Jonathan Prag at the Edinburgh Fringe - Tickets now on sale

Great excitement - word has come that tickets have gone on sale for this year's Edinburgh Festival Fringe.
Buy Tickets to Jonathan Prag Classical Guitar

Classical Guitar and bananas in Otley and Halifax

The acoustic at Otley Courthouse Theatre is just right. It actually was a courthouse and there is a

dressing room, Square Chapel Theatre

sweet spot on stage which is exactly where the judge used to sit. Glen, my expert technician, showed me and it was extraordinary - if I moved my chair a few inches back  the difference was amazing. There were some nice photos done of me playing during the concert (and also of me pretending to be locked up - playing my guitar in one of the police cells, three of which have been preserved upstairs).
In Halifax the Square Chapel is very impressive in size and has a lofty wide space flooded with light from enormous windows. It's a beautiful building and one of the only square chapels ever built. I needed my amp in there but I didn't turn it up to 11. The sound was really warm and just a bit of amplification was all it needed. Great audiences in both venues and lovely house managers and teams of stewards and technicians. I wish I still had the photos. This phone picture of me tuning up just before going on is the only one I've got though because the camera bag was nicked out of the car in literally one minute - the minute before we went back out to the car to get it after we'd brought most of the stuff in. They bashed the passenger window in and took the camera and my bananas.

We had been going to stay the night after the gig and were planning to get a curry first at Ziggy's Spice House, which is the best Indian restaurant in Halifax apparently. But with no passenger window and only the car to keep the stuff in we had to drive home instead. As there were no bananas to sustain us we had to eat Big Macs and chips and wrap our heads up to combat the very blustery draught. Never mind - there's always next year. And we'd had a superb curry in Red Pepper - a lovely place in Otley, so we'll live.

Gigs in Yorkshire

I'm off to Yorkshire. First I have a gig to do on the South coast tomorrow and then I aim to drive part of the way to Otley and stop over somewhere halfway up, Northampton-ish let's say, have a good sleep and a nice big breakfast on Friday morning

The guitar is ready

and finish the drive on Friday so I can arrive in good condition. The guitar is all ready - I put new strings on a few days ago and they are well played in now.
Otley looks like a beautiful town and Otley Courthouse theatre, where I'll be performing, looks awesome. We're lucky to have friends in the area so will be driving to their house after the gig - after the highly necessary curry that is. I don't think I can drive all the way to Otley, perform a concert and then not go out and have a curry.  I've been investigating local breweries in that area too...  there is the vital question of which local brews to sample.

Sampling the local brews is pretty much an obligation I think

I've got Saturday off - during which I will get the chance to see my friends and maybe do a bit of ale sampling and as it's the Holmefirth  festival of Folk I'll be visiting that. I'll definitely be going to hear Michael J Tinker playing at 4.30 pm - I am just assuming I'll be able to find him -  I'm not sure where it is but he's on at The Red Deer. The Gerry McNeice Band is on as well - And on Sunday I'll still be there and if you're in the area come and listen to Sarah Horn and James Cudworth - great musicians -  performing outside Hervey's, from around 2pm. I've just got time to sample some ale (modest pre-gig amount) and hear some music before it's off to my own gig - to play some Bartok and Bach and flamenco and Villa Lobos and all the rest of my programme in Halifax.
I'm performing there at Square Chapel Arts Centre and I notice that just above me in the what's on list is what looks like a very nice beer festival which I will have missed. Ah well - I'm sure I shall have had some very good local brews by then.