Coastline Bluegrass Festival: report!

Aran Sheehan reports:

Thought I’d fill you in on how the Coastline Bluegrass Festival in Llandudno, Wales, went.

It was the first year of the festival and we were blessed with fine weather. The whole event is on a visitor farm with llamas, snowy owls, peacocks, and various other beasties. Everything is self-contained with concert space, jamming areas, food, real ale, camping, and toilet facilities all on the one site. There was a lovely friendly atmosphere with picking sessions all over the place with some fine musicians. There were also workshops and I attended the mandolin one, which was very helpful (could do with a couple hundred more of those). All of this was complemented by the fact we had beautiful views of the sea and Welsh coastline and we were nowhere near a road or any other noise pollution. So: a very relaxing place to get away from it all. I may be back next year.

Aran also supplied the following photos from the festival:


A focused bassist: Cian Gill of the Kevin & Geraldine Gill Band


Geraldine & Kevin themselves


A solid wall of F-style mandolinists: Bill Titley, Aran Sheehan, Donal Gill, unidentified

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Dee Hallett of the British Bluegrass Music Association reports: 'The committee responsible for organising the recent Coastline Bluegrass Event that took place at Bodafon Farm Park, Llandudno, North Wales, emailed; "The EVENT turned into the most glorious weekend with a real gathering of some of the most talented 'pickers' in the UK. The setting was superb, the atmosphere 'electric', and the sun shone (did it ever!) With so many favourable comments, what else can we do - only do a repeat next year! Many thanks to all those who turned up to help make the EVENT such a success and we hope they'll tell their friends all about it." Check out their website.'