TRACKS

Dilettante at Last Train at Home, image by Rob Irish

DARLINGTON MUSIC COLLECTIVE TRACKS HAVE EMBRACED REAL LIFE AND VIRTUAL EVENTS THROUGHOUT THIS TUMULTUOUS YEAR, SARAH WILSON EXPLAINS WHY IT’S BEEN SO IMPORTANT TO KEEP REGIONAL MUSICIANS IN PAID WORK

It’s been such a stressful, heartbreaking year for many of us. I think we have veered between feeling absolutely gutted to feeling like we must follow our gut instincts, which is to continue to create music events in whatever form we can. We have spent a lot of the year embracing our new role as filmmakers (which Rob Irish was excellent at anyway, but I have certainly had a lot to learn!)

Music has a wonderful way of lifting people’s moods. When we started hosting busking-style outdoor performances after the first lockdown, it was so lovely to see people’s smiles when they heard the musicians singing in the streets, as for many it was the first live music they’d seen in a long time.

It is more important now than ever to support musicians. One of our biggest fears is that after Covid has faded away, so many people from the music world just won’t be there any more. They will have had to take work elsewhere and the music scene will be a far less rich landscape because of it.

When it comes to the events we’ve run, I think we have been quite cautious as we simply don’t have the finances to attempt to run an event and all the costs that are incurred in setting one up without the certainty that it would actually be going ahead. In that respect we have embraced creating interesting online content.

Our online event Last Train At Home was pretty special. It felt very emotional to see Ceiling Demons, Shakk, Eve Conway and Dilettante all play live whilst it was being filmed. We were all feeling very emotional having not seen live music for such a long time. Also filming it in such an atmospheric place as Darlington’s Head Of Steam Museum added to the vibe.

As for the future, like many independent promoters, we will be treading carefully, especially for the first half of 2021. We have some plans for some great online content including more Hark! events, Noisy Daughters workshops, more BIG Little Gigs and also hopefully some exciting hip-hop events working with Legitimate Anarchy. Going forward, we really hope to see the return of Mish Mash Festival in Darlington Market Square in August and our Last Train Home Festival in September. Fingers firmly crossed!

www.tracksdarlington.co.uk