Sorry to hear that Mrs Duck. The only thing to do under circumstances where people are rude and intentionally so, is to find another venue which will be better suited and the people better able to cater for singing. Sad that it comes to this.

Could it be that one of the reasons that singers insist on singing when it is obvious that the evening IS a tune session, is that they know they will usually receive attention, silence and a warm reception after the song, if only for the fact that one song is welcome, to most of the folk in the pub, including the staff, as a change and as novelty value to wall to wall tunes?

Is this ever a calculated action on the part of the singer, for this attention and reaction? It would sometimes appear to be.

I think we generally accept, from comments made here, that song after song in an open pub bar, no matter how skillfully performed or timed, does struggle for the above kind of attention and reception as the evening progresses.