First Folk Song You Sang in Public

Subject: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 02:53 PM

Significantly different to the other thread, this asks of Mudcatters:

A) What was the first song you sung consciously in the name of Folk in a folk club, singaround, festival (or any other Designated Revival Folk context)?

B) What was the source?

C) Where was it?

D) When was it?

E) How old were you?

F) How old are you now?

G) Is it still in your repertoir?

To kick off - mine was Lucy Wan sourced from Byker Hill by Martin Carthy in a singaround at The Bay Hotel Cullercoats (or possibly The Grey Horse Shiremoor) circa 1976 / 1977 when I was fifteen. I am now 49 and the song remains in my repertoir albeit in several variants, but I can still sing the Carthy version if pushed (& drunk enough).

Over to you...

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:02 PM

A Sally Brown
B Remembered from school
C Folk Union One, Bluebell, Hull
D c1965
E 18
F 63
G Not actively although I could sing it if asked.

I remember it clearly because it was quite embarrassing. Isobel Sutherland was the guest and I was very nervous, consequently the pitch was increased on each verse until I was singing castrato. Undeterred I jumped straight back in the following week with other newly learnt songs.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Penny S.
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:22 PM

A Probably Waly Waly
B Learned off a Kathleen Ferrier record
C St Osyth's College of Education Folk Club at Clacton
D c 1966
E 20
F Work it out
G Yes, with extra verses, though not often sung as others do it

Penny

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Penny S.
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:25 PM

Mind you, the first folk song, though not consciously as a folk song or in a folk context, was "The Minstrel Boy", sung in a music lesson at a private school in Folkestone, at the age of 8 or 9, a capella because I could not tell the music teacher what key it was in. I learned it from the "Daily Express" Community Song Book and my mother's piano playing.

Penny

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,DonMeixner
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:29 PM

Can't Help But Wonder Where I'm Bound
From Tom Paxton's second Electra LP
Burnett Park Zoo in Syracuse NY
Senior Skip Day picnic 1969
18
60
Sure is. I played it then on the Autoharp, I didn't pick up a guitar for 4 more years and that was the first song I learned on the guitar as well.

Don

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Gurney
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:35 PM

A Can't remember. Was English trad.
B One of Cyril Tawney's collection of songbooks, but I'd heard it before
C The Barbican Grecian Club, Plymouth. A gaming club, but CT had a FC there.
D About 1970?
E 29?
F Older!
G No

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Tootler
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:46 PM

A) Wreck of the Reuben James
B) Book of Woody Guthrie Songs
C) Thurso Folk Club
D) 1965
E) 21
F) 66
G) No. I can still remember the chorus and the tune (which is Wildwood Flower) including the variation for the chorus but the verses have been long forgotten.

I did think of re-learning it, but someone sings it fairly regularly at a local folk club. He just sings the straight Wildwood Flower tune for the chorus which frustrates me no end.

I used to sing in a duo with a friend who also played guitar. At the end of our time in Thurso we both went our separate ways to continue our respective University courses. I stopped going to Folk Clubs after Thurso and didn't start again until six years ago (or thereabouts)

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Dave MacKenzie
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 03:48 PM

A) Worried Man Blues
B) Mainly Jerry Silverman's 'Folk Blues'
C) School Folk Club
D) 1964
E) 16
F) 62
G) Yes

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 04:03 PM

Probably, "All My Trials" in 1966. Got in from Joan Baez recording, local folk club, Liverpool, 19 yrs old. No!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Andy Jackson
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 04:04 PM

A) Just as the Tide was a Flowing

B) Marrowbones (Gardiner collected song book)

C) Anchor Middle Bar, Sidmouth

D) Approx 1980

E) 31

F) 61

G) Oh yes!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 04:37 PM

A) Saucy Sailor
B) Steeleye Span, _Below the Salt_
C) A benefit gig where I'd talked my way into a support slot
D) 1984
E) 24
F) 50
G) No, although I could sing it if asked

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Tinker in Chicago
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 04:57 PM

A) "Abilene" (the Bob Gibson/John Loudermilk one)
B) A Brothers Four album. Don't remember which.
C) High school student council meeting
D) February of 1963
E) 15
F) 63
G) Nope, and it hasn't been for decades.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Zany Mouse
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 05:04 PM

Apart from school and home ...

