After nearly a decade of playing together, Helen Gentile (Threepenny Bit) & Lewis Wood (Granny’s Attic) are releasing their first studio album, Violet Sky on Friday 6th December. To celebrate, we’re delighted to bring you their video together for album opener, Limousin Bourrées.
The album features original compositions and the traditional European dance tunes the duo have become known for, in their trademark stripped-back style.
Lewis tells us more…
My journey with European dance music started, like most people in this country who have had similar journeys, with Balfolk. This is a revivalist movement combining the social dances that were popular in Western Europe, particularly France, in the 19th Century. It is in some ways the continental equivalent to English Ceilidh, both evolving in the 1970s, but with less of an emphasis on set dancing, and more on couple dancing, with the Scottish, bourreé, waltz, mazurka, and Scandinavian polskas being some of the most popular dances.
The base knowledge level is higher than in ceilidh, hence the popularity of pre-dance workshops, but once you’ve learned the basics, the increased freedom in the dances is compelling, and certainly compelled me!
As Balfolk evolves thanks to a broader continental outlook, more regional ‘trad’ movements in France have continued alongside it, focusing on the traditional styles of each area. A few years back, as I was keen to learn a bit more about this, a friend of mine leant me a book of traditional tunes and songs for dance from the Limousin region. The book is called ‘Ai vist lo lop, etc’, named after the Occitan dialect song of the same title, translating to ‘I saw the Wolf’. It mostly contains the triple-time bourreés that reign supreme in the Limousin, Auvergne and Morvan regions, such as these ones, ‘La courbiase’ and ‘La pradinoise’, both from the Corrèze département.
Helen and I have been playing these tunes for a while now, and they felt like the natural fit to open Violet Sky. When we first started playing them, we were gradually shifting away from the ad hoc nature of our early repertoire towards a more focused dance based set, incorporating Balfolk and Breton dance tunes, as well as French trad material like this. It is in this environment that we finally felt ready to enter the studio earlier this year, with the wonderful Alex Garden (Tarren) producing.
The video you see here is a snapshot of that recording process. While they weren’t behind the desk, Alex had their DSLR out constantly, capturing the ‘in-between’ moments that are so integral to staying sane while making an album, and that anyone who has done so will be familiar with. Perhaps the highlight for me of making this album though was spending time with the two cats that Alex had adopted that week, Chance and Bobo. They steal the show here!
Violet Sky is available to buy on CD and digital from Helen and Lewis’ Bandcamp from Friday 6th December (which is also Bandcamp Friday!)
The duo will launch the album on 5th December at The Hyde Tavern, Winchester; tickets still available at time of writing. A full tour will follow in Spring 2025.
