Port Fairy 2011 Gem from Tim O'Brien

I've been away at the Port Fairy Music Festival (I think they're trying to dissociate themselves from their past exclusively 'folk' reputation). This time I took along the wonderful Flip video camera and made some (short) video clips instead of attempting out-of-focus snaps of performers refusing to stop still for even a microsecond.

The results are patchy, to say the least. I forgot to take it on the first night - missing a superb opportunity in the front row to film Shakura S'Aida and band followed by Rosie Flores.

On Saturday I started filming the French Canadian group Les Chauffeurs a Pieds (that would be the walking chauffeurs?) followed by Crooked Still - an eagerly anticipated gig only marred by the Flip suddenly and inexplicably freezing: with the battery going flat, I couldn't record, play or turn it off. So I took it home to show it who's boss, and then proceeded to have a frantic live text chat with a techie somewhere else in the world - only after first installing a Telstra moby broadband USB borrowed from a generous companion. So it charged up whilst its primary carer caught up on an hour or two of much needed sleep.

The day's entertainment resumed with Joe Pug, and Tim O'Brien and the Two Oceans Trio. I captured one of several special 'moments that bring a tear to your eyes' when Tim O'Brien sang and accompanied himself on fiddle: achieving an amazing 3 part harmony. Listen for his wisecrack at the start about how to tell if your fiddle is out of tune. (I'm still trying to master that trim tool in Flip - again, it refused to acquiesce to my wishes.)



The timbre of his voice also morphs to blend with each musical style in their wide repertoire.

Other magical moments included the phenomenal guitar licks of the young Donna in Shakura's band (eat your heart out Santana, Hendrix and Zappa) and the delightful duet of 'You are my Sunshine' with Joe Chindamo (on accordion!) and Doug DeVries, guitar. We were all bowled over by young Callum, the drummer in Blue Shaddy (is he allowed to be away on tour without his mum or dad?!)

For more on the PFFF experience (yep, one of the 'f's stands for folk) go to Annie's Cat Politics one of the blogs featured to the right.

Better go and sort out that chaotic pile of video files floating around in the virtual universe between netbook, USB stick and imac Flipshare, imovie and iphoto...