Friday
Breakfast at Lookout Cafe on sea front. I will definitely not eat a large cooked breakfast every day, I seem to recall promising my Slimming World rep that I would make good choices. Having sung “tomorrow we’ll be sober” last night, perhaps I will say “tomorrow I’ll be sensible.” I think the only t hing I ate apart from the large breakfast was a pain a raison (sp) from the Cornish Bakery. Beer counts as sensible, though? We are in Sidmouth the land of pasties and cream teas.
12:30 Middle Bar Singers in room above Anchor Pub are a social group that exists all year round, I think, They all know each other and there are ipn jokes I don’t get. They do the thing where they pass a large bunch of leaves round the room and when it comes to you you are allowed to sing, or else pass it on. I subjected them to A Chat With My Mother and Dont Go In Them Lions Cage tonight. No one left and nothing was thrown.
3.00 Steeleye Span in the Ham, which is a 700 seater marquee and the main festival venue. It was a more traditional set then I have sometimes heard them do, including Thomas The Rhymer and Long Lamkin. Maddy Prior’s explanation of how she interprets lyrics was particularly fascinating. She prefers the version where Lankin is a disgruntled mason to the one where he is an invisible child murder who walks through walls. Also New York Dolls They finished up with a song about a hat.
7:30 Harbour Hotel for Intimate Trad Evening. Sara Grey is an American singer and folklorists with a banjo and a detailed experience of where songs come from and who passed them on. Lovely version of Hills Of Mexico, which I know as Plains of Buffalo. She claims (no reason to doubt this) that Andy Irvin learned Arthur McBride from an American source singer who deserves mofr credit.
Apres Folk: To Swan Inn where usual suspects are singing Daydream Believer and DIVORCE. I recklessly say to a stranger that I hope to sing by the end of the week; she now refers to me as “singing man”. (The main thing is having a go, not staying in tune, everyone can sing a bit, you are probably much better than you think you are.)
The barman recognized me, and remembered I like stout. The lady in the bakery recognized me and remembered that I write. A man I talked to at s Grace Petrie two years ago greeted me with “well we kicked them out.” Do I look particularly memorable?
Beer 3.5 pints
New York Dolls x 3
South Australia x 2
Pasties x 1
Breakfast x 1
Streets of London x1
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