About a year ago, I started going to a monthly session of French tunes in a country pub not too far from me. Not knowing the score (no pun intended...), I took a guitar along and played quietly, listening mostly as most, but not all, of the music was unfamiliar to me.

Talking to the organiser during a break, I discovered that he'd put together a PDF document of some of the more popular tunes which were played more or less regularly at this session. He willingly emailed me this to me at my request and, when it arrived, I spent a pleasant hour or two going through it and decided to learn them on mandolin, rather than guitar. I think it's easier - for me, at any rate - to pick up melody lines and join in (with totally unfamiliar tunes) on a mainly solo string instrument like a mandolin, rather than on a guitar.

So the next session I went to, I was armed with some knowledge of the repertoire and even managed to kick one off myself. At a later session, I also did what Leadfingers has suggested above and took along my Zoom H2 - as have other novices at this session.

I still have a fair amount to learn as new tunes from the seasoned regulars keep cropping up every session, but at least I'm more familiar with the genre and can pick up more of the music by ear as I go along. The music, by the way, is generally played on hurdy-gurdy, button accordion, French pipes, and fiddles - a sound I'd not really heard before and one which sent me away searching for CDs by La Chavanée and others!