Ahead of his show at the Castle Hotel on 16 February, Hey! Manchester catches up with Portland guitarist and composer Ryan Francesconi to discuss his guitar style, Joanna Newsom and what we’ll be ordering for him at the bar…

Hey Ryan, how’s your year going so far?

Well, so far it’s great. All 11 days of it. This tour is the kick off event of the year! I’m replying to your questions here on United flight 928 en route to Europe from Portland. [We should add that this epic response was written via iPhone... Ryan joked of getting 'touchscreen tendinitis' and having to cancel the tour.]

Is this upcoming tour your first solo visit to Europe? Are you looking forward to any cities or venues in particular (you don’t have to say Manchester!)?

No, I’ve done some one off things and smaller runs – but this is the first proper tour doing the solo guitar Parables music in Europe. I’m happy with all of the events and cities – in particular, getting to spend a bit of time in cobbled Flandrian Belgium is always something to look forward to. Aside from a tiny house show in Ghent (I love that sort of thing) and a great show at the AB in Brussels, I get to be in the holy land of bike-racing shortly before the spring classics season begins. I’m there just a tad early to catch any races unfortunately!

To begin the tour, my girlfriend and I will take the train from Budapest and head west. That will be a magical snowy old-world adventure of sorts. Or… a suitcase dragging over icy cobbles, trudging through freezing rain, lugging a too heavy guitar case on my back, getting lost in southern Bohemia. I’ll let you know which happened when I see you.

You’re also joining Joanna Newsom for her continental Europe tour this month. How did you come to work with her?

We’ve been collaborating since 2006. We’re both from northern California and had met previously at a folk music camp in 2005. I was really impressed by her improvisation ideas over a few jams we had. I hadn’t heard her songs before, but they later became the soundtrack of that summer. We kept in touch, then the following summer she had an idea for a folk band ensemble to perform the material from Ys. It was the first time she had decided to put together a band and she wasn’t expecting anyone to play the Van Dyke scores… but that seemed like a fun idea to me, so we gave it a go. I kind of by default ended up the caretaker of complicated challenges after that. And there have been many! I’ve kept rearranging all the scores and writing new ones since depending on the touring lineup.

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