Interview - Founder member on the ever evolving journey of Fairport Convention and playing Harrogate

Flashback to Fairport Convention 1998, the line-up set to tour again in 2023 - From left Dave Mattacks, Chris Leslie, Ric Sanders, Dave Pegg, Simon Nicol.

“I was always the baby of the band. I’m no longer that,” Fairport Convention’s Simon Nichol tells the Harrogate Advertiser.

“No. But at 72 you are very young to be in a legendary band that’s been going since the 1960s,” I reply.

Currently on tour as part of The Albion Christmas Band’s 22nd annual tour, fans of Britain’s premier folk rock band will get the chance to see Nichol’s trademark youthful spirit in action again when Fairport Convention’s 2023 UK tour hits Harrogate in February, if they can’t wait until the group returns to its own long-standing Cropredy Festival in August.

Not only does Nichol, who as a 16-year-old guitarist helped found the pioneering band in May 1967 alongside Richard Thompson and Ashley Hutchings, retain his musical skills more than five decades later, his sense of humour is also intact.

The album cover of Fairport Convention's classic Liege & Lief which was released in 1969.

"I’m the only original member now but I’m no longer in original condition,” Nichol volunteers in the manner of a man who has seen and done it all.

In fact, he says, it’s just the opposite.

Fairport Convention may have gone through an incredible list of line-up changes but they are short on the sort of rock n roll gossip that fills music biographies.

"We’ve never really been troubled by aspects of the music business that are less enjoyable,” says Nichol.

"We’ve never been ripped off.

“We’ve never been in a drugs scandal.

"We have our own management and own record label.

"We are entirely autonomous.”

Fairport Convention will be delving deeply into their vast back catalogue – including their most recent album Shuffle and Go which was released in 2020 – when they step on stage at the Royal Hall.

It’s then that Simon Nichol pauses on the line to make a point that clearly means a lot to him.

"The thing about the Fairports is that we’ve always avoided turning ourselves into our own tribute act.

"Mind you, as we didn’t have a string of hits to try to recreate, that was never an issue!

"We’re not ashamed of our past but we’re not slaves to it.

"That’s what makes us different from the other 60s bands we started with.”

Today’s music critics may lionise Fairport Convention’s seminal Liege & Lief album, recorded in 1969 after a horrific car crash on the M1 on the way home from a gig, perhaps the only major drama in their story, but there never has been only one Fairport Convention.

Born in Muswell Hill in 1950, Simon Nichol outlines a way of seeing things rare among famous bands.

"When someone leaves the band, we never try to replace like for like.

"When Richard Thompson left in 1971 we didn’t think “we’ve got to find a new Richard Thompson”.

"Every time there has been a change, it’s been an opportunity.”

Touring these days with Dave Pegg, Ric Sanders, Chris Leslie and, now, Dave Mattacks after the decision by Gerry Conway to hang up his sticks, the youthful Nichol says he loves life on the road more than ever.

"My favourite time of the year is touring.

"We are all genuinely really good friends.

"We travel in a little pack together and play to people.

"It’s an honour and a joy.”

For tickets for Fairport Festival’s 2023 tour and Cropredy Festival, visit https://www.fairportconvention.com/