Saturday 18 October 2014 - Stringybark Sustainability Festival, Rowville (#102)

Another trip down to Melbourne saw us playing two sets at the Stringybark Sustainability Festival in Rowville, in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs. A strong wind and bouncy stage made for somewhat less than ideal conditions, but we soldiered on. Since we had no drummer for the day, we asked the guys from the next act (the Drumming Monkeys) if they would play tchembe for us in the first set and they were keen to oblige. While there was a small crowd filling all the available straw bale seating in front of the tent, they were rather unresponsive, and so we ended up applauding ourselves after most of the songs.

After a short break, we returned for our second set which was to include a hands-on workshop. However, the Drumming Monkeys were late finishing their act and so we only had 20 minutes for a couple of numbers and the workshop. Luckily, those who wanted to take part in the workshop were quite enthusiastic, and they had a good time learning a little bit about how to play a steel pan.