A) Billy The Kid
B) Can't remember, but I was seriously into "Sing Out" etc. at the time.
C) Barnsley Folk Cub
D) 1968 - ish
E) 16 ish
F) You can work this out I'm sure! Ok, 58.
G) No. Taste has change a lot since then.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Gallus Moll
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 05:46 PM

Hi Tootler,

do you know / remember Iain and Margie Sinclair?

Also - Do you remember a band called Finn McCuill (probably more rock than folk - -?)

Just thought I'd ask - - -¬!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Gallus Moll
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 05:54 PM

oops! think the band was actually Fingal McCool - -? Could have been a blues-type band? - I'll need to ask - -get back to you soon!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Janie
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 10:33 PM

Would have been one of the following:

The Fox
Shula ru
This Land Is Your Land
Crabs Walk Sideways (Smothers Brothers)

Was in an all girl folk quartet in high school. We performed exclusively for programs at local elementary schools, going from class to class. We had those 4 songs, and nothing else, nailed down tight.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Jan 11 - 11:35 PM

High Barbaree.

First heard sung by Walt Robertson, learned it from The Burl Ives Song Book.

On the performance stage at the Hec Edmondson Pavilion at the University of Washington during a citywide hobby fair. On stage with Walt Robertson and Bob Nelson.

Spring of 1953.

23.

I'll be 80 in June.

Yup. Still sing it.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Little Robyn
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 12:44 AM

A) Either 'Lady Mary' or 'The Virgin Mary Had a One Son'.

B) Both of them were from Joan Baez records.

C) Wellington Teacher's Training College. Teremoana did most of the singing, I played guitar and put in the harmony.

D) 1963

E) 17

F) 65

G) No.

Robyn

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Desi C
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 07:33 AM

I well remember it as I was so nervous. The song was The Drover's Dream, originated from an Australia named Reedy River which came to England mid 50's and flopped. But it was recorded on The Ian Cambell Folk Group, sung by the late John Dunkerly the Banjoist and backed by their then fiddler Dave Swarbrick, I learned it from John Dunkerly in Birmingham. I performed it at The Old Bush Folk Club in Bradley nr Wolverhampton in 1982, and it was always a full house. I'd been an occasional Pub Singer, then started following The Ian cambell group. And it was my first folk Club performance, I was pure Acapella in those days. I was 31 at the time, nearly 60 now and yes it's very much still in my repertoire.
I now co host the Circle Folk Club in Coseley nr Bilston in The Black Country, every Wed open Mic, newcomers welcome. If you'd like to join our mailing list please drop me a line at [e-mail]

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Paul Davenport
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 08:48 AM

A Tottenham Frolic
B Ed McCurdy
C Folk Union One - Bluebell Inn, Hull
D 18
E 60
F No - but it could be if the price was right.

Like Steve I remember it with some embarrassment. I got up to sing and asked Norman Cross if I could borrow his guitar. There were mutterings in the audience which I now realise were, "Crutch, crutch, crutch!" (Accompanied singing was only ok with a concertina.)

But it was the first place where I ever sang in harmony! Thanks to Steve and Pam Brown. The song was 'The Wedding Song' (Copper Family?) and Steve had to teach me the bass part note by note.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 08:59 AM

A: Treadmill song
B: Steeley Span recording on "Storm force 10" altered slightly after listening to other sources.
C: Bridgwater Folk Club
D: December 1982
E: 29
F: 57
G: Yes, infrequently, but now accompanied on D/G Anglo rather than unaccompanied.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: John P
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 09:53 AM

A) What was the first song you sung consciously in the name of Folk in a folk club, singaround, festival (or any other Designated Revival Folk context)?

