2024
1 June 2024 – Epsom – Post Derby private party
18 March 2024 – Kemsing – The Bell
10 March 2024 Barny’s, Stroud – my third booking at this excellent listening club.
9 March 2024 – Kent Chamber Choir – Saturday Afternoon Concert in Meopham – solo slot – I think my 7th solo slot for the choir
Thursday 7 March 2024 – Sidcup – Conservative Club
Saturday 2 March 2024 at Longfield Village Hall – a Dance with the Aqueducts Ceilidh Band. A splendid return visit from last year’s very enjoyable event
28 January 2024 Cancer Charity Concert at Sidcup Rugby Club
2023
12 December 2023 New Ash Green Hub Christmas Party
9/10 Dec 2023. Ash cum Ridley – afternoons – Background music for the Tree Festival
4 December 2023 Bob Hope at the Oaks, Sidcup – floor spot
12 Nov 2023. Remembrance Day Evening Event tbc Ash
21 October 2023. Ash Church. Autumn Poetry Event
17 October 2023 PJs at Sidcup Rugby Club
PAST GIGS
15 October 2023. Plumstead Concert for Cancer Research
9 Sept 2023. York – Escrick Park, Samma and Leo’s Wedding
4 September 2023. Bob Hope Theatre, Eltham floor – spots
28 August 2023. Teddy’s Tower of Terror at Ash Church
Thanks to all our friends who came along to the Kent Chamber Choir Concert. It was a great night and almost a sell-out.
15 July 2023 Kent Chamber Choir, Ash cum Ridley – Soloist
2 July 2023 Aquaducts Ceilidh Band Golders Hill Park London
5 June 2023 Jean Bentley accompanied by Frank McConnell at The Bob Hope Theatre, Eltham
12 May 2023 Friday Night is Music Night, Church Centre, Hartley, Kent I will be doing a solo spot and accompanying Jean Bentley in her solo spot.
3 April 2023 The Bob Hope Theatre, Eltham – feature spot
11 March 2023 Kent Chamber Choir, Faversham – Soloist
4 March 2023 Aquaducts Ceilidh Band, Church Centre, Hartley, Kent
12 February 2023 Barny’s, Stroud, with excellent support from Dik Cadbury whom I last worked with many years ago in the recording studio.
2022
December 2022 included Ruskin House in Croydon with Jean Bentley and a New Year’s Eve ceilidh withThe Aquaducts at The Cryer Centre, Carshalton. I also played for the Christmas Tree Festival at Ash Church, nr Sevenoaks.
Sunday, 24th July 2022, early afternoon. Jean Bentley and Frank McConnell at Gardenview, 6 Edward Road, Biggin Hill TN16 3HL for Freda Davis in her lovely garden. Entry fee – for charity.
Thank you to a lovely audience at the Kent Chamber Choir concert at Yalding. What a pleasure to be able to contribute.
What a great Flower Festival with a splendid concert to kick off the weekend.
Just for a change, I played a programme entirely of instrumentals with entertainment via appreciation rather than a straight ‘fun entertainment’ set.
WHEN LIFE COMES BACK TO NORMAL… There’s the first line of a song if I ever heard one…
Hopefully, life is coming back to normal now and… At last, and finally, the gigs are starting to come back in after the lengthy Covid era along with the surprise interruption for me of an appendectomy/peritonitis in June 2021.
October in Peacehaven – The Mayor’s Community Day – a ceilidh with The Aquaducts
July 16 Yalding in Kent – Soloist – Kent Chamber Choir Concert
July 15 Wedding – Swanley
June 26 Parliament Hill Fields with The Aqueducts
June 24 Ash Church – Kent – Flower Festival Preview Concert with the Cinque Ports Five
June 11 Carshalton Festival – CryerFest
June 4 Private Party with Jean Bentley
June 3 Gravesend’s ancient Borough Market, High Street, Gravesend at 2pm with Jean Bentley
June 2 Golders Hill Park with The Aqueducts
May 18 Croft Tea Rooms, St Mary Cray with Jean Bentley
May 7 Private Party – with Jean Bentley. That was fun, with The Goodhearts, The Caramellos and a good crowd.
A Load of COVID CANCELLED gigs …
16 May 2020 Marden, Soloist for the Kent Chamber Choir.
Sorry, I couldn’t do the return for CRIBS on the 16th after their lovely evening in Hextable last year.
19 March 2020 Box Hill with The Aqueducts
13 March 2020 Carshalton with The Aqueducts
but the Cafe Dolce Vita was great!
11 March 2020 Petts Wood, Cafe Dolce Vita with Jean Bentley
A return booking for Jean and I for this afternoon gig. Nice place the Dolce Vita – come along. The Club now meets in the Lutheran Church round the corner.
8 March 2020 Maidstone Soloist for the Kent Chamber Choir
This will be my third solo spot for the Chamber Choir and my fourth classical choir invite.
29 February 2020 Ash near Sevenoaks Leap into Spring with Jean Bentley, Johnny G and Tony Field
A full house for an evening of relaxing love songs for the Leap Year.
25 February 2020. Bexleyheath with Jean Bentley
December 2021. Ash Church Tree Festival
Crumbling into history…
25 January 2020 Milland, near Liphook with the Aqueducts
Good to be back in Milland as they follow their two year cycle of barn dances.
24 January 2020 Reading University with The Aqueducts…
An annual event it seems! We’ve done 5 or 6 of these.
14 December 2019 Ash nr Sevenoaks Tree Festival
15 December 2019 Ash nr Sevenoaks Tree Festival…
The highly successful Tree Festival gives me a chance to chat with a number of people during the weekend and play carols and other Christmas songs on both days.
