Mostly remembering

Mike Starkey and Tom Mossman
(Photos: Simon Meeds)

After last week's sad news of the recent deaths of two Dragon Folk Club singers the session was suggested as the first of several where songs sung or written by Tom Mossman and Mike Starkey might be featured, and the originally suggested title of "Songs about singing" understandably faded into the background.

It was great to welcome Paul M and his friend Jane for the first time. Out of the five performers, only Colin and Simon really knew Tom and Mike, but it didn't stop others from selecting songs from their repertoires. Overall it was a great evening and definitely not at all morbid.

We were joined briefly by Mike's cribbage-playing friend, asking whether we knew of  Mike's death, and he stayed to listen to one song, so he is included in the count of attendees.

This Friday the official theme will be St George's Day, but songs from Tom and Mike's repertoires are definitely still on the cards - there may even be some that hit both targets on the bullseye!

Colin, resuming his seat as MC after a spell away from it, started proceedings with Deportee (Plane Crash At Los Gatos) (roud 26302 - Woody Guthrie).

Newcomer Paul M's debut song was Fare thee well Cisco (*  Tom Paxton), written about Cisco Houston.

Denny gave us Linden Lea (T roud X4683 - William Barnes, Ralph Vaughan Williams) and Paul W sang The song goes on (Mick Ryan), which having been written as a posthumous tribute to singer Cyril Tawney was very appropriate on all fronts.

Simon finished the first rotation with Standing at the door (T Allan Taylor).

Unusually, because of the themes, I will mention every song (and poem) performed during the evening:

• Colin - Following the southern star (M Mike Starkey, Dave Marshall)
• Paul M -  The twenty fourth of February (M roud 951)
• Denny - Marching inland (M Tom Lewis)
• Paul W - Jones's ale (M roud 139)
• Simon - After the gold rush (M Neil Young)
• Colin - Autumn leaves (T  Joseph Kosma, Johnny Mercer)
• Paul M - D-Day dodgers (M  Lance-Sergeant Harry Pynn, Norbert Schultze)
• Denny - Holmfirth anthem (M roud 1046)
• Paul W - Blackbird (T John Lennon, Paul McCartney)
• Simon - Lasso the moon (T Tom Mossman in discussion with Ray Croll)
• Colin - Mary Ellen Carter (M Stan Rogers)
• Paul M - Song for the Bowdoin (* Larry Kaplan)
• Denny - Rolling home (M  roud 4766)
• Paul W - Bring us a barrel (M Keith Marsden)
• Simon - John Barleycorn (M  roud 164 - Tune "Wir Pflügen" by Johann Abraham Peter Schulz)
• Colin - Dirty old town (M? Ewan MacColl)
• Paul M - Pastures of plenty (* roud 16377 - Woody Guthrie)
• Denny - When yellow's on the broom (M Adam McNaughton)
• Paul W - Country gardens (roud 29760 - Thomas Walker, Robert M Jordan) - Paul wasn't to know that Mike Starkey actually used to sing Fred Wedlock's parody English Country Garden.
• Simon - Grand Dad's cracket (*T Tom Mossman)
• Colin - British bobby (M Fred Wedlock) - Fred was Mike's English teacher when he was at school. Mike said that Fred taught him Brizzle and claimed that he taught Fred Glott'r.
• Paul M - The Marla Hill ducks (* roud V39873 - Tommy Armstrong)
• Denny - I can hew boys (M Davey Dodds)
• Paul W - John Dead (M). I've given Paul the hit on Mike's repertoire because there are many versions of this song and he was very close, but the one Mike sang is more like this Grey goose.
• Simon - Claudy banks (M roud 266, laws N40)
• Colin -  The band played waltzing matilda (M Eric Bogle)
• Paul M - Nantucket (* Jonathan Michael Peter Darely, David Robinson, Robert James Alexander Sattin, Andrew Robert Yates)
• Denny - Row on (roud 2084)
• Paul W - Hanging Johnny (M roud 2625)
• Simon - Home lass home (T Tom Mossman,  Sarah Morgan)
• Colin - Parting glass (M roud 3004)
• Paul M - Bones in the ocean (* Dave Robinson)
• Denny - Rolling Home (M John Tams)
• Paul W - Farewell shanty (M) This was the song Mike would sing at the funeral of a another singer.
• Simon - The January man (M Dave Goulder) Mike would have had Simon's guts for garters for singing this outside January.
• Colin - I'm bound away (M?)
• Paul M - A great northern river (* Graeme Miles)
• Denny - Teeside bridges (Erik Gooding)
• Paul W - Roll Alabama roll (M roud 4710)

Simon finished the evening with When all men sing (Keith Scowcroft, Derek Gifford) - although I don't think I heard Mike perform this song he would certainly sing along to the chorus with gusto, and this recording is particularly appropriate since I believe he knew and respected Johnny Collins.

