evening I was lucky enough to be whisked to the front of the queue on account of being the Vagaband’s photographer. Jammy, jammy Ryan, cried my friends. I genuinely hope that all who missed out on the Spiegeltent will get their chance in the future.

Here is my confession, though: no-one felt luckier, or cheered louder, than myself when the doors were closed to new entrants on the Saturday evening. Being so fortunate, I felt compelled to enjoy myself, and I like to think that I managed it…

Photographing Les Folies earlier in the week was a relaxed and simple affair: I picked my angles, and those around me were sober enough to accommodate my crouching presence. Saturday’s Vagaband audience, on the other hand, were of an entirely different, more challenging and hilarious order - raucous, energetic, loud and steamingly drunk.

The impact it had upon my photography was manifold: whereas my work for Les Folies was a matter of waiting for the right moments to come, during the Vagaband’s set there were far, far fewer opportunities to take time composing the images. From photo requests from irreparably smashed party people, to angles being blocked by blissfully sozzled dancers, to being inadvertently poked and elbowed in every part of my body (yes), to security staff ordering me to move, I had to think perennially on my toes. To get certain angles without irritating security, I had to wait for the lighting on the stage to be as I wanted, and the band to be posed agreeably, before stealing into forbidden positions for just a few seconds. I earned more concerned glares for this than I did for my dancing on the Wednesday evening – but thankfully didn’t cross the line too often…

Some parts of the audience hounded and hounded me for photo requests, which pleased me, but many haven’t made it online because of my woeful flash lighting, which lends an air of shame to all of my flash photographs at present. Apologies for that – it will be rectified shortly!
Keeping still enough to take good photographs was tough because of all the aforementioned unwitting elbows; another difficulty was the floor, which physically bounced with the audience’s frenetic dancing and stomping.

If any of this sounds like a complaint, I should clarify that I loved every minute of it – and the challenge has done me a world of good too! A fit and healthy set of photos was born, even if they were a touch more lightweight than usual. Here’s to the Spiegeltent’s triumphant return in 2010…?

It’s a good job my last post concluded the way it did; this week I will be photographing no less than four gigs! I am profusely excited about working in the fabulous Spiegeltent with two bands, performing as part of the Norfolk & Norwich Festival: the effortlessly sassy, stylish Les Folies on Wednesday, followed by the Vagaband on Saturday, whom I have yet to see live, but rather predict will bounce and leap around with an unnecessary amount of energy, rounding off the festival with a smashed panache. Muchly looking forward to it.

Festival festivities aside, Thursday afternoon will be spent producing some shots for Spidermilk , about whose quirky folk sound I have gushed previously – so aside from everything else, I should really look into finding some good locations to photograph them in…

Next Sunday evening promises to bring a treat: the welcome return to Norfolk of Brooke Sharkey. If, like yours truly, your ideal Saturday afternoon involves aimless bummeling through the sunny streets of Norwich city centre, then she may well have treated you to her relaxing blend of folk foppery and gentle French zest, whilst having her portrait painted by an equally talented old gent. Brilliant. Her Cider Shed performance should be a fine gig!

In the midst of it all, my newsagent hours this week have been more than doubled, I have babysitting commitments, am also househunting, and have front-row seats at the wonderful Philip Glass’ Theatre Royal performance on Friday.

My dears, it’s a hard knock life…