Venues: How welcoming?

Subject: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Mr Happy
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 09:45 AM

Besides our own weakly sinaround, where the landlord쳌fs great & provides luvly butties mid evening, other local do쳌fs venues are generally welcoming also & some give chips, butties etc as well.

Other sessions I쳌fve attended both near home & further afield, there sometimes seems an atmosphere of almost resentment   from both locals & management alike.

This hostility can manifest itself in such ways as excessive noise from tellies, jukeboxes etc, but luckily is often the exception rather than the rule in most places.

How do other seshes fare in various hostelries?

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: GUEST,PeterC
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 11:27 AM

Varies a lot but I haven't seen free snacks or drinks for many years.

I know of one pub where the landlord loved the session but the regulars voted with their feet. Poor guy had a family to feed so no session.

Where I have seen the most problems is where a manager is put in or where the licensee who agreed the session doesn't actually work at the time of the session.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 11:41 AM

Rose and Crown in Writtle for the Blackmore (in exile) club is a brilliant venue.

Let us have the upstairs function/pool room every 1st Thursday. They even recently removed the pool table because the attendance was so good.

Don't know the landlord, but I think he is the gentleman who keeps sneaking upstairs and hanging out by the door. Guess he prefers the music upstairs to the sport on telly downstairs.

No freebies but genuine interest and encouragement.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: bubblyrat
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 11:50 AM

A "weakly sinaround " ? Is that an orgy for anaemic libertines ??

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: GUEST,Cup of Tea wif no cookies
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 12:14 PM

but.. but would *I* be welcomed at a "sin around"
I'm fat, fiftyish and go to church regularly.
But if there are autoharps and concertinas, I could gleefully sin.

I think

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Nick
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 01:32 PM

We are lucky at our weekly gathering that the landlord's wife knocks together some food - very nice of them. Not needed but enjoyed.

Session at the Maltings in York always has a plate of (excellent home-made) chips and some sandwiches.

Singaround at the Gay Husaar in York used to have food.

Session at the Ormidale in Brodick offers the participants a free drink toards the end of the evening.

Scotland and Yorkshire - good kind, generous folk. Can't go wrong.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Spleen Cringe
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 02:51 PM

I think Joanne, the landlady at the Beech, is glad to have us in. There are something like 25 pubs and bars in about a half mile radius ... and we're not even in the city centre, just one lovely suburb, the Chorlton Bubble. So lots of competition - enough, perhaps, to make our sin-around into a unique selling point. It can sometimes get a bit noisy, but bar staff are happy to turn the volume down in the adjoining room. Some of the other locals sometimes poke their heads round the door for a listen - especially when Sue sings. At Christmas we got sarnies and pork pies. Smashing.

And we're in the process of going from monthly to fortnightly.

All good, then.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 03:14 PM

It can vary.

The shortly-to-be-defunct Greyhound in Maidstone (see birthday bash thread) used to do wonderful amuse-geules, and so did the White Horse in Upper-Class-Stoke for the Morris.

There have been others where the landlord was surly, and the jukebox invasive. The Old House at Home in Maidstone was awful (apart from the stuffed furniture) - no nibbles, juke box and big-screen TV and even live bands downstairs, and overpriced beer. The Style and Winch (as it used to be) in Maidstone had a nice outhouse - but shame about the heating if you arrived early in winter! Its other snag was that nearly every ex-Maidstone lag used the bar as his place of business.

I hope I am getting the manager at the Nag's Head in Lower Stoke trained - after the first week (no food, big-screen TV at far end, landord's mates very noisy) I had a heart-to-heart and said we did it for fun and if we weren't wanted we would give up - Next month - nice roast tatoes and yorkshires, TV quiet - good pack of locals listening and joining in (never mind Paddy Cannon, he's like that) and beer very good both nights (barrel got in specially for us, served under gravity on the bar). We'll see what the 22nd Feb is like.

Same pub can change overnight with the manager. When Sarah was alive and had the Canopus it was lovely (and indeed so was she) - but when she died the new incumbent was an ignorant prick and one day when he turned up the juke-box in the opposite bar I led a walk-out and we never went back. Same for the wossname in Maidstone (was it the Hare and Hounds - under the prison wall?) - one day the manager (seeking, drunkely, to raise money for the Water-Rats charity) invited me to contribute £20 if singing. Again I led a walk out. Both lost regular nights when we and listeners would put a couple of hundred squid or more across the bar.

