A friendly session

(Photo: Vaibhav Sharan)

Last Friday's Dragon Folk Club session saw four singers meet in our usual venue at The Bridge Inn. Colin being MC and having been the first to arrive started things off with a song which we agreed was a suitable starter or finisher: George Papavgeris' Friends like these.

Rob sang us his own Minstrel of the sea about a musician of his acquaintance. He told us that he has not yet made a video of it, so I won't waste time looking.

Simon's first was Dougie MacLean's Caledonia. Colin later sang another of Dougie's songs: Ready for the storm.

Geoff completed the first circuit of the room with his first performance of Ewan MacColl's Morrissey and the Russian sailor.

Geoff sang the last song of the evening, a version of Seven drunken nights. Sorry for the abbreviated report again. Normal service may be resumed next week.

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

(Number of people present - 4 of whom 4 performed)

The new and the rare

Thylacine (Tasmanian Tiger) - a company recently
announced that it hopes to recreate this extinct animal 

Last week's Dragon Folk Club session was fun. There were four singers, which isn't a bad showing by recent standards. It was good to be joined again by Rob.

As predicted on Facebook I haven't had much time to work on the report this week, so it is short, but definitely have a look at the "a selection" link below because there are quite a few songs we haven't heard at the club before, or at least not for a long time. They aren't all exactly folk songs, but some of them are and anyway we are happy to listen to pretty much anything as long as it's acoustic.

Colin started us with a song we had heard at the club from Gary Hopwood. Although Gary has written soem fine songs this one, Muesli, is from the pen of Dave Reader. I've lost track a bit, but I think it's the only one from this week's bunch that I haven't found on YouTube. I'm sorry, but I'm pretty sure you won't get the link here to play either.

I'll shoot straight to the closing song and leave you to listen to the rest. Geoff finished the evening with Phil Collins' Another day in paradise.

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

(Number of people present - 4 of whom 4 performed)

Seek and ye shall find

Judith Durham in 1970

OK, so that went well didn't it. With Colin away last week I did a bit of extra publicity and... Geoff and Simon ended up serenading each other for the evening. Seriously, we had a pretty good do, with plenty of singing and a bit of chat thrown in.

Since Geoff arrived just before Simon he was called to sing first. He sang Good Hearted Woman (Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson) which he said was written during a card game, inspired by Tina Turner and the abuse she suffered while married to Ike.

Both Geoff and Simon sang songs which had been recorded by The Seekers to mark the death of original lead singer Judith Durham. Geoff sang Bush girl (words by Henry Lawson) and Simon sang Morningtown ride (Malvina Reynolds).

Simon marked Colin's absence by singing a song from his repertoire: Cousin Jack (Steve Knightley).

There was a brief conversation about songs which while good aren't very nice, usually it seems in terms of misogyny. Note that we don't avoid songs which may cause offence, particularly when those songs are historical artefacts telling of past attitudes. There followed a few of these, possibly including:

• Geoff - Step it out Mary (Sean McCarthy)
• Simon - Laird of the dainty Dounby (roud 864)
• Geoff - As I roved out (roud 277, laws O17)
• Simon - No Sir no (roud 146)

Simon closed the evening with Jean Ritchie's The L&N don't stop here anymore.

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

(Number of people present - 2 of whom 2 performed)

Incomplete recall

We were back to a skeleton staff at the Dragon Folk Club last Friday, but we had a good evening nevertheless. This week we will be one core man down - Colin, our usual MC - so all being well Simon will be MCing. Please make an effort to come along and sing, play, tell a story or even just listen.

Back to last week, MC Colin started us off with Stung Right with words by Joe Hill. The tune (written by by Winfield S Weeden) comes from an evangelical hymn called Sunlight, sunlight (words by Judson W Van De Venter) and was later used by Ewan MacColl for Browned off. Stung right was a new one for my database, but Colin had sung here it before.

Mike sang two songs which can both be known as Tom's gone to Hilo: Tom's gone to Hilo (roud 481) and Johnny come down to Hilo (roud 650). Simon didn't remember having heard roud 481 before, but Mike assured him he had previously sung it here.

Colin didn't remember Simon having previously sung Mike Harding's A small high window though he had done so.

Simon finished the evening slightly early since we were the only people in the pub and the staff wanted to close. It's always good to close with a joiner-inner. In this case The Galway Shawl (roud 2737).

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

(Number of people present - 3 of whom 3 performed)

Raised on songs and stories

Last week's Dragon Folk Club session was a refreshing change. We thought it was going to be a game of "to me to you" with our version of the Chuckle Brothers the only performers present, but no we were blessed with the only slightly late arrival of Steve C and Jane. Steve would join us with some singing and Jane would give us some of her excellent stories.

Colin started the evening with Ted Edwards' Coal hole cavalry which certainly got us warmed up in the vocal department. Simon brought to mind the very recent death of Bernard Cribbins with Right said Fred, written by Ted Dicks and Myles Rudge.

Steve C gave us The Blarney roses (roud 6329) and Jane's first story, which she gave the title "The Violinist" introduced us to the reaction of an elderly violinist to a new preacher who condemned "the devil's music" and what that led to years later.

As some of you know, I keep a database of songs which have been sung at Dragon Folk Club sessions. It goes back a few years now but isn't complete even over that time. This week there were four songs which I had to add to the list.

1) I remember The Shan Van Vocht (roud V33975) being sung at the club before, but it hadn't previously found it's way into the database. On this occasion it was sung by Colin. The title seems to be a phonetic rendering of the Gaelic "An tSean bhean Bhocht" - "The Poor Old Woman". The song dates from the Irish rebellion of 1798. It gained notoriety in nineteenth century Ireland as a seditious text. In the 1890s it was adopted as the title of a popular historical novel and of a nationalist magazine, both of which, in the face of the growing sectarian division over Irish Home rule, sought to vindicate the republican legacy of the United Irishmen.

2) Steve C sang The bold poachers (roud 1686).

3) Colin sang Dougie MacLean's Rescue me.

4) Steve C, clearly a fan of Steeleye Span, was familiar with their version of Mantle of green (roud 714). He wasn't entirely happy though with the version of the words they used so he had researched other versions. Those however didn't seem to fit Steeleye's tune, so Steve made his own version of the words based on several other versions.

Colin asked Simon to finish the evening which he did by singing Stan Rogers' Northwest passage.

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

(Number of people present - 4 of whom 4 performed)