WOLF FOLK CLUB NEWSLETTER
August 2006 Copyright Wireworks Music © 2006	Back to TheWolf Folk Club
Progress so far
Well, here we, are about three quarters of the way through our first year. The Folk Club seems to be prospering, which is very satisfying to all who come to enjoy this kind of music making. The variety of music and the standard of musicianship has amazed us all. What seems to be continually surprising is that we keep seeing new faces. This is no doubt due to the fact that word of mouth is slowly spreading the news about the club to the wider world. This is borne out by the fact that we have entertained visitors from as far afield as Sheffield, Devon, Bristol and County Durham. We haven't done any real advertising for some time. We do get a mention in the "What's On" section of the Lynn News and we now get a mention in the Sandringham Parish Magazine (thanks to Marilyn Jones). But what is even more amazing is that we are discovering what a lot of talented people we have in our area. It is exciting to think that there are still excellent musicians in the locality who haven't visited the club yet, some we know about but some we don't know about. We look forward to seeing these new faces in the future and to whatever pleasant musical surprises may be in store for us.
Did you know?
On the Monday before a Wolf Folk Club meeting we always send out an E-mail reminder to anyone on our email list. These messages usually include important notices, whenever necessary, such as reminding the session musicians what tunes will be played. If you would like to get these reminders make sure and give your email address to Patsy.
Where are the mouth organs?
Considering how many months we've been going it is a little surprising that nobody has turned up to play the mouth organ. Come to think of it, where are the spoons players? Have these instruments died out in our region? What about the bones. the washboard, the jew's harp. These are all good old traditional items used by the last few generations. Almost everybody knew how to get a tune out of a mouth organ how to rattle off a good rhythm accompaniment with the bones or the spoons. These things are not beneath our dignity, they are fun. If you used to play, dig into that drawer, get them out and get going. There's always an opportunity to join in the general merry music making.
FOAOTMAD Summer Camp Sacrewell
Friends of American Old Time Music & Dance have their summer camp at Sacrewell Farm near Peterborough. Folk who like this kind of music gather together in this way twice a year at this venue. They come in their caravans, mobile homes or tents and spend the week sitting around camp fires and playing music. The camp lasts from August 11th – 20th. Visit www.sacrewell.org for campsite details and location.   There is a modest charge if you want to camp. On the other hand, you can just visit during the day and listen to what people re playing. It's free.
EATMT 5th Annual Traditional Music Day
You may already know about this event but for those to whom it is news, here are the details. EATMT stands for East Anglian Traditional Music Trust. They are a registered charity based in Stowmarket in Suffolk. They run a lot of events supporting traditional music all around our region. They run courses and workshops in musicianship and dancing and take travelling exhibitions around, promoting local traditional music and musicians to the general public. Each year they have their Traditional Music Day which this year will be on 2nd September. The day is at the Museum of East Anglian Life in Stowmarket and is packed full of interesting events all day long, with dancing, instrumental sessions, singing, concerts, workshops, and stalls selling CDs, music etc. The museum is interesting too, in its own right. If you want to know more, you can visit their website at www.eatmt.org where you will find full details of everything they do. The day runs from 10.30 am to 5.30pm an adult single ticket costs £18. The evening ticket for the concerts costs £7.50 but is usually sold out long before the day arrives. If you are interested in going to this event let Patsy have your name. It is only three weeks away so we don't have much time to organise anything fancy in the way of transport. It will probably be down to car sharing. Patsy has a publicity leaflet if anyone wants to look at it.
Wisbech Folk Fayre 2006
Sue and Dick George are the organisers of this festival and they handed out leaflets at the last two meetings, so most people will be pretty much in the picture about this event. If you've lost your leaflet you can go to their website for the most up-to-date details www.wisbechfolk.net
Wolf Folk Club First Birthday coming up
One year old soon! Our first meeting was 6th October 2005 and we met in the little committee room just off the entrance. There was about 17 of us, if we remember correctly. The memory slowly fades but we know for definite that there are people there at the first meeting who still come to every meeting they can manage. We give a special thanks to them for being such loyal supporters all the way through. We want to find some way to celebrate the occasion which will be the meeting on 12th August. Your suggestions will be welcomed.
FOATMAD Fiddle and Banjo workshops
October American style fiddle and or banjo players might like to know that Dwight Diller (clawhammer banjo) and Dave Bing (fiddle) will be coming over from West Virginia, USA. to run teaching workshops during the last two weeks of October. Roger will probably go to both beginners and Intermediate fiddle workshops. If anybody wants more information talk to Roger.
