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| Denny wearing Bonnet and Shawl? (Photo: Simon Meeds) |
Last week's Dragon Folk Club session saw a very rare appearance from Alison: non-singing but nevertheless welcome. There was no theme and an eclectic bunch of songs was sung.
There will be no official theme again this week, but as usual feel free to bring your own or we can allow something to develop through the evening.
The reason for Alison's presence was Simon's birthday, and the session was started and finished with Happy birthday to you. Of course, this song is problematic for the scribe, because it is probably included in roud 36104, which appears to be a bucket for unloved songs, and it is controversially attributed to Patty and Mildred J. Hill who wrote Good Morning to All.
The session proper started with Colin singing Ben Backstay (roud 21256).
Deny's first song of the evening was Graeme Miles' Drift from the land (*) and Paul's was Generations of change (Matt Armour).
On the face of it Stan gave us a new song: AP Carter's I never will marry (*), but according to the Roud Folk Song Index it is a version of the oft-sung Forsaken mermaid (roud 466, laws K17). I assume there was an interim American version since Carter is well-known for having taken traditional songs and, under instruction from his publishers, making very minor changes before claiming copyright.
Simon completed the first rotation with Jez Lowe's The Bergen.
Colin had us singing along to Sail away ladies (roud 17635). I didn't take enough notes to be sure, but I think it was the Uncle Dave Macon version rather than the hit version from The Vipers Skiffle Group and Lonnie Donegan among others, Don`t You Rock Me Daddy-O (Bill Varley, Wally Whyton). I believe Colin has sung both in the past and I was singing too hard to take note of which it was.
Stan introduced us to another "new" song in Earth Angel (* Curtis Williams, Jesse Belvin, Gaynel Hodge), from the singing of The Penguins. I knew I recognised the song. It could well be because I used to be, and still am to some extent, a fan of 50s and early 60s music, but could it also be because it was used in Back to the Future - here.
Stan was full of new songs for the database, giving us My buddy (* Walter Donaldson, Gus Kahn), first recorded in 1922 by Henry Burr and later by Mario Lanza among many others, and then Eileen (Sylvia Fine, Max Liebman). Fine, who was Danny Kaye's wife, is credited with the lyrics. It has been collected in Ireland and England and is listed as roud 23884, but it seems it may have been original to Fine since the collection dates all post-date Bing Crosby's recording of 1950.
Simon finished off the evening in traditional Dragon club style with When all men sing (Keith Scowcroft, Derek Gifford), that is before the aforementioned post cantatum reprise of Happy birthday to you.
Now listen to a selection of songs sung during this session.
(Number of people present - 6 of whom 5 performed)
In the above report songs new to the Dragon database (though no always new to the club) are marked with an asterisk (*).
