Cellist and Festival Director Mary Barnecutt tells the story behind Spike: Dublin’s Alternative Cello Festival, running this year from Friday 9th - Sunday 11th February.
The idea for a cello festival featuring only non-classical cello came about two years ago when fellow cellist Lioba Petrie and I were having the chats in Simon’s Place Café, Dublin.
We both work in a wide range of music genres and often compare notes on the various ways we work in creating, performing and teaching music. I mentioned I had seen a flyer for the great Amsterdam Cello Bienniale on the door of a teaching room in the Royal Irish Academy of Music, where my 6 year-old daughter does music class on a Friday. The Biennale is a huge festival, incorporating all types and kinds of cello.
We talked about how many people here in Ireland were making interesting noises with their cellos and how amazing it would be to get us all together for a gig. Or five... Our cello cases taking up space in the tiny café, we ran the idea of having a gathering of cellists who were also working in non-classical fields.
"What’ll we call it?"
"Um…what do cellos have that no one else has? Sad tunes?"
"Spike?" suggested my husband later, adding "But don’t tell double bass players or they’ll want in."
So Spike it is. Spike: Dublin’s Alternative Cello Festival.
What we mean by ‘alternative’ was initially anything non-classical, and even then the boundaries are fluid, or there are no boundaries - so one of our main performers in the inaugural festival in 2017, Rushad Eggleston, jumped on a table and broke into the Prelude from Bach's Suite No 1 all the way through in the middle of a jam last year.
The more we chatted, and met up, and started to plan, the more we realized this was a vast field and could have days of events - cello yoga, cello clowning, stunt cello, cello techno, cello trad - the list got longer and longer and we made lists and lists (and more lists) then looked around for a venue.
Part of our criteria for the evening shows was that people should be able to have a pint and watch the gig - the atmosphere had to be relaxed. The Workman's Club on Wellington Quay is one of the few venues that do club-like cabaret tables and red curtains, and also has the cash register out of the room so it can be very, very quiet when needed and loud loud loud too. It also has a smaller upstairs venue, The Vintage Room, where we ran the Yocella (yoga with cello) last year. This year we are holding workshops in the Vintage Room and using it as an after-show club, and Kitty Maguire will be running her Yocella workshop in St Kevin's Community Centre in Portobello.
Improvisation is a key element to this year's festival.We saw Rubin Kodheli playing in the final evening of Laurie Anderson’s residence in the NCH last May. We were very excited that Rubin, a US/Albanian artist, composer and cellist, who has been described as a "genre-transcending creative rebel" was available to come over for Spike. He is bringing his drummer, Garret Brown and together they form Blues in Space. We are also going to have a ‘Cellinstallation’ in the Hugh Lane Gallery on Sunday 11th February - in the entrance hall to the Gallery, a series of Irish cellists will be improvising all day, in relay, in half hour slots.
Both Lioba and I are very committed to music education and really wanted this to be an essential element of the festival. This year we will have two workshops, and an all-ages gig on the Saturday afternoon in The Workman’s Club to try to get as many different interested people together as possible.
We really want Spike to be about exploring cello, gathering musicians together and encouraging people to learn music by any means necessary. Even if it means putting your cello on your head and running up the walls with it (Thanks Rushad, many cello repairs later!)
Mary Barnecutt and Lioba Petrie are the co-directors of the Spike Cello Fest, which takes place in venues around Dublin from 9-11 February 2018. More information and tickets available from the festival website.
