Sale Folk Club

Newsletter No 96 - 7 September 2010

A top quality gathering at the club this week resulted in a great evening with John Condy starting the ball rolling in fine style with Dylan's Chimes of Freedom quickly followed by poet Dave who did My One And Only Love the twist being that it turned out to be a car. Mike Dixon then did the Rufford Park Poachers followed by Mick who sang Arctic Monkeys' Mardy Bum and Carl who did Jez Lowe's Soda Pop Man. Not to be outdone Bob, in his usual inimitable style, treated us to The Devil And The Farmer's Wife followed by Colin Rudd with his own Breaking My Heart and Albert, back after a lengthy hiatus full of Thespian activities, with his own World Wide Travelling Blues. Welcome back Albert. Anne next with Let No Man Steal Your Thyme then preluded Zoe's version of Chris Smither's No Love Today, fresh from her appearance at Fylde Folk Festival for which she got paid and we should think so but don't tell the tax man. Frank as ever then did his lovely interpretation of Black Is The Colour swiftly followed by Isobel with two tunes on her recorder South Winds and Fanny Powers, Gail who sang Come O Love and Karen came in with The Seeds of Love on a borrowed guitar. Much to their delight the smaller number of performers soon brought us a second round with John singing his own excellent composition Town You Know Too Well followed by Dave's football-related story of Earwig-O, Mike Dixon's moving Little Musgrave and Mick with his own Those Bad Old Days. Carl was next on his feet Eric Bogle's The Band Played Waltzing Matilda only for Bob to go Puttin' On The Style and Colin Rudd to celebrate the Libran Woman in his life. Albert couldn't then resist giving us Cyril Tawney's Oggy Man and Anne came up with The Sands of the Shore before Zoe sang My First Career with massed guitar accompaniment enabling her to do solos on kazoo and melodica. Frank reminisced about The Maid of Coulmore and Isobel again piped up with Dingle Regatta before Gail sang The Rose of Tralee and Karen did It Ain't Necessarily So with a massed guitar accompaniment.

With the usual raffle in between we hurried on to round three with John taking us to Anderson's Coast telling us about the escaped convicts from Tasmania from the singing of Nancy Kerr and James Fagan. Poet Dave was again on his feet for another for which the title escaped us and Mike Dixon explained the dangers of a Loony Love Affair by Loudon Wainwright III. Mick next gave us his own If You Are Here and Bob jumped up with The Sweet Nightingale while Albert told us of The Last of the Great Whales. Anne finished her set with The Rigs Of Time and Zoe's last one was her own song Our Lady Of The Highways, an absolutely superb and moving song about the protection of travellers, before Frank said I've got to Catch The Wind. Karen then finished her set with Donna, Donna before the evening was brought to a grand finale by Carl singing Stuck In the Middle With You accompanied by John on slide guitar. A fitting end to a great night.