There's going to be a revolution

Bolshevik forces marching on the Red Square

Last week's session saw six of us singing a wide variety of songs to no particular theme. This Friday the theme will be Halloween so we look forward to hearing your songs of ghosties and ghoulies and long legged beasties, or maybe hubble, bubble, toil and trouble.

It was good to see Phil after missing the last few months, bringing back his songs of 19th and early 20th century USA. Colin was MC and started off the session with Tim Laycock's Heaven's A Bar.

A few discernible mini-themes emerged during the evening, not least the singing of two quite different versions of the same song (Roud 1, Child 200). Colin started it off with Raggle Taggle Gypsy while Phil gave us the transatlantic version in the shape of Gypsy Davy.

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

Parish notices

I won't be hurrying out the report for last week's Dragon Folk Club session, mainly because there is no session this Friday (13 October) so I will use it to publicise next week's session (20 October) which will be without a theme. We have however got a few themed sessions coming up, so I will take this opportunity to inform you and perhaps you can put on your thinking caps to come up with some appropriate songs, tunes, monologues or whatever other forms of performance you wish to share:

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

The anniversary waltz

Kevin Barry

Before getting down to the report of last week's session there is an important notice, that there will be no Dragon Folk Club session on 13 October because The Bridge Inn is hosting a wake for someone from the village. There is no need though to go without music that week because there are two recommended events.

On Wednesday 11 October Simon's friend Damian Clarke is doing a gig in aid of Médecins Sans Frontières. Damian, who plays hammered dulcimer and hurdy gurdy, will be joined by George Whitfield on accordion and Kent Nielsen on ukulele. All this will be at The Star Inn, Fishponds and will kick off at 7:30pm.

The second recommended gig is friend of the Dragon Folk Club, Keith Hyett who is performing his own classical guitar compositions as part of his Memories of You tour at Mount Pleasant Community Centre, Bradford on Avon at 7:30pm on Friday 13 October. Tickets at £7.00 are available on the door or from www.ents24.com.

The sound of silence

No, not an intimation that someone sang Mr Simon’s popular ditty of the 1960s; nor yet did a passing musician drop in to perform John Cage’s 4’33’’ (a work that should surely be incorporated into the repertoire of so many guitarists).

The title above is in fact a full and detailed record of the songs sung and music played by the three people who arrived for this week’s session. Even Indie didn’t believe it was worth his while to attempt to vocalise to an audience that numbered less than his legs.

We will meet again this Friday. What happens then, and from then on, will depend upon what support folkies in the area are willing to show.

(Number of people present - 3, of whom 0 performed)

Here We Arrrrrrrrrr Again

Tuesday 19^th being International Talk Like a Pirate Day your Substitute Scribe was shocked to discover that his own rendition of Phil Tanner’s version of Henry Martin (Child 250) was the only piratical event of the evening. 

The session began with Colin singing Droylesden Wakes, which he entirely failed to record in the Book as Dreighlsdin Wakes, which was its original title before it was rendered into ‘more gradely English’!

A couple of unusual partnerships should perhaps be recorded in case they one day prove to have been the birth of a pair of world renowned Super Groups. Firstly John B, having arrived with not only his trusty bodhran but also an Egg Shaker which he had bought that afternoon and was anxious to try out, asked Colin to accompany him on guitar whilst he sang Australian Slim Dusty’s Pub With No Beer. Secondly Derek, when singing Jarama Valley (Alex McDade), asked Roger, who had earlier both sung and played Red River Valley, to reprise his harmonica part as an accompaniment.

A touch agricultural

(Photo: администрация Волгоградской области)

For those of us who remember the halcyon days of Dragon Harvest Night with tables groaning under the weight of freshly grown or at least freshly purchased comestibles, and the assembled masses groaning under the weight of fines from Mike for breathing out of tune (or just for breathing), it was very sad to see the tiny turnout for this week’s charity evening – 5 performers, and one visitor  who sat through one complete round before deciding she had left her life elsewhere and went off to look for it.

But we are the Tradition, and the Tradition goes on in lean times in the hope they will again lean the other way. So there will be a small donation going the way of Shelter; precise details of the amount will appear here next week.