FOLK SESSION – Howard Arms, Brampton

We had a good turn-out on 15^th April when we met in the Howard Arms to make music and tell stories on the theme of ‘Houses/Places to Live’. A warm welcome to Bev and Hedley, visiting us from Maidenhead, the former with her portable piano (not a common instrument at folk sessions!)

To start with ‘houses’ (including ‘cottages’): Sally sang us the ribald story of The Yorkshire Couple, involving a whole row of cottages, plus a pub. Little Boxes (Kath) is critical about the houses of 1960s America, and the Skyscraper Wean (Katy) complains about the inconveniences of high-rise living. On the other hand, the value of house and home was presented in Sam’s song Give Me Clean Water (sung by Alan) which argues that ‘a house with four walls’ is an essential for happy living; the heroine of The Galway Shawl (Jane) takes her admirer to her father’s cottage, and Gerda, grieves for the ‘homes that were drowned for a city’ (Ashokan Farewell). Chris went upmarket with two stories involving manor houses: The Witch of Edmondthorpe and King of the Cats. Steve lamented that ‘this old house is falling down’ (Dimming of the Day), while John sought patches of garden between ‘terraced houses and concrete towers’ (A Place called England). Les’s entertaining parody, Ukulele Hallelujah, described how no ‘dwelling, house, or home’ could escape from the instrument, while proving how many rhymes he could find for ‘ukulele’! Some songs implied houses by mentioning ‘bits of house’ – a window in Love Minus Zero (Bev and Hedley); another window in It’s Been a Long Time (Steve) and a door in Lights of Home (Gerda).

There were lots of imaginative variations on ‘houses.’ Phil found a lodging-house (Keep Your Feet Still, Geordie Hinny) and Alan a house of ill-repute (The House of the Rising Sun). The Keeper of the Eddystone Light (Adrian) lives in a lighthouse; while Barges (Gary) provide another watery residence – with castles (also a place to stay) painted on the side! A gypsy caravan features in Beeswing (John), as do ‘the tent and the old caravan’ in Thirty-foot Trailer (Phil). The protagonists of The Little Old Sod Shanty on My Claim (Chris) and of Little Bridget Flynn (Kath) both want wives to come and look after their homes and themselves.

Some places to live are decidedly temporary: the hotel mentioned in Big Yellow Taxi (Gary); the warm boxcar of The Hobo’s Lullaby (Hedley and Bev) and the sentry box that witnesses the frolics of The Gentleman Soldier with his ‘fair maid’ (Anne). What does it say about folk song that we had three separate references to prisons? I Wish There Were No Prisons (Adrian); Little Tim McGuire (Sally) and To Althea from Prison (Anne).

‘Home’ can be a place, rather than bricks and mortar. Kath and Geoff rejoiced to be Westering Home; Les commended Glasgow (No Place Like Home); Geoff looked forward to Going Home and Gerda sang Lay My Heart about the place where the narrator feels safe and at home. 

And finally, there is homelessness: London Lights (Jane), the Victorian song about the deserted mother in the winter streets, and Hedley and Bev’s of Knocking on Heaven’s Door, adapted to speak about homelessness.

We next meet on 20^th May in the Howard Arms Brampton at 8pm, with the theme of ‘furniture and household plenishings’ – think ‘beds, chairs, clocks, spinning wheels, crockery, saucepans’ and so on. ALL WELCOME!