I've seen pubs with 5 people in on a karaoke night when the karaoke will ahve cost them between 40 squid and a ton. I've seen pubs with only 10 extra people in when I KNOW the electric pub-rock band cost over 2 ton ('cos they're mates of mine and sometimes let me play with them).

We come free, 30 of us will drink a fair amount of beer and if anyone stays to listen on a dead night we are a bigger source of profit. And we tend to fight and break things less than teenagers. I don't see why pub operators don't get it.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Snuffy
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 04:43 PM

Quite a few music sessions and general come-all-ye's in village pubs in the South Warwickshire/East Worcestershire area. Most of them are monthly, with the odd fortnightly or weekely one. Folkies are made very welcome by the landlord, most of the locals find us tolerable, and something to eat is almost always provided.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Bru
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 05:47 PM

Well, I've found an idea singaround. The organisor knows what he's doing; the landlord likes us being there and even feeds us half way through the evening; his customers treat us as mild excentrics and don't disturbs us; the rest of the musicians/singers are polite and let me have a go when I want to and - better still - don't mind me strumming along with their tunes; I could even take my dog there if I want to (although he's a worse singer than I am), and the pub is warm, comfortable not too far from home and serves a decent cheap glass of coke.
Where are these Elysian Fields?
You must be bloody joking! I'm not telling.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Will Fly
Date: 07 Feb 09 - 05:55 PM

Two of my fellow ceilidh band members run a monthly acoustic session on a Sunday evening. The landlord (who's rarely there) puts £100 behind the bar for them. Anybody who particpates in the session gets to drink what they want all evening - anything left over is split between the two organisers.

Another band member and me did it last month as the other two couldn't make it. We paid for everything that everybody wanted to drink - and took £35 each at the end of the evening. And it was a great session.

This is rare I believe - anyone else get a good deal like that?

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Mr Happy
Date: 08 Feb 09 - 09:54 AM

Where are these Elysian Fields?

Well one've 'em's Mr Happy's Come All Ye!

Every Wednesday 8.30pm

The Carlton Tavern
Hartington Street
Handbridge
Chester

Free Butties & Mystery Guest every week!

All Welcome [even dogs, cats, why]

**************

Re refereshments; arrangement was negotiated with the licensee prior to the sessh moving there

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Mavis Enderby
Date: 08 Feb 09 - 10:53 AM

I've been to a couple of good venues in Lincoln (UK) - the first is the fortnightly open-mic at the Golden Eagle - not exactly folk but extremely well MC'd with free chips & sarnies at half time. Very well attended for a Tuesday night.

The second is the monthly Sunday session at the Dog and Bone. This is a nice relaxed session which seems to be enjoyed by all. The pub stays open all afternoon specially for the session, it usually closes at 3.

Both have a landlord/staff who are very supportive, and I think it's to everyone's mutual benefit.

BTW Richard - you should hire your "heart to heart with the landlord" services - roast tates and yorkshires would be very welcome!

Pete.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Tootler
Date: 08 Feb 09 - 11:07 AM

Much more important than the provision of food and so on, welcome as that would be, is the attitude of the organisers and the regulars. When I was starting out I was fortunate to come across some very welcoming people in the singarounds and sessions I went to which has encouraged me to carry on. If I had not met that I might well have given up.

One thing I remember in particular was one overhearing a regular at one venue I had been going to saying to one of the others during the beer break, that she liked my voice and enjoyed my singing. For someone who had been told for over 30 years that he couldn't sing, that was a real boost.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: GUEST,PeterC
Date: 08 Feb 09 - 11:41 AM

VirginiaTam - I'm glad Blackmore has found a good home. When I lived around there nearly 20 years aog they were thrown our of the Bull by a temporary manager. Then thrown out of their new home in Ingatestone by another temporary manager but were welcomed back by the new landlord at the Bull.

Subject: RE: Venues: How welcoming?
From: Folkiedave
Date: 08 Feb 09 - 01:04 PM

Was at the Royal Hotel Dungworth last night (Sunday)

An excellent evening with Will Noble and John Cocking+ a number of excellent singers

Too many sarnies to eat - egg, cheese and onion and boiled ham. Brilliant.