Stuart and Denise Savage (Special Event)

The Shellbackers from Sussex Are BackTraditional singers and musicians DENISE AND STUART SAVAGE have performed on the English folk scene since the early 1960s. Their first love is English traditional folk song and some early music hall material, mainly parlour ballads. More recently they have written a number of their own songs, which reflect the traditional style. Material is both accompanied (guitar, English concertina, and mandola) and unaccompanied harmony.Their concerts as a duo are highly varied with the emphasis on entertainment as well as historical interest. Their well balanced voices blend with instruments and harmony and have gained them much respect, particularly in the south of England. They have performed largely as a duo, but also in various group combinations. These include ?Formerly Grubb Street? a five part a capella harmony group and ?Gaslight Follies? with Jim Ward and Iris Bishop, which combined traditional and early music hall material. Their first trip to the USA in 2003 with Shellback Chorus encouraged them to make this return visit in 2004.Denise was born in South Africa and moved to the UK in 1953. She became involved in the folk music revival while residing in the county of Sussex.Stuart was born in Petworth , West Sussex, in 1943. (Petworth is in the heart of an area of southern England which provided a rich source of material for early collectors such as Lucy Broadwood, Cecil Sharp and more recently, the Copper family.)