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**The Delgados will play a set with two string quartets, a brass section,
timpani and tubular bells at a major folk music festival in Glasgow this week.**
The band have been asked to headline one night at the Celtic Connections
festival, Scotland's biggest festival of traditional and folk music. The
Lanarkshire band played with a full orchestral line-up at the Royal Festival
Hall in London last year, when they were joined by veteran Scottish folk-rockers
The Incredible String Band.
Drummer Paul Savage explained: "It might have been the Incredible String
Band connection that prompted them to ask, I suppose. But we're really pleased,
as we're hardly in the folk category."
Savage added: "This will probably be the last time we'll play 'The Great
Eastern' set in full, so we're going out in style. There'll be 17 musicians
involved, including two string quartets, and a percussionist playing tubular
bells and timpani, as well as a couple of brass players."
The group originally wanted to invite Gorky's Zygotic Mynci to support them, but
the Welsh band were unable to make the gig at The Old Fruitmarket on 20th
January.
Savage said: "We considered getting [Gorky's] in for the gig, but when they
couldn't do it we remembered Arab Strap's acoustic set in Edinburgh at
Christmas." And he warned that the woolly jumper brigade could be in for an
ear-bashing, adding, "I don't think either band will be toning things down
for the folk fans, which could be interesting."