I'm not a revivalist, nor do the places I usually play folk music have anything to do with reviving anything. Be that as it may:

A) Matty Groves

B) Fairport Convention

C) Camlann Medieval Fair

D) 1982

E) 28

F) 56

G) Not that version. I've done at least four different versions over the years, most recently the newly, beautifully composed "Matthew Green".

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 11:13 AM

A) Song: "The Hobo's Lullaby" (Cisco Houston)

B) Source: A Pete Seeger album

C) Venue: A folk club in Leeds

D) Date: 1964

E) My age then: 20

F) My age now: 66

G) In repertoire? No, but I still know it!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Sailor Ron
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 11:59 AM

A. D. Day Dodgers
B. Ian Campbell Folk Group L.P.
C. Fleetwood Folk Club
D. 1969 Oct.
E. 21
F. 63
G. Very occasionally.

I thought I could sing! I was so awful I was banned from singing there for years [quite rightly]. I am a bit better now.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 12:04 PM

A) Probably "Walkabout with my Pen"

B) My collection "WalkaboutsVerse"

C) The Bridge Folk Club, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE England

D) Spring 2004

E) 37

F) 44

G) Yes

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 12:21 PM

A) "New York Girls"
B) Bob Davenport's first album
C) Birtley Folk Club
D) 1966
E) 17
F) 62
G) Yes - on odd occasions

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: JHW
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 12:35 PM

I remember Margie Sinclair yonks since at Loughborough Festival in a threesome?
'Button up and aye be cheery and tak a dram afore/before you go'


A The Springhill Disaster (Peggy Seeger)

B Singing of Martin Carthy I believe

C The Oak Tree, Richmond, North Yorkshire. Now knocked into houses. I'm waiting for the blue plaque.

D 1964 best guess

E 19/20 Just left school and got a job (you could do that then)

F Clearly well past it. I've got all the years in, all the stamps on my card, do I really need to keep turning out?

G Yes as with all songs when the occasion suggests it

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 12:39 PM

This is great stuff, though forgive me, WAV, for insisting you fill in your questionnaire again with respect of your E.Trads.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 01:06 PM

...I'm not sure which traditional song I sang first, S...maybe "Johnny Todd," which I somehow? knew of, before using the internet, and which I still sing. (The rest, as above.)

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: raymond greenoaken
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 04:10 PM

A The Old Man From Lee
B Penguin Book Of English Folk Songs
C Hexham Folk Club
D 1977
E 25
F 58 (59 in a fortnight)
G Never sang it again until last year. Back in the rep!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Graham_Pirt
Date: 18 Jan 11 - 04:12 PM

I did sing with a group singing Clancy Brothers songs when I was Thirteen in 1960 but would class this as my true introduction to folk song

A) Black Leg Miners

B) From the singing of Don Day (from Hebburn, Co. Durham)

C) The Fort Folk Club, South Shields

D) It was in 1963

E) I'm now 63

F) It is when I do a show about the Miners' Union

and it introduced me to a lifelong love for the music

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: JHW
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 05:42 AM

This is interesting; worth keeping going...

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Surreysinger
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 07:36 AM

The question in the heading to this thread was about the first folk song sung in PUBLIC (rather than in folk club, singaround etc). I we're talking that, then it was "Blackwaterside" with guitar accompaniment in front of an audience comprised of choral singers. Source was a Tony Rose LP if I recall correctly, and the location was a choir singing weekend in Winchester, Hants in the 1980's when I was in my late 30's (I think ... datewise). It's in my repertoire at home, but I haven't sung it out in a long while. Thanks ... that gives me an idea for the next night when I have to stand up and do a spot at the club.

Re the actual standing up and singing a "folk song" in public ... again, definition required. The first time I stood up in a folk club was actually September 1991, as part of a harmony duo with Jane Ravenhill in the Ram Club in Claygate, Surrey. (We never did have a name - she wanted to call us 88 ... bingo parlance, of course... but I never agreed!!). The song would have been either "Inisvaddy's Annie" or "This Old World" ... in neither case a true folk song, of course - one being a poem set to music by Len Graham's wife, and the other a hymn.

