James Dumbleton, who played at last Saturday’s Folkal Point. (0963186)

The future of Guernsey Folk music looked uncertain back in 2000.

A folk club that limped from venue to venue, a dearth of young local talent and a festival that breathed its last in a pub car park.

The future was not bright.

But wait – rumours of folk music’s extinction have been grossly exaggerated.

A good-sized crowd of young and not so young (I knew and had played with some of them) gathered at the Fermain Tavern last Saturday for Folkal Point.

For the uninitiated, this is the monthly gathering to raise awareness and bit of cash for this year’s Sark Folk Festival, on the weekend of 1-3 July if you’re interested.

On an all-local bill we had a couple of bright young things and two elder statesmen. James Dumbleton kicked things off on a very homely stage set comprising pot plants and table lamps and entertained us regally with a selection of self-penned material showing some nice Joni Mitchell influences in his two stand-out songs (in my opinion), Path and Stuck In a Hole. On closer inspection I noticed that James had dispensed with his shoes for his set. This is folk for the new millennium, foot odour obviously not an issue – something I would not have attempted back in ‘my day’.

After the obligatory ‘stage fiddling’, Jamie-Lee was up next. I was alerted to his talents a while ago and he didn’t disappoint.

Here is a unique artist who uses the guitar not only in the method for which it was designed but also as a percussive device.

Aterrific set (note to organisers – next time, turn the PA up full so they hear the music at the back). He has a CD out soon.

The last of the ‘billed’ musicians were Rob McGhee and Martin Spoelstra.

What can you say about these two?

They have probably played more gigs than you and I have had hot dinners and seen more changes in folk music than both of them would care to own up to. Rob’s voice is as still and strong and rich as it was 20 years ago and Martin’s playing as versatile as ever, traditional folk at its best.

A nice touch to the evening was the open mike session which followed Rob and Martin. No rendition of  Wild Rover though… I’ll bring my guitar next time.