This summer I went to several folk festivals and discovered that there is something very distinct about the sound of a folk festival at different time of the day.
I think my favourite is the morning. To start with it's very quiet, a few shuffles of people beggining to venture from their tents. There's the sizzle of Bacon as every food stall owner knows that soon several hundred hungover folkies and morris dancers will descend upon them. There's the gentle mumble of groans from people who spent a little to long in the beer tent yesterday and the discordant tuning from many musicians, fiddles and melodeans seem to battle for dominance while tin whistles struggle to be heard, and everyone insists that the drummers please shut up. There is this gradual build of sound as more and more people arrive to the site, the zipping of tents and soggy footsteps. Then the bells, the chiming as the morris teams finally see the light of day, crawl out of their resting place and towards the beer tent and the bacon sandwiches. Then the gradual transition for seeming chaos to the rhythmical thunp and chime that accompanies them. then once again the bells grow quieter as the dancers move away to their first spot of the morning, leaving chattering festival goers to their breakfast.
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