Sillertides

Linn Phipps is a UK-based traditional folk singer in Scottish Gaelic and English.  She sings lyrical songs of love, loss, and landscape, and performs regularly – in English and in Gaelic – at ceilidhs, Burns nights and singarounds.  She has performed on cruise ships (strictly amateur unpaid) with ocean-related songs and extended her repertoire to whaling songs so as to perform in Canada, Greenland, and the Antarctic.

During the year of Covid lockdowns, Linn has zoom-connected with singers and singing groups all over the world.  She sings as a regular at Zoom-sings stretching from Australia through the United States and on to Ireland, UK, and France.  Linn also sings Sea shanties with shanty groups originating in the USA and UK, and leads her own Ladies’ Shanty Group, with members in the US and UK.  She co-founded and co-hosts regular UK-based sings in English and Gaelic, both of which are delighted to welcome USA singers as regulars.

Doug Huggins’ introduction to folk music came in the 1960’s, as a pre-teen boy soprano, singing harmony with his older sister and a girlfriend of hers in a suburb of Los Angeles, CA.   The rise of artists and performers like Joan Baez, Buffy Sainte Marie, Bud and Travis, Burl Ives, The Kingston Trio and Ian and Sylvia formed much of his early musical education.  Later when attending college in Nashville, Tennessee, he took up the five-string banjo and moved into bluegrass, adding that influence to his earlier 60’s Folksong Revival background, with influences from Flat and Scruggs, and Bill Monroe, The Stoneman Family, and Buck White and the DownHomers.

With much joy, Linn discovered live zoom-shared-singing.  Many folksongs and ballads are built around a conversation between two or more characters, often lovers, master and servant, parent and child, married couples, or adversaries, for example.  These songs lend themselves well to being sung by two or more different people, clearly differentiating the characters and bringing them to life.  While in-person singing – and simultaneous duet-harmonies on zoom – are not yet possible, it is very feasible to do live zoom shared-singing of these dialogues with a song partner 5,000 miles away.  Linn’s special zoom-singing partner, Doug, lives in Colorado, and although they have never met in person, Linn and Doug have developed a rapport and a repertoire, and have been performing shared songs since August 2020.  They regularly delight their listeners with new interpretations of songs sung in a “conversation” or “call and response” style.  Their shared songs have become a special feature at zoom sings.  The organizer of the recent Spring Harmony festival said that their video concert performance had received “rave reviews.”  You can hear and see several for yourself at https://linnphippsfolk.co.uk/music/#collabs where Linn has posted some shared song Collaborations on her website.