Finland foursome debut at The Jam House

One of the smash hits of the 2012 Edinburgh Fringe Festival will be opening their debut UK tour at Birmingham’s Jam House.

Fork band

Fork will be bringing their stunning glam-rock look and ‘a cappella’ repertoire to the live music and dining venue in St Paul’s Square on Thursday, March 21.

The foursome from Finland are aiming to thrill the audience with their ability to produce pristine vocals and instrumental sounds using only their voices.

Their ‘electro vocal’ show will see them performing contemporary covers from the likes of Coldplay, Queen, David Guetta and Lady Gaga, adding their own twist and spicing up their act with glamorous costumes and plenty of humour.

Dubbed by ‘The Herald Scotland’ newspaper as “Finland’s answer to Abba”, Fork was founded in 1996 by three theatre students, Mia Hafrén, Silva Lillrank and Jonte Ramsten, along with police cadet Kasper Ramström.

Kasper Ramström says: “We were four friends who had dreams of forming a rock band of our own. Although we could all sing none of us could play any instruments so we decided to start an ‘a cappella’ band.”

Mia Hafrén adds: “For our first show we started with three songs and the audience were so excited by them that we had to come back out and do all three songs again. That’s when we thought ‘maybe we have something here’.”

Mia admits that she finds it “quite difficult” to explain in words what Fork do: “Audiences tend to arrive a little skeptical about the idea of four Finns trying to do some rock ‘a cappella’ but they end up laughing, dancing, clapping and singing along. So I think people can expect to have a really good time.”

Approaching their tenth year as full-time performers, Silva Lillrank has been replaced by professional singer Anna Asunta, while the band – with the help of talented sound engineer Gregory Maisse – now performs at clubs, theatres and casinos worldwide.

Kasper says: “We are looking forward to starting our debut UK tour at the Jam House. We will be performing a scaled down version of our theatre act to meet the constraints of a smaller stage, but that will make it more intimate and more fun.”

John Bunce, Jam House General Manager, said: “We are delighted to provide the launch pad for the debut UK tour of a unique and supremely talented band that I’m sure we’ll hear a lot more of. This is an entertainment opportunity not to be missed.”

Tickets to see Fork on Thursday, March 21 are available priced at £5 (plus 10% booking fee) on the website here: www.thejamhouse.com.