All things wise and wonderful?

(Photo: Simon Meeds)

It was great to see more new faces at last Friday's session, the third week in a row that we have had newcomers or visitors who seem to have gone away happy. This time it was singer, Barry from North Wales with his non-performing entourage, Kath and Charlotte. Thank you very much for coming to The Bridge and we hope to see you again soon or at least the next time you are down this way on a Friday.

Given that Colin was a bit late as expected this time, Simon took over the mantel of MC and started the evening off with Dave Sudbury's King Of Rome. I am a bit fussy about the versions of this song that I link from these blog posts. I don't absolutely love Lucy Ward's version but I like it and coming from Derby she has as much right to sing it as most people.

Derek took the opportunity of Colin's lateness to sing Four Quid A Day (Stan Kelly). It's a version of Fourpence A Day which Stan wrote in the 1950s, which answers a question raised by Geoff, I think.

Occasional visitor, Steve C opened his account for the evening with Stan Rogers' The Field Behind The Plow (sic).

Geoff's first song was Noel Murphy's The Ones Who Got Lost In The World which remains elusive in terms of finding a version, or even words to link from these reports.

Barry commented that as an Englishman living in Wales he has found himself singing a lot of Scottish songs. His debut song at the club provided evidence of this, being Dougie McLean's Caledonia.

Mike gave us a sea song which he has informed us before is not a shanty because a shanty is always either for outward bound or homeward bound whereas Outward And Homeward Bound (Roud 18905) sits on the fence. Of course Mike's version refers to the Bristol docks rather than to Liverpool as in the linked version.

Steve C started something with his Irish Brikkies' Shanty, written based on Bound For The Rio Grande (Roud 317) for a Sidmouth Folk Festival comedy song session. The main subject of the song was a group of Irish bricklayers available to build Donald Trump's wall. This set us on a course for an ad hoc theme of parodies.

Geoff stayed with the POTUS, singing Don Caron's Little Duffer Boy. Barry followed with his own song, Courting In Snow.

Colin started a sub-theme of parodies based on All Things Bright And Beautiful (Cecil Frances Alexander, William Henry Monk- Roud 25389). We had three on this theme starting with Colin's All Things Dark And Dangerous (Edward M Berckman). Next came Derek with a single verse, remembered from his school days and sung by the naughty lads at the back of assembly:

All things bright and beautiful;
All creatures great and small;
All things wise and wonderful:
Prince Philip shoots them all.

Finally on the "All Things" theme came Mike with one he got from Colin, All Things Dull And Ugly (William Henry Monk, Eric Idle).

Simon came in with his Grandfather's Clock (Henry Clay Work - Roud 4326) parody, My Grandfather's Ferret (Derek Jolly). He returned later with House Of The Rising Damp (Mary McCloud), which is of course a parody of House Of The Rising Sun (Roud 6393).

The only other parody I noticed was Derek singing The Texaco Fusiliers, which I guess he wrote himself, based on McAlpine's Fusiliers (Dominic Behan) which Geoff had sung earlier in the evening. Another of Derek's songs turned up in the form of Lament For The Fishing, sung by Geoff.

Traditionally I mention all the songs sung by first-time visitors to the club, so the other ones Barry gave us were: Steve Tilston's The Road When I Was Young, They Sent A Wumman (Nancy Nicolson). Barry's penultimate song of the evening was a celebration of the sort of singing we were doing - Eric Bogle's Sound Of Singing, which led Simon to sing in a similar vein, When All Men Sing (Keith Scowcroft, Derek Gifford).

By the usual algorithm it fell to Derek to close the session but he gave up his place in favour of Barry who sent us on our way singing Wagon Wheel (Bob Dylan, Ketch Secor).

Here's a selection of songs sung during this session.

(Number of people present - 9, of whom 7 performed)