Music Acts
Blowins in the Wind from Sligo
The Blowins, as you can probably guess by the name are not from Sligo originally and include the band leader Hans Wieland from Germany.
They played to a full house at the 2015 DylanFest in Moville in the Market House (Town Clock) and according to the audience were one of the best bands ever to Play Moville’s DylanFest. This will be only their second appearance at the festival.
They are a 5/6 piece.
Al Diesen from Sardinia in Italy
Al Diesan comes every year from Sardinia in Italy to the DylanFest in Moville. It takes him and his wife six planes to get here and back as well as buses and taxis.
When Dylan fan Paddy the Shoe, from Moville, who has seen Dylan more than 40 times, saw Al for the first time he said “I think I prefer to hear Al nowadays rather than Dylan himself”. He said later “maybe I was exaggerating a bit – but not by much”.
He plays a different Dylan set each night of the festival and plays a lot of the less well known songs as well as the classics.
Jacques Mees from the Netherlands
Jacques is from The Netherlands and has played at the DylanFest in Moville several times but not for a few years. He will be making a long-awaited comeback this year.
A few years ago, Dylan Radio ran a competition to see who was the best Dylan Act in the world. The competition was worldwide and Jacque came 3rd out of more than 200 acts. He lost out in the semi final to the eventual winners from America.
So, the Jacques Attack will be back on this year. Jacques is a larger-than-life gregarious personality who loves to enjoy the festival immensely.
Michael Thomas from New York
Michael has played the keynote gig at the festival, Saturday Night in Rosatos for the past three years. Indeed he is already booked for it in 2018. He is a virtuoso guitarist.
Originally from New York he lives in Portstewart now. He played regularly with the late Henry McCullough ex of Paul McCartneys’ Wings and who was the only Irishman to play at Woodstock in his Greaseband days.
Slow Train Band from Milan in Italy
Previous star performers at the festival they have made two DylanFest appearances.
Steph Buhe from France
This year will see the long anticipated comeback to the DylanFest of Steph Buhe. He played the first two DylanFests in 2007 and 2008 but got children and settled down and hasn’t been back since. He is now ready to make his comeback. That’s great news for all his fans in Moville, of which there are many.
Steph plays all the Dylan Classics in his inimitable French style in the manner of Jacques Brel plays Bob Dylan.
When he played Rawdons in Moville in 2007 he had the whole audience singing along to the Dylan classics.
Luigi Catuogno from Italy
Luigi Catuogno does something very different. He plays Dylan in a classical guitar style, turning Dylan into a classical music composer almost without lyrics. He is well worth seeing at least once. He plays his Dylan music all over the world and this will be his first appearance at the DylanFest.
Bobby Does Dylan from Scotland
Bobby has actually met Dylan. Indeed, it was at Dylan’s own request. Bobby had set up to play the Oran Mor in Glasgow one year ( a venue of 9,000). It was a sunny day outside so he thought he would take his guitar outside and play.
It was like The Beatles on the Roof at Saville Row as people gatered around to hear his impromptu concert. Someone videoed it and put it on YouTube which came to Bob Dylan’s attention. He contacted Scotland’s top DJ and aked him “How can I find this Bobby Does Dylan?”.
So, it was arranged that Bobby would meet up with Bob next time he was in Glasgow. Bobby was given all sorts of instructions beforehand incuding not to let the press know.
Bobby was taken up to Dylan’s hotel suite. Said Bobby “I didn’t recognise him at first as there were quite a few other people in the suite, including some famous actors that I recognized.”
He and Dylan shook hands and sat down. “Thanks for playing my song Like A Rolling Stone” Bob said. Bobby told him that he was a massive fan of his.
“Are you doing well?” asked Bob. “Very well” said Bobby. At that Dylan cupped his hands, leaned over towards Bobby and said “Well you must owe me a lot of royalties then”. That took Bobby by surprise for an instant before Dylan laughed, very pleased with the reaction his quip got.
They sat talking for about 5 minutes till someone came up with something for Dylan to sign and Bobby was tapped on the shoulder and told “that’s it”.
Bobby has some fantastic equipment and has his own lights and sound engineers and a roadie too. He plays all the classics and really gets the audiences up jiving to Dylan songs. Not to be missed.
Egon from The Netherlands
Egon is a higly accomplished musician, emanating from the Netherlands, and living in Moville now. He has played several DylanFests in Moville, memorably, with Al Diesan in the Malin Road. He plays all over the area including many times in Derry.
GuidoBaldo Maria Riccardelli from Italy
Riccardo, as he is known, emanates for Cagliari in Sardinia like Al Diean. He played the 2014 DylanFest in Moville.
He had the worst luck of losing his luggage including his guitar and equipment on the way over to Moville so wasn’t able to put on the perforamce that he would have liked while he spent a lot of the time chasing up his gear from the airline.
He did manage to borrow some equipment and played but not as often as he would like. he is looking forward to showing an international audience this year how good he is.
Mickey the Hat from North Wales
The only DylanFest that Mickey has missed since the very first one was when he broke his arm a few years ago. “If it was my leg I broke I would still have come” he said memorably last year.
Mickey plays many of the less well known Dylan songs and sings them very sympathetically. He was a regular singer of “To Make You Feel My Love” before Adele found it.
Paddy the Shoe from Moville
Pady is arguably Moville’s best all-round musician playing many different instruments. Said his sister Carmel, “All Paddy wanted to do, even when he was a little boy, was play music”.
Despite being self-taught, himself, Paddy has brought up two generations of Moville youngster to play music and introduced them all to Dylan music in his role as school Principal and teacher.
Indeed, it was because there was so much Dylan music played in Moville, due to Paddy’s influence that the DylanFest was started in the first place.
Shaun Hiboy from Moville
Shaun, from Moville, has played many of the DylanFests there.
Shaun once went on a songwriting course run by Glen Hansard, and the song he wrote was picked out by Glen Hansard as the best. Sometimes play with Paddy the Shoe.
Gary Teer from Belfast
Said DylanFest organiser Gerry McLaughlin “Of all the acts that I’ve put on at the DylanFest, this is the only one that I never got to see. He only played once at one venue, McGettigan’s. However, those who saw him said he was sensational.
“Indeed one guy said that he was as good as Jacques Mees and that’s quite some compliment. After all Jacques was voted the 3rd best Dylan Act in the World by Dylan Radio listeners. We haven’t been able to get Gary back since then but he’ll be there this year in Derry. I won’t miss out this time”.
Ryan O’Dochartaigh from Derry
Ryan has played at previous DylanFests both as a duo and with a full band. Said organiser Gerry McLaughlin “I remember in one of the early years of the DylanFest that I attended a play about Dylan in the local Temperence Hall on the first night of the festival. There were not many people there.
“I remembering wondering whether many people had come for the festival that year. Would it be a flop? I looked in the back door of the Bar- A Cuda to see if there were many there. The whole place was packed out to see Ryan’s band. Not only that everybody was up on the floor jiving to Dylan songs”.
Ryan, whether he playing as a duo with Kevin Brown from Derry or in a full band, plays Dylan songs upbeat.
He and Kevin impressed so much at the DylanFest that they were given a regular gig at the iconic Rosatos Bar in Moville.
Possible
We will add more info when we know if the following are available to play this year or not.
Slow Train Band from Milan
Michale Moravic from Germany
Kevin Brown from Derry
String Fellas from Derry
Christopher Euesden Band Blonde on Bob from England