Hi FolkCasters, it’s Folkie Phil here wishing you a Happy New Year.

We all have our own New Year traditions. Some like to drink til dawn. Some like to be in bed early … and to get home by midnight. Me, I like to see the New Year in with a dram or two, and to watch the live music and Hogmanay celebrations from BBC Scotland and BBC Alba TV. But once all that has finished, and the fireworks have fizzed and popped their last, what then? That’s when I turn to The Last Hurrah, our ever-expanding, ever-evolving collection of music for the turning of the year.

The latest revision of the show is available now from folkcast.co.uk and this year we’ve broken the two hour barrier! That means that the show is a huge file of more than 100mb, and I didn’t want to send something that massive to you as a podcast. Instead, I invite you to visit our website and either stream it from there by clicking the play button, or if you choose, to download it by clicking download.

The show will only be available for a few days, and I hope you have the time to enjoy the great party music and songs about endings, and beginnings.

Who knows what the next 12 months will bring us, or where we’ll be blown to by this time next year, but here’s hoping it’s as good as we could hope for, and far better than we might fear. FolkCast will return in January to bring you the latest and greatest in folk, folk-rock, singer-songwriter and roots music so, until I next poke my digits into your ear, have a Happy New Year, enjoy the Last Hurrah, and Fare Thee Well.