However, if you're talking solo performance, and real folk song, then that came five weeks later ... again at the Ram Club in Claygate, Surrey. We'd been rehearsing and performing two new songs each week, and on the fifth week we had only one song. Naively I thought we'd revert to something we'd done in the first week (daft when I look at it now!) ... she sat down in the front row below the small upraised stage and said "You're on your own - get on with it!, and I ended up singing "Let No Man steal Your Thyme" (unaccompanied)... can't remember who the source was, but it wasn't the version which was ubiquitous at the time. Year again (obviously) was 1991, age 40, age now pretty obvious if you can count ?? Is it still in my repertoire - that particular version is one that I sang in public quite a lot in the 1990's, but haven't done for some time (although I could quite easily, but it's a bit bog standard). I now tend to sing a version which was collected from Henry Burstow by Lucy Broadwood

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: mikesamwild
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 08:32 AM

paddy McGinty's Goat and Kelly the Boy from Killane, learned from my dad. Sung at Harry Boardman's club in 1956 in Brazenose St.

Mind you, elsewhere I was plonking an old nylon strung guitar with a ragbag of popular skiffle and Burl Ives songs and Woody Guthrie numbers and blues etc etc , very eclectic for the fellow teens. Just mopping it all up and totally unselfconscious or self aware or critical. By early 1960 I was at our new University Folk Club in Sheffield singing 'serious' unaccompanied folk

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Alan Whittle
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 09:06 AM

I was stopped singing Kelly the Boy from Killane when I was six, my cousine who was seven,but whose name was Kelly thought I was taking the piss out of him. I probably was. He used to burst into tears.

Powerful stuff, folksongs.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Louie Roy
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 11:08 AM

Mother the queen of my heart
5 years old
Feb 1930
aT A BARN DANCE
Still sing it
Still sing and play 2 times week at nursing homes and senior centers
86 now

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: janemick
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 11:39 AM

A) The Appretice Song

B) Ian Campbell Folk Group

C) Rising Sun, Catford

D) 1972

E) 20

F) 58

G) No, but I still know all the words

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Doug Saum
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 12:02 PM

"Pretty Boy Floyd"
Woody
Sung at "The Sewer" (Coffeehouse)University of Nebraska Kearney
In 1968 when I was 18
I'm 60 now
Still play it once in a while

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 12:07 PM

Depends how you define "public". I first sang to any sort of audience at Restaurant Chez Cléo, Harrington Gardens, off Gloucester Road, South Kensington, which belonged to my family, in about 1955. I would be initially accompd by the resident pianist, but later with my own guitar when someone taught me the chords. Songs I mainly sang were "Foggy, foggy dew" and (most in demand) "Caviar's the roe of the virgin sturgeon".

The latter, as I have mentioned on other threads, was enjoyed particularly by Ruth Ellis, brought by her lover the racing driver David Blakeley (who came once or twice with Stirling Moss). David was a regular and he and I would usually chat and have a drink. Ruth came only once as I recall; David introd her to me as they left and she thanked me as she left particularly for that song. Then a few days later she shot David dead in Hampstead and became the last woman ever to be hanged in the UK.

An interesting fan, tho I say it myself, of the first folksong I recall singing in public!

♪Michael♪

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 12:18 PM

For info ~~ version of above song in DT as "The Virgin Sturgeon".

~M~

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Pulseroom
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 01:47 PM

A) Annie's Song

B) Have to admit "I nicked it from my mate Colin Hancock"

C) Masons at Rotherham where I first heard David sing Lola. "Ray Hearn wrote a song for David"

D) Wow! About 1970 ish

E) Gulp! 21, I just received the key to the door. Vin Garbutt was guest.

F) 61 getting on 40

G) Of course, I can only remember the old ones.   I could learn a song a week, takes me 3 month's now.

What was the question?

Over to you!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Pulseroom
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 01:49 PM

P. S Annies song - Tom Paxton

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: JHW
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 04:52 PM

Surreysinger - The initial post says 'Significantly different to the other thread, this asks of Mudcatters:
A) What was the first song you sung consciously in the name of Folk in a folk club, singaround, festival (or any other Designated Revival Folk context)?'

