Auckland New Zealand
Following our very successful Club dinner in September 2006 we are again getting together to share a meal and music. If you haven’t been to Elevation Café before you can look forward to a panoramic view of the city and its lights by night.
Menu is ‘a la carte’ so everyone will pay separately at the end of the meal.
Bring along your voice and your musical instruments and be ready to enjoy the good food, good music and good company.
To say Nigel Gavin is a guitar virtuoso is an understatement: he's a gifted, imaginative and highly exploratory musician who uses charm and taste as the backdrop to his amazing guitar pieces. American born, Nigel has been a New Zealand resident for some 15 years. He has long been a featured player in New Zealand's music scene, particularly in Auckland, playing guitar, banjo, mandolin, bass - indeed, almost anything with strings - with the Nairobi Trio, the Fondue Set, the Jews Brothers, the Blue Bottom Stompers, Below the Bassline, Jonathan Besser's Bravura and his own Snorkel, among others.
He has also found time to create and mentor the multi-guitar Gitbox Rebellion and to perform in collaborative ventures such as the free-jazz Vitamin S, often using other instruments such as the Chinese sheng. Floating like a butterfly, stinging like a bee, Nigel has contributed scene-stealing solos to an astonishing variety of musical groups and settings, bringing with him the dedication to the guitar that earned his place in Robert Fripp's legendary League of Crafty Guitarists.
Gavin describes his target market as "music lovers - people who actually listen to music". When he was young, he recalls sitting around with friends listening to music. No talking, just listening. "These days we hear music all day, we're bombarded with it, but how many people actually listen?"
Nigel Gavin is one of New Zealand’s musical treasures. The eccentric range of his musical projects is matched only by his astonishing virtuosity with stringed instruments and his prodigious musical imagination. Guitarists will be simply astonished by the technique on display here. Nigel’s finger-picking is so fast, so smooth, and so laden with sudden virtuoso explosions that it is damn near impossible to work out either what he’s doing or how he’s doing it.
- Tauranga Weekend Sun
An informal ‘Singaround’ - ‘Open Mic’ without a Mic - A smaller group of people meet to share their songs and music.
What better way to keep warm on a winter evening than leaping about the Beach Hall?
Noel Armstrong will be ‘calling’ the dances - which means he'll be telling us all where to put our feet and which way to turn.
Westumbria will be providing the music to facilitate all this leaping about.
Floorsingers will be providing the entertainment while we rest & recuperate between ‘sets’.
The forerunner of the disco and dance parties, the Ceilidh was an event where local people originally gathered to tell stories, sing songs and read poetry. In relatively recent times (measured in hundreds of years) the dance portion was added and the Ceilidh has become the event that is now familiar to us.
Don't know how to dance? It doesn't matter; Noel does so all you need is the desire to have a fun time and you'll leave at the end of the night knowing how to do the the likes of the Circassion Circle, Borrowdale Exchange and a few others to boot!
You can expect plenty of rest in between dances when the floor singers do their stuff. So if you are one of our wonderful artists and would like to do a floor spot be at the hall at 7.30pm and it will be first come first served as usual. Since the whole evening is devoted to the Ceilidh we will be able to accomodate a couple of extra floor singers but BE THERE EARLY. We're looking to keep this a really upbeat evening so dust off you brightest songs & tunes; chorus songs will be particularly sought after as will funny, witty poetry.
But most of all we'd love to have a great turn out from the club members and friends, all with dancing shoes on, to make this a really sociable and fun night.
Last Update: 2008-11-23
The Club was conceived in 1965 when the Clancy Brothers didn't come and someone had the astounding idea of having a sing-a-round thus transforming an audience into a folk group. Formally established in 1966 we're still going strong.