Squaring the circle with skiffle: Van Morrison on returning to the music that inspired him
Van Morrison recently released Moving On Skiffle.
Past the red carpet, next to the main reception, a door opens at Belfast’s prestigious Europa Hotel. Van Morrison exits the lift and a 70-year-old lady’s day has been made. “My two sons won’t believe I’ve shared a lift with Van the man,” she tells me in a friendly Scouse accent.“They both picked Van songs as the first dance at their weddings.”
We are here to see the Belfast Cowboy launch his 44th long-player, Moving On Skiffle, a tribute to the movement that inspired Morrison, as well as The Beatles and many others, all introduced to the idea of forming a band when Lonnie Donegan released ‘Rock Island Line’ in 1956. Originating in the US, skiffle became hugely popular in the UK in the 1950s, as British musicians melded jazz to a genre that hitherto had a distinctively folkish feel.
