The Petteridge Light Orchestra - Live and Kicking

Here are the details of the tracks on the Petteridge Light Orchestra CD, and here on the site

Tracks 1 - 7 were recorded live at a booking on April 18th 2009. We just put a small recorder on a table behind us so you can hear exactly how we sound live. No fancy studio tricks or tweaks. The caller was Malcolm, Rob was on fiddle or guitar, I was on squeeze box - as picture above, except I'm on bagpipes in that.

- Track 1: "Marie's Wedding"
The first tune, played before the dancing begins so we can check the volume and tone levels of the different instruments.

- Track 2 "Captain Lanoe's Quick March"
The guests were not quite ready to start dancing, so we played another tune.

- Track 3: "Redwing"
Played for the first dance, a fairly easy circle dance to ease everyone into the evening. As you can hear, with a bit of audience participation to break the ice.

- Track 4: "Buffalo Girls"
The second dance, straight after the first to keep up the momentum. But this one has the opportunity for guests to dance with different partners - again, helping to integrate the audience.

- Track 5: "Orange in Bloom"
Played for a waltz. Its good to have a bit of variety in an evening, and waltzes are often popular with the older guests.

- Track 6: "Dingle's Regatta"
As the evening develops, we can start bringing in some more complicated dances, with more challenging figures. Half the fun seems to be getting it wrong!

- Track 7: "Sweets of May"
Keeping up the variety, this tune was played for a 'longways' dance - with couples facing each other in two long lines. We also have circle, square and couple dances, as well as a few speciality ones.

Tracks 8 - 13 were recorded live in our front room. Rob and myself again, joined by Phil and Jon. And we used a whole pile of instruments, including hurdy gurdy, English bagpipes, Anglo and English concertina. Probably added a bit of echo, but nothing fancy in the way of effects or editing.

The tracks were -

8: "Captain Lanoe's Quick March"
9: Two French Schottiches
10: Mazurka
11: "Michael Turner's Waltz"
12: "Monck's March"
13: "Astley's Ride"

Track 14 was again recorded at home, Phil and myself tootling away playing two French tunes on English medieval-style bagpipes. The picture comes from a wedding at Lympne Castle. Echo added as above, perhaps a bit more enthusiastically!I've split the track into two on the website.