The End Fes­ti­val 2015 cul­mi­nat­ed on Sun­day with “The Feast of Saint Cecil­ia”, an event ded­i­cat­ed to the patron saint of musi­cians. The musi­cal ban­quet start­ed at 3.30pm and went all the way through to around 10pm – keep­ing the bar at Earl Haig Hall busy.

Billed as a ‘folk event’ did­n’t quite do jus­tice to the wealth of artis­tic expres­sion we were pre­sent­ed with. Things kicked off with The Spec­tral Cho­rus, a trio with a rich sound of acoustic gui­tars (and bass), against which their rich, hym­nal har­monies fill the room. Next was Ker­ry Andew as You are Wolf  with avant-garde rein­ter­pre­ta­tions of tra­di­tion­al folk songs. Elliott Mor­ris brought humour and nifty gui­tar play­ing to his solo set.

Col­lec­tress (above) were cap­ti­vat­ing. The female quar­tet, their music described as ‘cham­ber pop’, played com­po­si­tions of such atmos­pher­ic beau­ty they sound­ed like film sound­tracks, some airy and light, such as The Sound of Wind in the Trees, oth­ers chill­ing and spooky.

The fes­ti­val closed with The Mem­o­ry Band, a folk out­fit of par­tic­u­lar res­o­nance for pro­mot­er Howard Monk, who revealed that he has played with them in the past. Set­ting the mood for each num­ber with a spo­ken word record­ing, there was some­thing quirk­i­ly British about this ensem­ble, with their evoca­tive and thought­ful inter­pre­ta­tions of loca­tion, his­to­ry and events.

THE SMALL PRINT

EVENT: The End Festival

WHEN: 12th to 22nd Novem­ber 2015

WHERE: Venues around Crouch End

The End Fes­ti­val open­ing weekend

Howard Gelb, Romeo Sto­dart, Nadine Khouri