Lyrics & Knowledge Personal Pages Record Shop Auction Links Radio & Media Kids Membership Help
The Mudcat Cafesj



User Name Thread Name Subject Posted
Will Fly UK 60s Folk Club Boom? (1167* d) RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom? 21 Mar 19


I've never seen any performer bring his own enforcers and force the audience to listen.

I have - just the once. It was at the BBC Folk Club - "Clanfolk" - in the Marquis of Clanricarde in Bayswater in the early 1970s. The booked act was Martin Carthy, and I was the then organiser and booker. Just as Martin had started his act, in walks Dominic Behan, pissed, with two large Irish blokes with him - very obviously his "minders".

Behan stalked to the front of the stage, pushed Martin in the chest - Martin stumbled back, luckily into a chair - and then proceeded to sing Irish rebel/anti-English songs at the top of his voice. Being in no mood to tackle two large blokes - though I would have happily slung Behan out if he'd been on his own - I went downstairs and summoned Danny, the even larger Irish landlord. Up came Danny and out went the trio.

What struck me afterwards was Martin's calmness and patience at the time - though he remembered it all with a grimace when I met him, many years later at a Christmas concert in Shoreham!

But that's the one and only time I've encountered such an incident at a folk club.




Back to the Main Forum Page

By clicking on the User Name, you will requery the forum for that user. You will see everything that he or she has posted with that Mudcat name.

By clicking on the Thread Name, you will be sent to the Forum on that thread as if you selected it from the main Mudcat Forum page.
   * Click on the linked number with * to view the thread split into pages (click "d" for chronologically descending).

By clicking on the Subject, you will also go to the thread as if you selected it from the original Forum page, but also go directly to that particular message.

By clicking on the Date (Posted), you will dig out every message posted that day.

Try it all, you will see.