Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore

Subject: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: Steve Hunt
Date: 23 Aug 09 - 07:46 AM

Hi folks. This is probably a VERY long shot, but you never know with Mudcat, so here goes...

Did anyone here ever go to the old Liskeard (Cornwall, UK) Folk Club in the 1970's?

I know that it was held in the self-same room as the current incarnation, Barley Folk, but that's about it.

If anyone has any memories of the club at all, I'd be hugely grateful for every single one, whether you were a booked artist, a floor singer or an audience member, even the most innocuous recollection will be received as if it were the lost treasure of the Pharos. The discovery of any existing photographs or sound recordings would probably cause me to spontaneously combust with excitement...

All the very best - Steve

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: Gweltas
Date: 23 Aug 09 - 08:20 AM

Sorry Steve, I only moved here in 1995, but I know a friend of a friend who might have been here then and who might have played there. He now lives in Plymouth, but Martyn knows how to contact him, so I'll ask him to pass on your enquiry..
Good luck with the search !
Rgds,
Anne XX

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 23 Aug 09 - 09:07 AM

Steve - PM sent with possible informant from the era 1970-72.

Mick

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: Waddon Pete
Date: 23 Aug 09 - 09:50 AM

I played there back in the day...

A feature of the club was the way everyone left to catch the last train back to Plymouth etc.!

Best wishes,

Peter

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: Cats
Date: 23 Aug 09 - 07:52 PM

Steve, I used to go there in the 1980's / 90's but not further back than that.
Kathy

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: The Sandman
Date: 24 Aug 09 - 06:19 AM

Why not google John the Fish,he has a website,he must be able to give you info,he must have played the club as well.

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: The Sandman
Date: 24 Aug 09 - 06:24 AM

another possible informant might be Wizz Jones.
he was in Cornwall in the early sixties

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: GUEST,Lin Fletcher
Date: 01 May 14 - 06:19 AM

Hi, my husband and i used to play there regularly. Always being introduced as" some fine contemporary folk from Lin and Mike". We even got top spot once when and paid for what we had done for free for months. Happy days!

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: GUEST,SqueezeMe
Date: 02 May 14 - 02:47 AM

Used to regularly make the pilgrimage from Plymouth, 1969-71, but for the life of me I can't remember much about it. Am I getting old, or just too many pints of "braincell remover"?

Maybe a few more posts to this thread might remind me.

Strangely, I have vivid memories of visiting the Bodmin Folk Club at The Garland Ox around the same period; Vic Legg, Lar Cann, the Ridleys etc. No "last train home" from that one; used to sleep it off in the car up on the moor, much against the advice of the locals....

Got to a Padstow May Day one time; can't recall the year, but a certain Mr R Stone reputedly "lost his footing" and ended up in the harbour as I recall....

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: GUEST,SqueezeMe
Date: 02 May 14 - 07:29 PM

OK, I've had a sleep and a think and I can recall one floor singer who made an impression on me, and I'm fairly sure it was at Liskeard one night around that time.

An elderly lady who sang unaccompanied "A Cottage Well Thatched With Straw" and also a song called "Adam's Fall". Can't recall hearing either of these songs before or since. Not sure if she was a "local" or a visitor. I believe her name might have been Mrs Foxworthy or something similar, and she seemed to have been treated with some sort of reverence by the audience and other performers, most of whom played and sang a more contemporary style of folk music if I remember correctly. You could have heard the proverbial pin drop....

Not sure when Liskeard Folk Club began, but I think it was a fairly new enterprise at that time. I believe that they would often book "guests" who were perhaps not nationally known, but were locally based in Plymouth (and elsewhere close by), and on some of the occasions I attended it was to support not only a new club, but to hear an extended set from those performers who were only usually heard doing floor spots.

I'll post again if anything more comes to mind.

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: GUEST,Derrick
Date: 03 May 14 - 04:41 AM

Mrs Foxworthy or Foxy as she was also known as was Tony Foxworthy's
mother. She was a wonderful lady who indeed was loved by the local
folkies both for her personality and character and her wealth of local songs.
I came across the words of "Adam's Fall" only the other day and was
transported back to those days again.
I only went to Liskeard Club once,we called in on the way back from a wedding in Bodmin.
We were looked at with some suspicion as we were both dressed in suits and ties,but after singing a couple of songs we were accepted as folkies and not the Old Bill in a crude disguise.
That would have been 1972 if my memory still works.

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: GUEST
Date: 03 May 14 - 04:44 AM

"Cottage Well Thatched with Straw" is still sung in the SouthWest and "Mrs Foxworthy" is still remembered by some - so you got both of those memories right!.

Subject: RE: Liskeard Folk Club - days of yore
From: GUEST,David Yardley
Date: 16 Jun 17 - 10:14 AM

I think I remember Lynn and Mike!
John the Baptist was one of theirs.