Another relaxing evening, purely acoustic with no amplifiers or microphones in sight. There were 9 performers and what follows is the of names of performers and the songs they sang/strummed/performed etc.

We went round twice with each of us performing 2 songs first. Steph was first up and sang ‘You Can’t Black Out the Moon’ and ‘Eleanor Rigby’ Helen performed ‘Love Letters’, a song written in 1945 and recorded by both Elvis Presley and Alison Moyet.

Chris Martin was up next and and sang 2 of his own songs ‘It’s Only My Time’ and ’Tick’Tock.

Roy Champion was up next and played 2 pieces on the piano, a Prelude by J S Bach and the theme from the Octet by Schubert.

Lance was up next with ‘Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road’ and a song inspired by talking to Chris Martin, ‘70s Casualty’

Helga sang a German song written by Wolf Bierman. She learned the song in her twenties and it is called ’Take Heart’ The second song was a jazz classic called Blue Bossa. In the arrangement she changed the bossa rhythm to flamenco.

Ella was back for the first time in over a year. She sang ‘Goodbye’ a Patty Griffin song and Iris Dement’s song ‘Our Town'.

Manus performed Hoagy Carmichael’s ‘The Nearness Of You’ and the Charlie Mingus song ‘Goodbye Porkpie Hat’.

Jason and Lisa who sang Dylan’s Girl From The North Country’ and a new song of theirs called ‘Where On Earth Would We Rather Be’.

Heather sang The Dixie Chicks song ’Travelling Soldier’ and her own song called ‘Just a Dream’.

We all went round again and sang a song each as follows -: Steph sang ‘You’ll Never Know How Much I Love You’ Helen sang ‘The Mummers Dance’ Roy decided that he had performed all he wanted to and carried on listening Lance sang ‘Sadie’ Ella performed Joni Mitchell’s ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ Manus sang his own song ‘Murray’s Bar’ Jason and Lisa performed a song written by Jason’s dad ‘Lifeline’ Heather wrapped things up and sang ‘What have they done to the Rain?' Written in 1962 by Malvina Reynolds. Originally called Rain Song, it was a protest against nuclear power.

Lance of Seaford (retired)

26th October 2021

Against a background of rising Covid cases, road works and other sickness, 5 hardy souls braved the weather and gathered as one at the 6 Bells. Tales were told and songs were sung. There was no amplification as Simon was too unwell to carry out his usual unselfish task of setting everything up for us. Instead we sat in a circle and performed acoustically.

It was a really nice evening Chris sang 5 songs follows’. My Only Hero’ a song he began at the recent songwriting workshop and completed afterwards. Chris’s hero was Peter Osgood who played football for Chelsea, and later, played for Southampton. His other songs were ‘Insomnia’s Dream’, I Want To Sing Along’ ‘My Mum, The Care Home and Alzheimer’s’ and ‘Ghosts’.

Roy who usually come along to listen played 2 pieces on the piano, a Mazurka and a Minuet.

Lance sang 5 songs in quick time ‘Old Bob’ a song about his labrador ‘The Old River’, ‘He Isn’t There Any More’ ‘Better Eat Your Veggies” and lastly ‘The Nativity Song’ all about baby Jesus, the King Of Kings and the Wise Men.

Heather sang ’Yes Dear’ , ‘Weald and Sea’, ‘The Skye Boat Song’ and ‘Here We’ll Stay’.

Clive sang 5 songs as follows.’The Grey Funnel Line’, ‘All Of The Love Will Remain’ ‘I Guess You’ll Never Know’, ‘ Above The Grey’ and ‘If You Will Be My Friend’

And that was it, packing up was easy to do as we were acoustic and all we had to do was put our guitars in their cases and like Elvis, we left the building.e to edit.