Duets

Featuring many of the artists with whom he has worked over a 30-year career, bassist and singer Ben Nicholls parades a retinue of folk’s finest across the 14 songs on Duets, beginning with a beguiling vocal from Nadine Shah on a ruminative ‘Cuckoo’. Other guests include Cara Dillon, Sam and Seth Lakeman, Tim Eriksen, Kris Drever, Fay Hield, John Smith, Martin Simpson, Sam Sweeney, Patsy Reid and Jon Boden. That’s quite a line-up. As such, it’s something of a British folk All-Stars from the past three decades, with Nicholls’ bass a key driver. Tim Erickson’s vocal is brilliant on the uneasy ‘Corydon’, from 1840s America, while John Smith commands the pathos of Richard Thompson’s ‘Down Where the Drunkards Roll’. Jon Boden is as distinctive as ever on ‘Polly Vaughan’, while Cara Dillon leads a delicate and gorgeous take on the oft-covered ‘I Wonder What’s Keeping My True Love Tonight’ which also features Sam Lakeman. ‘Flash Company’ gets some flash Martin Simpson guitar work, with Nicholls’ bass looming at its shoulder, while ‘Northern Frisk’ features the mercurial playing of Leveret and Bellowhead fiddler Sam Sweeney duetting against Nicholls’ nimble bass lines, and Seth Lakeman brings his distinctive, driving energy to ‘The Fire’. This set of duets is a gift that keeps giving.