8 December 2019 Kensington Ceilidh with the Aqueducts
30 November 2019 Plumstead with Tideway and more…
Many thanks to Paul Nichols and his colleagues for filling the hall with a great listening audience. Lots of fun!
26 October 2019, it was great fun to play some music during the New Ash Green Art Exhibition stepping in for Jeff Smith who wasn’t well on the day. That’s what New Ash Green is like! Full of artists, musicians, poets, guitarists…
Barny’s, Stroud on 27th October was excellent! Jo and Karina run a great club and if you are in their area, you must go along. Theirs is a listening audience par excellence. Right from the first offering, I knew this was going to be fun – and it was. Thank you all for helping me to flow and enjoy the whole event.
Johnny Coppin played Walking with Nicole and Won’t You Come Along With Me on Radio Gloucestershire as a promo for Barny’s and was kind enough come along for the whole evening. I know that Barny’s had been hoping that Dik Cadbury might be along too. Dik and Johnny played together in the folk-rock band Decameron some years ago and are touring together with their Christmas show soon. Dik worked with us as Pisces and played on some of our recordings. I have a vague feeling we did a support for the Albion Band too. Certainly we were introduced to each other by Alex Atterson during a tour of the Norwich area.
I think Johnny’s show goes out on a regional basis throughout the BBC Radio Gloucestershire, BBC Radio Bristol, BBC Somerset and BBC Wiltshire areas..
Man of Straw
Wow!, John Cunningham’s Man of Straw at Chelsfield’s Five Bells on the 11th of October was something else! Fabulous performance of a story as John called it.
Quite an honour to be able to finish off the evening for John. Good night!
21 September 2019, Portsmouth was a good dance – for a wedding reception of an older couple.
RUBY ROCKS… thank you to Andy Forrest for his generous write up in advance of the music festival.
“…Ruby Rocks Music Festival, and we are very lucky to have Frank McConnell to start the festival off… Frank is a fantastic guitar player who kindly played on my last album. He has written many songs and recorded several albums. He plays and sings all types of music, especially folk, so don’t miss him.” Andy Forrest – The Old Vigo Inn, Vigo, Kent
Pics from Ruby Rocks on August Bank Holiday Monday 2019 which raised £5351 for Ruby. A baking hot day with a decent crowd at Andy Forrest’s Old Vigo Inn venue. A brilliant effort all round for a little girl. Thanks to Pavel Artiouk for the pics. I got dancers!!!
FREDAS GARDEN… (twice this summer) was as lively and as lovely as it always is. Freda opens her garden to visitors and to support the NSPCC – long may she bloom.
Lovely concert by the Kent Chamber Choir in Hothfield near Ashford in Kent with a very appreciative musically knowledgeable full church. A delight to do! Another one coming up in early March 2020, this one in Maidstone.
Thanks very much to the crowd of friends and regulars who came along to the Cafe Dolce Vita in Petts Wood. Jean Bentley and I had a great afternoon and we’ll be there again on March 11th 2020. It’s an interesting place, the CDV, with great cakes!
8th September 2019 Royal Oak, New Ash Green with Jean Bentley for the 50th Anniversary of New Ash Green Football Club. I used to play for them! A great turn out and after all these years, I nearly recognised one or two of my OLD team mates.
I played a concert in Otford Methodist Church for the Kent Chamber Choir on March 2nd 2019, with French and Spanish music from the 16th C, a Welsh folk song to mark St David’s Day on March 1st, and my own Llynfi valley inspired Lletty Brongu.
Great night at Chelsfield with their Mighty 45. Steve Ball is a brilliant host. Many thanks to the friends who came along – the house was full! It’s so good to have a listening audience. Thank you.
The barn dance in Kensington was excellent with a big crowd dancing all night.
I spend a lot of time these days at my favourite clubs and open mics around North West Kent and having fun in The Aqueduct Ceilidh Band with my good friends Sarah, Chris and Mike. Between us, we have around 150 years experience at Barn Dances, Ceilidhs, Wedding Receptions, Birthday Parties, Anniversaries, School Events, Corporate Does, you name it – we’ll play there. It’s always great fun and even more so for those crowds who have never done a dance before. How many times have we happily heard at the end of a dance – ‘I’ve never been to one of these before, they’re great fun!’
We have a web site http://www.aqueductcb.co.uk . Here’s a photo from a Scottish dance we did – Burns Nights are a speciality!
I look as though the haggis has been having an effect and I’ve lost bit of weight since then! Here’s the proof in this more recent photograph from a Russian event in London where we were again playing Scottish music (don’t ask!) 
Heaven knows what the plastic thing says. I only knew which way round to hold it because of the bit that said 2018.
If you are planning a ceilidh at some stage in the future, please bear in mind that The Aqueducts is a popular band and get booked in advance for special dates;
Take a look at The Aqueducts
I’ll also be at various clubs and open mics as usual; The Bell in Kemsing and Eltham’s Bob Hope Theatre are nice. I like Lime Meadow in Sanderstead too and Ted was asking me to do a gig for Orpington Folk Club – I’m sure we’ll get around to that. If there are Richmond fans of the Hanging Lamp about, you might be pleased to know that I was talking to Pixie a few weeks back and we met in Stroud in the autumn. These last few months have been great for meeting old friends. I might do a little tour of Scandinavia? Well, Doug Mortar and I briefly mentioned it. Met a great guy from Manchester whilst we were in France – that could be a good gig. Amsterdam looms with another singer we met and shared a couple of reds with. Montreuil in northern France has an interesting venue too. Let’s see!