Cross-Channel Connections Britain and Brittany

Every summer in the middle of August, the black and white flag of Brittany flutters for three days over a field in the English countryside. Beneath it stands a comfortable campervan belonging to Dave Pegg, bass guitarist with legendary folk rock band Fairport Convention, and around it, the annual music festival that is Fairport’s Cropredy Convention. Gillian Thornton chats to Dave Pegg about his cross Channel connections and life in Brittany…

A Briton in Brittany

Launched nearly 40 years ago, initially as a fundraiser for Cropredy village church, this relaxed festival has always welcomed an eclectic mix of artistes from 10CC to Nile Rodgers, Ralph McTell to Robert Plant, with opening and closing sets always by the Fairports themselves.

So why the Breton flag? Nothing, it seems, to do with the band’s 1969 hit single, Si Tu Dois Partir, a French language version of the Bob Dylan classic, If You Gotta Go. The Brittany effect began in the mid-70s when celebrated Breton harpist Alan Stivell invited the late, great fiddle player – and Fairport member – Dave Swarbrick to play with him at the Royal Albert Hall. Beside them was Breton musician Dan ArBraz, who so impressed the Fairports that they recruited him on the spot.

‘Dan rented the next cottage to me in Cropredy and says it was me who taught him English, unfortunately with a Birmingham accent,’ laughs Peggy as he is affectionately known to family, friends and fans. ‘When Dan returned to Brittany, we visited him on holiday and soon fell in love with the region and its musical traditions.’

For 15 years, Peggy owned a holiday house at Penthièvre on the narrowest part of the Quiberon peninsula. He loved pottering round the tranquil Baie de Quiberon to the east in his catamaran and walking beside the Côte Sauvage on the wilder western shore, but eventually the summer traffic down this slim finger of France became too much. So in 2005, Peggy and his partner Ellen began house hunting.

I’ve enjoyed many a glass of French wine beneath that backstage festival flag in rural Oxfordshire and heard French conversations around the picnic table from guests such as Dan ArBraz and Anglo-French folk band The Churchfitters. So it’s a real treat to finally meet Peggy on home ground in the Breton department of Morbihan.

Today he and Ellen divide their time between Oxfordshire and a traditional 18^th century longhouse with lashings of period charm complemented by a bright modern extension and secluded garden. Barely half an hour from his former seaside home, Peggy’s inland pad stands in a farming hamlet so small that the address begins simply ‘Lieu dit …’ (known as). Head west for the bustling port of Lorient and east to the tranquil Ria d’Etel, a drowned riverbed with picturesque inlets and historic villages.

‘And we’re still close to incredible beaches like the huge arc of golden sand that stretches from Port Louis and Gâvres to the Quiberon peninsula,’ says Peggy, who happily admits to being a huge fan of Breton seafood.

One of the first thing they did on arrival was organise an apéro for their new neighbours, many of whom had never met each other. Today, it’s an annual ticketed event with food and live music in the true spirit of Breton musical events or ‘festnoz’.

‘I’ve always loved the way that traditional music is part of everyday life in Brittany,’ says Peggy. ‘Kids start playing in a bagad – or pipe band – from an early age, and the music evolves as they introduce contemporary instruments like bass guitars.

‘There’s nothing like a Breton music festival and there’s a great one in Lorient every August, but sadly it’s the same weekend as Cropredy. So I bring a bit of Brittany back to Oxfordshire with me!’

By Gillian Thornton, one of the UK’s leading travel writers and a regular writer for The Good Life France Magazine and website.