May Day 2026

(Photo: Simon Meeds)

Last week's Dragon Folk Club session fell on 1st May, so the theme had to be May Day. As always the theme was entirely optional. Some people had prepared appropriate songs, others mangled their songs or introductions to fit, and others quite reasonably went ahead and sang what they sang.

It was great to see a turn-out of 11, just the same as the week before, and a level we would be very happy to maintain, so do come along whether you're a regular, it's been a while or it will be your first time. We really are very friendly and definitely non-judgemental.

Two of those present were happy to be our audience: Heather's friend Hazel, and Sheila who was with Paul and Denny. It was Sheila's first visit; she seemed to have enjoyed it and said she was surprised how many of the songs she knew - I saw her joining in quite frequently.

Colin, MC as usual, started us off with The month of May (roud 153).

Stuart and Carrie sang I wandered by a brookside (Richard Monckton Milnes, 1st Baron Hougthon, Barbara Berry) and Fresh as a sweet Sunday morning (Bert Jansch).

Paul gave us The Galway shawl (roud 2737) and Denny followed up with the Swinton May song (roud 305).

Stan added the first new entry of the evening in the Dragon database with I will love you all my life (* Charlie Landsborough).

Heather's first song of the evening was Day trip to Bangor (Debbie Cook).

Simon had been stuck on the motorway, but having arrived and bought a drink from the bar, it was his turn straight away and he plucked out Phil Tanner's version of Barbara Allen (roud 54, child 84). And so the first rotation was completed.

Keith G arrived some time later on a rare visit complete with a new keyboard, which he used to give us Is you is or is you ain't my baby (Billy Austin, Louis Jordan). His second offering was a medley of songs which included among others excerpts from: Love letters (* Victor Young, Edward Heyman), Georgia on my mind (Hoagy Carmichael, Stuart Gorrell) and Perfect day (* Lou Reed).

Other songs new to the Dragon database last week were:

•  Stuart and Carrie - Tin man (* Dewey Bunnell)
•  Stan - Someday soon (* Ian Tyson)
•  Carrie - Sunshine in Leith (* Craig Reid, Charlie Reid)

It fell to Denny to finish the session. She said she thought of May as the start of the festival season and sang a song she proposed as a good one to start off a folk festival: Come by the hills (W Gordon Smith).

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

(Number of people present - 11 of whom 9 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 (#).

Ne'er cast a clout

(Photo: Simon Meeds)

We weren't too sure last week whether we would get a good session at the Dragon Folk Club with our usual MC, Colin, being away, but Simon stepped in and we had a pretty good time.

Simon started the ball rolling with The moonshine can (roud 9949). This was followed with the Swinton May song from Denny. Paul thought he might have a new song for the database with Blackbird (John Lennon, Paul McCartney) but that one was just pipped to the post by Colin a few short weeks ago. Steve first song was the Jolly waggoner (roud 1088).

My usual criteria for making special mention of songs doesn't really get me anywhere this time. All thirty six songs we sung were available on YouTube and are therefore included in the playlist linked from "a selection" below, and there was only one sing that was new to the Dragon database (though not necessarily to the club) and that was Lisbon (roud 551, laws N8) which was sung by Denny.

Although we didn't have any more new songs, we did have a few first performances by specific singers to be recorded in the database:

• Paul - The aforementioned Blackbird
• Simon - The keeper (roud 1519)
• Simon - Hotel California (Don Felder, Don Henley, Glenn Frey)
• Simon - Hal an tow (roud 1520)

In pre-database times Simon had definitely sung The keeper and Hotel California, and probably also Hal an tow.

And so we kept on with the singing and the banter until Steve closed the evening with Cyril Tawney's The ballad of Sammy's Bar.

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

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