But if your first public performance was on the Sidmouth camp site bus I'd say fair enough

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Young Buchan
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 05:03 PM

A Invalid Miner by Roger Watson
B A folk magazine called something like Sing or Sing Out - but not THAT Sing Out. This was a little local magazine from the North West (of England). Which is interesting because I was living in the South East.
C and D Long ago and in another place and besides the wench is dead. I recall it was a benefit evening for some good cause, almost certainly organised by the Communist Party.
E Not very
F Very
G Yes
H And the second one I did was Dylan's You Playboys and Playgirls. But don't tell anyone else.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,999
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 05:51 PM

`First Folk Song You Sang in Public`

I`ll let you know if it ever happens.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: John J
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 05:57 PM

'Old Horse', at a folk club near Newport Pagnell in 1976 - far enough from home for it to be extremely unlikely that anyone at that club would ever be unfortunate enough to hear me sing again.

I was terrified!

JJ

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: mikesamwild
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 07:46 AM

Actually in public aged 7 Hello Patsy Fagan on the stage at Ardwick Hippodraome at a panto! I ran down from the Gods and backstage to emerge blinking in the light and stagestruck !

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 09:52 AM

A) Julia, We Don't Live In The 60s

B) Downloaded from "The Indelicates", chords worked out with the assistance of a guitar teacher

C) High Brooms Tavern Singaround, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, UK

D) November 2009

E) 54 at the time

F) 55 now

G) Yes, should hope so given that it was only a year ago!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Wolfhound person
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 11:12 AM

In a folk club:

A Careless Love and The Foggy Dew with excruciating guitar accompaniment
B Learned off someone else at Forest School Camps
C Christchurch Folk Club (now in Dorset)
D 1965/1966
E 15 maybe
F A lot older
G No, though I could join in with it

In a school concert(not solo):

Stuff from Singing Together - I remember Dashing White Sergeant, Canny Newcastle and Bobby Shaftoe (this was in Poole!!)
aged about 8, so 1959-ish.
I play them still....

Paws

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: puck
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 12:02 PM

Blow ye Winds
A CD of seasongs
Pennymoor singaround, Black Dog Tiverton Devon
About twenty years ago at age 48ish
59
I've never sung it since - tho' it was well received.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Stringsinger
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 01:33 PM

A.   Streets of Laredo
B.    Probably Burl Ives
C.    Y.M.C.A. campfire at "Little Green Valley" in Big Bear Lake area California
D.    c1945
E.    12
F.      76
G.    Still do occasionally.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: NaeMairSea
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 04:55 PM

Significantly different to the other thread, this asks of Mudcatters:

A) Paddy and the Bricks

B) Learnt while on a Warship in the South Atlantic

C) Woolston Folk Club, Near Southampton (Now moved to Bursledon)

D) 1998

E) 44

F) 56

G) Yes, as a good Health and Safety Warning.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,smuggler
Date: 24 Jan 11 - 03:50 PM

A)For Lovin Me(Gordon Lightfoot)

B) My brother brought back a recording of it from Canada/USA when he was working as a steward on Candian Pacific ships.

C) Rhyl Folk Club, North Wales

D) 1966

E) 16

F) Work it out!!

G) only when someone asks me what was the 1st song you sang (happened at Christmas!)

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: PHJim
Date: 24 Jan 11 - 04:02 PM

A) What was the first song you sung consciously in the name of Folk in a folk club, singaround, festival (or any other Designated Revival Folk context)?
My brother Gary and friend Jim had a folk group called The Rovers Three (named after the song The Gypsy Rover). The first song we sang was Jesse James.

B) What was the source?
We learned it from a Kingston Trio record.

