St Patrick's Day 2023

Florrie Forde (1875-1940)

We had a great little session for St Patrick last Friday at The Bridge. The usual suspects were joined again by Paul W and Denny, the previous week's newcomers. The full complement was made up by Steve C.

I'll keep it short this week, but I can get away with that because, unusually, the YouTube playlist from the "a selection" link at the bottom includes every one of the 40 songs sung. And yes, while forty isn't a record for Dragon session it's really up there.

Colin as MC started us off with Whiskey in the Jar (roud 533, laws L13A). Many, although not all of the songs we sang were Irish or had some connection with Ireland. Next it was Simon singing Down Our Street.

Paul gave us All For Me Grog (roud 475) and Denny added Percy French's Mountains of Mourne. Steve C completed the first round with Galway Shawl (roud 2737)

I'll briefly mention a few of the other songs.

Steve asked whether he had sung Stan Rogers' Field Behind the Plow at the club before. I can confirm he has. One occasion, not necessarily the only one, was 13 September 2019.

Colin sang The City of Chicago which was made famous by Christy Moore, but was written in 1984 by his brother, Barry Moore, who is the singer Luka Bloom.

Paul sang a version of Fathom the Bowl (Roud 880) which he had adapted to refer to Ireland and Guinness. I've taken the liberty of linking a more conventional version.

Denny sang Oh! Oh! Antonio, which was written by CW Murphy and Dan Lipton in 1908. It's nice to be able to link to a recording of Florrie Forde who was the original artist to sing the song. I really wanted to use a photograph of Forde to head this article, but realised there was probably no Irish connection. Despite CW's surname, he was William Murphy, born in Manchester in 1870. It turns out however the songs he wrote include Irish As She's Spoken (1893), How Can They Tell That Oi'm Oirish? (1898), The Little Irish Postman (1904), The Singer Was Irish (1910). That's good enough for me.

Steve finished off the evening with The Ballad of Sammy's Bar (Cyril Tawney).

Now listen to a selection of songs sung during this session.

(Number of people present - 5 of whom 5 performed)

The need for speed

Fiat S76, The Beast of Turin (Photo: Simon Meeds)

Last week was the final theme-less session until we are well into November. This week's theme is Halloween. The theme is optional but songs, tunes, stories and poems of ghosts and ghouls, witches and wizards, and of course All Saints will be very welcome along with any other tenuous links you can come up with.

So back to last Friday; Colin was MC and started the evening with If It Wasn't For The 'Ouses In Between (Edgar Bateman, George Le Brunn - Roud V35719).

Anzacs, a story of two Bostons and space oddities

The dock at Boston, Lincolnshire

Last week's session was originally to have been the proxy St George's Day but it has been moved to this week, so get your George, dragon and England songs, tunes, poems and stories out this Friday and come along to the Bridge. If you need any more inspiration, apart from England, St George is patron saint of:

agricultural workers; Amersfoort, Netherlands; Aragon; archers; armourers; Bavaria, Germany; Beirut, Lebanon; Bulgaria; Bulgarian Army; Cáceres, Spain; Cappadocia; Castilla y León; Catalonia; cavalry; chivalry; Constantinople; Corinthians (Brazilian football team); Crusaders; equestrians; Ethiopia; farmers; Ferrara, Italy; field workers; Freiburg, Germany; Genoa; Georgia; Gozo; Greece; Haldern, Germany; Heide; horsemen; horses; knights; lepers and leprosy; Lithuania; Lod; London; Malta; Modica, Sicily; Montenegro; Moscow; Order of the Garter; Palestine; Palestinian Christians; Piran, Italy; Portugal; Portuguese Army; Portuguese Navy; Ptuj, Slovenia; Reggio Calabria; riders; Romani people; saddle makers; Serbia; Scouts; sheep; shepherds; skin diseases; Slovenia; soldiers; and Teutonic Knights.

Back to last week, Colin was MC and started of with Utah Phillips' All Used Up.

Should I sing this?

Cotton Bales, Savanna, Georgia

It was almost two weeks ago that the Dragon Folk Club last met. Last week was a fallow Friday for us and this is the somewhat belated report of the session from the previous week. Seven was a decent turn-out for us in recent weeks and it was good to see Richard for the second time recently (not Richard G, who has left the area but Richard who is apparently a regular at Folk Around Fishponds and is known to Colin from that club).

The parish notices, as placed in the previous short blog post involve a number of themed nights coming up, so you are encouraged mainly to come and be part of the fun, but if possible to dig out some songs and tunes to match the themes:

• 20 October - Session with no theme
• 27 October - Halloween session
• 3 November - Campfire, Guy Fawkes, etc.
• 10 November - Remembrance