The Wolf Folk Club Christmas Meeting 23rd Dec
The last meeting for this year will be Thursday December 23rd. There are a couple of obvious thoughts. It's going to be a great opportunity to make it a bit of a party. And it would be nice to try to follow a "Christmas" theme. This does not necessarily mean traditional carols (they would be very welcome but) there are loads of songs, monologues, stories, jokes, favourite readings and tunes around the subject. The sort of stuff your favourite uncle might have trotted out after too much Christmas Pudding and Brandy Sauce. The fires no doubt will be on and plenty of good beer and good cheer flowing. There's enough time to dig something up and rehearse it for that meeting or even to compose something completely from scratch. It will be good fun and different too. The Mummers might even pay us a visit.
Whittlesey Straw Bear Festival Jan '07
Sue and Dick George switched us on to this event in January earlier this year and we are very grateful. The Straw Bear Festival takes place at Whittlesey, over near Peterborough. It is a Plough Monday celebration on a grand scale. We found it mind-blowing and couldn't stop talking about it for days. The streets are given over to a parade of Morris Dancers, Molly Dancers, Clog Dancers, Rapper and Longsword Dancers, who all follow "The Straw Bear". The streets and the pubs are filled with music and dancing and wonderful costumes and colour. In the evening there is music making and singing in most of the big pubs in the central area. The celebrations continue over to Sunday with more dancing and then in the final act, the straw bears are burned on a bonfire (but without the human bodies inside them). It is truly spectacular and a not to be missed event. The other amazing thing is how many people come to see the parade and to enjoy the music and dancing. The streets are thronged with happy folk which is a testimony to the popularity of folk music and dancing. if you believed the media you would have thought that all interest in folk was completely dead and out of fashion. Here is proof it is alive and kicking, and popular too. The next one will be on 12th - 14th January 2007. If you want to know more or see some pictures, go to www.strawbear.org.uk Patsy and Roger will definitely be going for most of the Saturday. If you are interested in going, give your name to Patsy . If we get enough names, we may well organise a coach to transport us. If not, travel will be by car as usual. For those who do go, maybe we can arrange some lifts, or car sharing.
Who's Who -Dave Cooper
Dave moved to Thetford in 2004 but has been active in folk music since the early days of the "Folk Revival". He opened the first Folk Club at The Wheatsheaf, Cropwell Bishop, Notts in 1962. By 1966 he moved to London for his job and started the Rising Sun Folk Club at Catford, South London in 1967. He became involved with the English Folk Dance & Song Society and was Chairman of the London Folk Festival for several years. In this period he was performing at folk festivals around Europe and America including Burg Walded in Germany and Philadelphia in the USA. Back in the UK he sang in duos and groups, married in 1971, and moved back with his job to Nottingham in 1976. He opened the Robin Hood Folk Club in 1977 which is still running although it has changed venue several times. At this time he was still singing solo and in duos and quartets. He was also a founder member of "The Tuesday Occasionals" which was a twenty strong "a capella" (voices only) group singing "Sacred Harp" and "West Gallery" music and was making continued visits to America and Europe. All this coupled with a job as a buyer for a Cable Company and something had to give - and it did. Heart attack, early retirement and divorce! Dave had enjoyed in the past his holidays in Norfolk and with the idea of taking a lower profile(well that was the idea) he moved to Thetford. There he joined the St Cuthbert's Church choir singing tenor.