C) Where was it?
-at a Boy Scout Hootenanny in the basement of Binkley Church in Hamilton

D) When was it?
-circa 1959 or 1960, during the great folk scare

E) How old were you?
-15 or 16

F) How old are you now?
-66

G) Is it still in your repertoir?
-My siblings and I still do it occasionally at family get-to-gethers

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 12 Apr 11 - 07:50 AM

(A) Hanging Johnny
(B) Sea Songs and Shanties (book)- Hugill
(C) Old Kings Head - Teddington
(D) 1980
(E) 20
(F) 51
(G) I still know it, but as I sing in public on average once a year, it could take 50 or 60 years before I get round to it again!

The very very first folks songs would have been in the school choir when I was 12 or 13.

The location was session run by Michael Black (I've been told more recently it is he of THE Black Family). I remember it well, the first few times I went there I was overheard joining in choruses. On the night in question the dialogue went something like:

Are you going to give us a song?
'Vigorously shaking my head'
Come on sing us a song.
Maybe another time.
If you sing us a song, I'll buy you a pint.
Thanks, but no thanks.
Here's a pint - what are you going to sing?

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 12 Apr 11 - 08:07 AM

First sung in the early 70s but the song I sung(The Port Of Amsterdam) was recorded at the Lamb in Preston in the 1980s
Port of Amsterdam... done in the 1980s

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Apr 11 - 08:28 AM

Preston, eh? Well I sang Amsterdam in Fleetwood a few years ago but I would never think of it as a Folk Song. As I recall I didn't use the usual translation, but based it on the word for word text of a film of Jaques Brel on YouTube which is a good deal more interesting & colourful!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2kkr0e_dTQ

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,VirginaTam
Date: 12 Apr 11 - 09:20 AM

A) The Minstrel

B) Graham & Eileen Pratt LP

C) Sing a round session at Rochester Sweeps

D) May 2008?

E) 50

F) 53 (in less than 24 hours)

G) It is my preferred piece and most requested.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Paul Reade
Date: 12 Apr 11 - 07:25 PM

I have no problem remembering the first song - it's the last one I can't remember!

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Jeremiah McCaw
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 12:54 AM

A) What was the first song you sung consciously in the name of Folk?
"Is There Anybody Here?"

B) What was the source?
Phil Ochs, from the "I Ain't Marchin' Any More" album

C) Where was it?
Outside the Riverboat (Yorkville Village, Toronto) - standing in line at 10 o'clock for Gordon Lightfoot's midnight show! I was singing it quietly to a friend by way of trying to introduce him to the work of this amazing songwriter I'd just discovered. Not as quietly as I thought - I ended up with a healthy round of applause from the rest of the lineup!

D) When was it?
196-4?

E) How old were you?
17

F) How old are you now?
63. Please don't make me do the math.

G) Is it still in your repertoire?
Not really. Main Phil Ochs song I still do is "When I'm Gone."

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Charles Biada
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 01:44 AM

A) "Jeff Davis Rides A Grey Horse"

B) Field recording of Oscar Gilbert via the Wolf Folklore Collection

C) Weeknight singaround at the Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture

D) June 2010

E) 19

F) 20

G) Yes, with an added seven or eight verses

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Max Johnson
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 07:03 AM

A) What was the first song you sung consciously in the name of Folk in a folk club, singaround, festival (or any other Designated Revival Folk context)? The Maid of Fife (with harmony and everything!)

B) What was the source? The Clancy Brothers' Carnegie Hall album.

C) Where was it? Les Pope's White Horse Folk Club, Ripon.

D) When was it? 1966.

E) How old were you? 18.

F) How old are you now?. 2011 -D +E -10

G) Is it still in your repertoir? I no longer sing in public and only sing with friends nowadays, but, yes.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Brian May
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 07:10 AM

A. Colours

B. Donovan

C. Ashley House Folk Club, Bognor Regis

D. 1967 ish

E. 17 ish

F. 60

G. Yes, and an objectionable parody too (which my wife hates)

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: GUEST,Desi C
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 07:27 AM

A- The Drovers Dream
B-from album Presenting the Iam Cambell Folk Group, which
I later gave to Ian & Lorna cambell as oddly they hadn't a copy!
Comes from a 50's Oz musical Reedy River, on the album by
John Dunkerly with Dave Swarbrick on fiddle
C-At The Old Bush Folk Club, Daisy Bank near Bilston
D- 1982 ish
C- 32
D- almost 60
E- Very much still in my repertoire as an Acapella song

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: kmbraun
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 09:59 AM

A) Foggy, Foggy Dew

B) A Dulcimer instruction book bought when I got my dulcimer.

