End of an era and start of another

Last night at The New Inn Westerleigh

This report has been a long time coming since Christmas and New Year and some other commitments got in the way. It is of a session held on 16 December 2016 at The New Inn, Westerleigh. And that is an important point to start on. Our next session, on Friday 6 January 2017 will be at our new venue, The Bridge Inn, Shortwood (BS16 9NG). If you haven't been there before you can find directions and a map here. It was actually our venue from 1995 to 2014, so it is familiar to many of our regulars and visitors, who will also be aware of the excellent acoustics, so we are hoping for lots of good singing and playing at future sessions This is now our new permanent home.

Anyway, back to the last session of 2016. There was a perfectly respectable turn-out of 10, all of whom sang and Colin was the MC as usual. There was no particular theme though Christmas made some appearances despite the previous week having been our nod to all things Yule.

Mike started off the evening with Here We Come A-Wassailing (Roud 209) before Roger calmed us down with Silent Night (Franz Xaver Gruber, John Freeman Young).

Chris went to Ireland for Down By The Glenside (Peadar Kearney).

Next we travelled across the ocean to America for John's Will the Circle Be Unbroken? (Ada R Habershon, Charles H Gabriel) and for Phil's Danville Girl (Woody Guthrie).

A brief return to Blighty had Tony playing concertina on three Cumbria-inspired tunes written by a friend: Crummock Water, Buttermere and Windermere. He later returned to the work of that same friend with: Spencefield Lane, Saint Bruno and One For The Pot.

So back it was over the pond for Geoff's San Quentin (Johnny Cash), Simon's Factory (Bruce Springsteen) and Colin's Huron Carol (Jean de Brébeuf, Jesse Edgar Middleton).

Occasional visitor Henry gave us four songs through the evening which I assume, with some grounds, to be his own work: I Saw John Wainwright In Town Today, There Was Me And Marilyn And Evelyn, I Went Down To See The Hepworths, and a version of Away In A Manger which ended up with the baby Jesus being put into care.

So ended the first tour of the room and we had already lost Mike with canine companion Indy being too restless to be sociable in the session.

Some of the variously more unusual or seasonal songs from the rest of the evening included:

See you from 06/01/17 at The Bridge Inn, Shortwood

• Phil  - Kaw-Liga (Hank Williams, Fred Rose)
• Geoff - Dandy Vernon (Michael Snow)
• Geoff - Step It Out Mary
• Colin - Christmas In Prison (John Prine)
• Phil - Lost John
• Colin - Christmas 1914 (Mike Harding)
• Roger - Deep Purple (Peter DeRose, Mitchell Parish)

It was left to Simon to finish off the evening with the rousing, sing-along When All Men Sing (Keith Scowcroft, Derek Gifford).

So, with that I will close the chapter of the Dragon at Westerleigh and open a new era at The Bridge, Shortwood. See you there on Friday 6 January and all Fridays thereafter.

Here's a selection of songs sung during this session.

(Number of people present - 10, of whom 10 performed)