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

(Number of people present - 7 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 (*) and any songs not included in the "a selection" playlist are marked with a hash (#).

Additionally this week "T" and "M" indicate songs from Tom Mossman's or Mike Starkey's repertoires and a question mark (?) indicates a song only possibly identified as such.

A random selection - almost

Pecker Dunne

Another themeless session last week which I think remained pretty much that way, no major themes emerging through the evening. Tom was a very welcome visitor, ahead of his spotlight set at Chipping Sodbury Folk Night on 1 June.

As usual, Colin was MC, and as often happens he started off the evening, this time with George Papavgeris' As Long As Someone Sings A Song.

Derek continued his ongoing May theme well into the evening, starting with The Verdant Braes Of Skreen (Roud 419).

Geoff challenged me to find the version he sang of his first song. Derek suggested looking up Elizabeth Cronin but I'm afraid I failed, so here is Séamus Ennis' version of As I Roved Out which seems similar enough. Apparently Ennis recorded Cronin's singing, so perhaps this isn't such a surprise.

Louder than usual

The knocker-upper man

Last weeks session was slightly unusual for us in that our venue at The New Inn was somewhat taken over by people who would usually be at The Old Inn (the pubs have really original names in Westerleigh) which was closed for refurbishment. While they were fairly loud at times they were at least reasonably appreciative of our efforts in the main and in any case they had dwindled to a memory by the break.

Colin was naturally Mc and for a change kicked off the singing himself with General Guinness, which seems as good a place as any to start even if he wasn't actually drinking the black stuff.

I think there was some skulduggery going on, maybe trying to test the resolve of the non-folkies in the bar when Derek sang Molly Bawn (Roud 166, Laws O36) and Mike sang Haul On The Bowline (Roud 652).

Benjamin Britten's gardener

Bob Hart

It looked as though we were going to be particularly thin on the ground this week, causing Mike to joke that it may "come round" once or even twice... every ten minutes. His scepticism was however put to bed when three further people came though the door - not a huge crowd but certainly enough to make a good do of it.

The three welcome latecomers were Carl, now almost a regular, who brought his brother-in-law, Derek (we'll call him Derek 2 to differentiate from our regular traditional singer of Suffolk origin with the same name), and Alison, whose arrival was somewhat sudden and startling but whose presence and singing were definitely more soothing.

Mike started us off with a newly "discovered" Bristol version of Outward bound a sea song, which he had explained on a previous occasion is not a shanty because shanties are either outward or homeward bounders, whereas this song mentioned both directions.

England's out but we're still singing

Kate Rusby

Thank fully all facilities at the pub were restored this week so there was nothing to disrupt an entertaining evening of singing and playing.

Mike started off the evening with a "calling on shanty", used when recruiting for a ship to show that the shanty man on board was good enough. It was said that a good shanty man is worth ten men on the rope, since his singing made it easy to keep time, thus making the job easier. The song was poor Tommy's gone, grey goose is dead. I haven't been able to trace it but it seems to me to have elements at least of Tom's gone to Hilo, Go tell Aunt Rhodie and D'ye ken John Peel. Neither Mike nor Maggie seemed to think that its mournful tone would be very good for getting new recruits to come on board - surely something more rousing would be better.

Starstruck Folkies

Female drummer (Roud 226)

This week we learnt that Mike, a long-time critic of guitars at folk clubs, has bought an example of that classic famed instrument of folky torture, the banjo! Of course, in experienced hands, such as those of the club's friend Betty, my old friend Richard Holland, or hundreds of other accomplished players, it can be absolutely acceptable but we shall see (or maybe we won't see) what Mike makes of his new purchase.

We were visited this week by Neil, who has been in touch with me for a few days regarding the possibility of filming a documentary about the club. He brought his camera and did some filming, though he hopes to return sometime to do a proper filming session. Capturing each singer involved moving the microphone into position and placing candles close enough to shed some light on the subject. Mike seemed to be looking for a make-up artist but none was forthcoming.

Pre-session discussions were sparked by Maggie handing out copies of the magazine Folklife Quarterly. The main subject was Vin Garbutt, who appeared on the cover in an advert for the Bromyard Folk Festival. I don't remember exactly how, but this eventually led to Derek singing an excerpt from the Rigs of time.