C) The Rack 'n Sack Society in Little Rock, AR

D) 1973 or so on a Sunday evening.

E) about 29

F) 67

G) Yes, but with concertina, not the dulcimer.

Kurt

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: tritoneman
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 12:41 PM

The first 'folk' song I sang in public was 'Danville Girl'. I learnt it from an album called 'Rambling Boys' by Ramblin' Jack Eliot And Derroll Adams. This happened at Farnborough Folk Club held at the Old Ford pub at North Camp, Hampshire (UK). It was in 1965 and I was 14 years old. I'm about to turn 60.... This song is no longer in my repertoire but maybe it should be !

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Richard from Liverpool
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 02:04 PM

A She's Like The Swallow
B Vaughan Williams, Folksongs from Newfoundland
C At a music festival in Liverpool
D 10 and a half years ago
E 18
F 29
G In theory, yes, although I can't actually remember the last time I sang it (overdue for another go), and having seen other sources I've shifted away from the words that Vaughan Williams gives.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Rebecca Fox
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 02:39 PM

A. Either The Gardener or The Bold Fisherman (did them both but can't remember in which order)
B From a my parents' Tim Hart & Maddy Prior album (Folksongs of Old England 2)
C. As part of a 'folk music' week at the Othona Community in Dorset.
D 1995
E 19
F 34
G Yes, but not all that regularly as I have always had my father accompany me on guitar for both those songs. Maybe about time I rearranged them so I can accompany myself or just sing them a capella occasionally.

Sang folk songs for many years prior to that, but only in general musical gatherings... that was the first time with a specifically folk oriented audience.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 13 Apr 11 - 02:57 PM

The cuckoo, she's a pretty bird, sung at the Herga folk club.
As far as I can remember, the words for the version I sang were learned from a book shown to me by my German penfriend in Ludwigsburg during a school exchange in the Easter holidays in 1968, when I was 16, so you can work out how old I am now. And I still sing it occasionally.

Kitty

PS the first song I sang in public was Que sera, sera, at my infants school, when I was about 5...

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 14 Apr 11 - 12:13 PM

Out of interest - score so far:

16% learned their first song from books/publications, 47% from recordings, 15% from other people, 22% other/did not say.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: Jon Bartlett
Date: 14 Apr 11 - 09:04 PM

A) Solidarity Forever
B) An unknown singer at a Young Socialist Weekend School in Tonbridge, Kent, on the Common Market (as Europe used to be called)
C) Heart & Hand Folk Club, Brighton
D) Sometime in September 1962
E) 16
F) 64
G) Yes

Jon Bartlett

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: DrugCrazed
Date: 15 Apr 11 - 06:16 AM

A) Hanging Johnny
B) Either Great Big Sea's Road Rage album, or Boden's Folk Song A Day. I think I heard GBS's first.
C) Raise The Roof folk club, above the Red Deer pub
D) Last month, 16th March I think
E) 19
F) 19
G) Hell yeah. A nice shanty which is great for a crowd song, even if they aren't folkies.

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: doncatterall
Date: 28 Apr 11 - 06:02 AM

A) Lucy Wan (I think)

B) Byker Hill LP (Carthy & Swarbrick)

C) probably in a pub in North Cheshire with Adlington Morris Men

D) mid 1970s

E) mid 20s

F) 61

G) yes, but rarely sung

Subject: RE: First Folk Song You Sang in Public
From: threelegsoman
Date: 28 Apr 11 - 09:58 AM

A)       Going to the Zoo by Tom Paxton
B)       City of Leeds College of Education Folk Club
C)       1966
D)       21
E)       65
F)       Yes, but not often