The Unfinished Violin – carved by Richard S Howard, played by Sam Sweeney at York NCEM
Rich and Dexter and I had a terrific night out this week at York NCEM to see Sam Sweeney perform his album The Unfinished Violin. Sam has put a superb band together for the show, with beautiful and powerful renditions of all the tunes on his album. He tells the amazing and moving story of how he bought the violin ten years ago the day after it was completed. The pieces of the violin had been carved in 1915 by a luthier and musician from Harehills in Leeds called Richard Howard. Richard went to fight in the Great War and sadly didn’t return. The pieces were lost for 90 years when they turned up at a car boot sale in Manchester. They were put together by luthier Roger Claridge who completed the violin the day before Sam went into his shop to look for a new fiddle.
Needless to say the performance was captivating, poignant yet uplifting and beautifully played from the first note to the last.
Rich took this gallery of photos, have a scroll through…
We’ve been listening to The Unfinished Violin since it was released last year, but we treated ourselves to a couple of Sam’s previous albums, all excellent, and also his double bassist Ben Hillier’s album Kings of the South Seas. Fantastic to find something new too, I’ve played it over and over this week.
Visit Sam Sweeney’s website here
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