He sings bass with the Norfolk Gallery Quire which is based at Castle Acre and has occasional excursions to Tenterden in Kent where he sings with the Marsh Warblers (another West Gallery Quire). He also sings Sacred Harp (that is unaccompanied American white gospel music. He sings as often as possible at Wolf Folk Club (always late because of choir practice) because he agrees very much with Roger and Patsy's philosophy, which is to get as many people as possible playing, singing or doing something. He is a member of the "East Anglian Traditional Music Trust", and also "Suffolk Folk" and writes articles for their magazine "Mardles" and is to be found selling copies wherever he goes. Dave is very interested in the ancient Mumming Plays. He also sings with "Rig-a-jig-jig"the Norfolk Folk Music Band who support Music and Dance all over East Anglia. he has also broadcast on community radio. Currently Dave runs a session at The Greyhound , Flempton near Bury St Edmunds. You are likely to bump into Dave at almost any folk event as he supports folk music in all shapes and sizes and particularly loves village hall and charity events. Well! As Dave puts it, "The rest of my life is my own"
. Proposal: A "Floor Spots" Night
This section is aimed principally at the more confident and capable players and is intended to meet their special needs. We now have two well established singaround sessions per month. But we are still formulating our plans to start a program of guest nights. We are very conscious of the fact that the people who will be attracted by guest nights will be substantially different to those attracted by singarounds. Various things which have been said to us have prompted us to come up with an idea for an evening in a different format to the singaround and that is the idea of an evening of "Ffloor-spots". There are no plans to alter the singarounds. They are sacrosanct. The floor spots would be in addition to the singaround nights. In a singaround format, the performers go round the room, one song at a time, in turn. A performer takes a turn and then has to wait until everyone has had a turn before they get a chance to go again. This is actually a very good system where you are creating an environment which is encouraging to beginners or those who suffer somewhat from nerves. The more experienced folk however frequently find this frustrating and they would much prefer to do a set of pieces as one performance but which would consume their share of the evening. We are fortunate to have quite a lot of people at that level of ability. The proposal is that we have one evening a month composed entirely of, say, 20 minute slots which would be available to those who feel they would enjoy the opportunity. There would be three slots in the first half, 8.30 to 9.30 and then six slots in the second half 10.00 to 11.40. Or some similar format. The slots could be shorter or longer than suggested. There could be a mixture which performers could choose. We are seeking the format which is going to be most acceptable and useful to you. This suggests about 9 or 10 spots to the evening. A quick count around the room on any night will soon show that we have many more players than we have slots. There would have to be some form of ensuring fairness in allocation. Slots would have to be pre-booked by the performer who wishes to take a spot. You tell us you want to do a spot and we book you in to the first available evening. If you just had a spot you have to wait until all the other applicants have had a turn before you get to go again. Irritating, we know, but can you offer a better, fairer suggestion. Rather than sitting around in a loose circle, there would be a "stage" area at the centre of the room to give the best viewing and listening conditions to the audience. That would be placed at the entrance to the room overlooking the bowling green. This room would be treated as backstage and all instrument cases etc would be stored in there. If there is enough demand then we could consider having two floor spot nights per month. As with the singaround, admission would be free and there would be a raffle during the interval, proceeds going towards funding the programme of guests. Guest nights would almost certainly need to be admission by ticket only. If we can't do that at our present venue, we will have to hold guest nights where we can control admissions. If we can make a success of the floor spots nights, it makes it easy to get the "Guest Nights" going,. It would just be like a normal Floor Spots night but the guest would take the second half of the evening. The floor spots night would help us to build up the "Guest Nights" type of audience. There are a two or three other considerations. "Floor spots" is a very unattractive name for what should be a very attractive evening. It makes it sound like something unpleasant on the floor which someone has flattened with their foot, chewing gum or worse. Can anyone with a creative turn of mind come up with a much more appealing name for such an evening. We don't have to have it on a Thursday evening. It could be another night. We need to check with Wolferton Club Committee to see what they can make available to us. Maybe then we would be able to choose. The other point is that this all adds up to increase the burden on us (Roger & Patsy). Whilst we are very willing and enthusiastic, we do have to leave West Norfolk from time to time (we have friends and relations all over the place) so we need to be able to hand the running of events over to other willing and capable hands. Dave Cooper has already helped in this way. Other offers of involvement would be appreciated. We will be running a "bookings list" for those who wish to add their names and to take the opportunity of getting a floor spot. The list is now open. Give your details to Patsy. Floor spots will be allocated in the order in which bookings are received.
Early Learners Group
The slow jam and learning session, for those who want to build their skills and their repertoire will be starting soon. We need to know if you are interested to take part and we have to have some input from you so that we can choose the best time and place. Please do not wait for us to approach you, but give your name to Patsy (poor old Patsy gets all the clerking jobs). We will then arrange a first meeting to get everyone together and sort it all out. If you ever had a desire to get started, now is your chance, don't be backwards in coming forwards..
Wolferton Folk Club meeting dates for 2006
Thursday, August 24th Thursday, September 14th Thursday, September 28th Thursday, October 12th (One year old, Happy Birthday!) Thursday, October 26th Thursday, November 9thThursday, November 23rd Thursday, December 7th Thursday, December 21st (Last meeting for the year - Party time!)
Wisbech folk club now meets only twice a month, first Tuesday at the Angel Wisbech and fourth Tuesday at The Swan, Parson Drove. Castle Acre Folk Club had moved to The George & Dragon, Newton by Castle Acre but have now changed back to their old venue which was at The Ostrich.

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