NAVVIES

“How cool was 'Navvies'?!! What talent!! I was rivetted - that was fantastic plus.”

In 2005 Mal had the idea of producing a ‘Folk Opera’ for Chester Folk Festival 2006.  She approached well-known folk performer Mick Ryan to see whether he would allow her to produce one of his shows – perhaps The Voyage.  Imagine her delight when he came back to her and offered to write a new piece especially.  Apparently he had thought for some time about writing a musical drama on the subject of Navvies – in fact he’d already written a couple of songs on the topic and had recorded them with his musical partner Pete Harris.  He said he’d be glad of the impetus it would give him to finish his project, so Chester Folk Festival agreed to commission the work.

Mick completed writing Navvies in time for rehearsals to begin in March 2006.  As well as Mick himself, the cast was made up of performers local to Chester.  Chester Folk Festival has long been blessed with the number and quality of its local performers and these were pressed into service as combination folk orchestra, singers and actors.  Members of popular band Full House and well-known duo Roy Clinging and Neil Brookes joined The Waite Collective along with Roy’s wife Mary and keyboard-player Ian Jones, who was imported from another Chester band that’s gaining a name for itself, Time Bandits.

The musical drama follows three navvies’ women (played by Rebecca (18^th century), Katrina (19^th century) and Mal (1950s)) through three different eras of building – canals, railways and roads.  Moving and amusing by turns, there is a strong Chester link in that one of the main characters is Thomas Brassey, a major Victorian engineer who was born in Chester and built Chester’s railway station along with much else, including most of the French railway system.

Performances in Chester and at the Chester Folk Festival 2006 were exceedingly well received – so well in fact that it would be good to do it again sometime.  In addition the band got at least one song for the regular set list.