Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Nov 10 - 09:24 AM

Chas Upton is still around. Colin and Shirley now live in Germany, where Colin has a radio programme.
They always did well over there, and I believe it was they who encouraged Derek Sarjeant and Hazel King [Sarjeant] to play over there too. I know there was plenty of work for UK folk singers over there in the 60's and 70's.
Colin's Web site

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,guest - jim younger
Date: 08 Nov 10 - 10:08 AM

Howdy to Joe Palmer of The Peelers - good to hear you're having fun in the sun while I languish in rainy Highams Park. I occasionally hear of sightings of the great Tom Madden - but I never seem to be in his vicinity. So far on this thread I think we've had him running a B and B in Torquay (shades of Basil Fawlty) and also living in Manchester.

Last time I looked, Joe, 'Banished Misfortune', the Peelers album had become something of an underground hit and could fetch a decent price, even in Japan. (I know someone who paid £150 for a copy about ten years ago.) So if you have any left over, maybe you might think of releasing them into the 2nd hand market on a slow drip.

I was in a pub in Clapham North back in 1980 and 'Broken Down Squatter' came on the jukebox. Given that the clientele was mainly Jamaican, I was surprised, to say the least.

Still playing - whatever takes my fancy.

Best wishes

Jim

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Peelers
Date: 09 Nov 10 - 12:10 PM

Hi Jim

Really great to hear from you and that you are still playing the music not much of it over here in Spain but I get the chance to play the music on a show I do on Sunshine FM called The Celtic Connection
I have just spoken to Mick o Connor and he tells me that Tom Madden is living in Clonakilty in Cork maybe we should have a reunion one day and catch up on old times

Joe Palmer

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Jack King
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 09:15 AM

Hi John
Just tolet you know that I have made contact with Col & Shirl and they are both well although like Margaret & I well stricken in years( though not as struck as us two ) Colin is still doing gigs and writing so many thanks for pushing me in the right direction to find them Cheers Jack

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,guest - Jim Younger
Date: 11 Nov 10 - 09:41 AM

Hi Joe

Good to hear from you - Mr Madden seems as elusive as the Scarlet Pimpernel. Clonakilty, is it now?

I have spoken to Mick O'Connor now and again - he's still playing dynamite banjo.

Yeah, let's have a blast one of these days, before we get too old to remember who we are.

Jim

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Sheila Guilford
Date: 19 Nov 10 - 06:24 AM

Hey Joe (that's not so original)

So good to hear that you are alive and well (but sad to hear about Ann). You have been so far underground these past few years,I've surfed the web a few times to see if you showed up, so now we know where you are. Sounds good, not like the cold and damp of good old UK. Do you remember me? I'm afraid I let the folk scene go for many years but now my eldest son is heavily into all the old music and we go off to gigs together. In fact he told me about the cult status of your album (which of course I have).

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Peelers
Date: 19 Nov 10 - 11:47 AM

Hi Sheila
Nice to hear from you and that you are still listening to the music I am having a little break from the Celtic Connection show I do on Sunshine but would love it if you tuned in when I start it again and maybe I could do a request.

I will post it here when the show starts again

Joe

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 19 Nov 10 - 02:34 PM

Further to the posts from Jack King and John McKenzie on 8 November, Chas Upton is playing and thesping in deepest Dorset (Childe Okeford).

Kitty

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Dom Bonito
Date: 23 Nov 10 - 09:06 AM

Speaking of Chas Upton,anyone know how I can get hold of the words to Silbury Hill?

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 23 Nov 10 - 01:59 PM

Dom - try an e-mail to Charles at childokeford.plus.com (but using the @ symbol...)

Kitty

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Dom Bonito
Date: 25 Nov 10 - 01:18 PM

Thanks Kitty. Regards, Dom

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 25 Nov 10 - 02:13 PM

Dom - I e-mailed Chas to let him know that you might be inquiring, and he's replied that it was one of his brothers who collected it, c 1960. then he wrote the music. He's seen the words written out on postcards of Silbury Hill - for sale in Marlborough - but hasn't sung it himself for a long time!

Kitty

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Simonne15
Date: 02 Dec 10 - 09:03 AM

Does Hoddesdon Folk Club still exist? I forget the name of the pub but remember being there 1964-67 when at college in Hertford and the 'Two Daves' led the sessions.I remember the McCarthy family, Johnny Silvo and others.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 02 Dec 10 - 03:06 PM

Simonne - I think that Hoddesdon mutated into the Ware folk club... but that's no longer going either.

Kitty

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 08 Dec 10 - 11:35 AM

Interesting Jack :)

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Jack King
Date: 09 Dec 10 - 09:54 AM

John

       Chas upton's band's website is fipennypiece.co.uk Iam not computerliterate enough to transfer this to you via computer


                                  Cheers Jack

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 11 Dec 10 - 09:04 AM

Link to Chas's site.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Barbara Newlin (now Bernstein)
Date: 19 Dec 10 - 01:51 AM

To anyone who may remember...I was the librarian at EFDSS from 1973 to 1976. I worked with Daisy Armitage and Dave Tulloch and had the time of my life. If anyone wants to get in touch, I'm in California and on email at [e-mail]. Would love to know what Daisy and Dave are up to you.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 19 Dec 10 - 03:32 AM

BARBARA... WOW!!! I worked upstairs for Miss Gold when you were at CSH, and never would have gotten my job there if it hadn't been for you. I'd done some volunteer typing in the library (remember all those little index cards?) and when they needed to hire someone in the Folk Shop mail order department you rang to tell me about it, and I came in and applied and got the job.

My email is my full name as it appears above, no dots or spaces, at Gmail dot com. I live in an old farmhouse on the south coast of Ireland now. How great to see your post here! Brilliant site, is Mudcat.

Bonnie xxx

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Kevin Sheils
Date: 19 Dec 10 - 04:08 AM

Hi Barbara. I remember you.

I still see Dave Armitage at various festivals and have an email for him somewhere. If I can dig it out I'll pass yours on to him.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: ollaimh
Date: 19 Dec 10 - 10:35 PM

i once wondered up to the troubadour back in 73 i think. i didn't knw any of the history at the time and played a couple of scottish songs. some git was in my face telling me i shouldn't be playing scottish songs--i had no idea then what he was on about but i supose now he thought i was american. for those who don't know i am a nova scotian franco gael. well i was sitting in the audience duely chasened(from my child hood in the educational system i had learned we were to be duely chasened when anglos told us what to do) and he began to sing the mist covewred mountains of home--well i knew the chorus to that one and started to belt out the classic gaelic chourus!!! i didn't notice they were singing in english, but back home we always sang that chorus in gaelic. well he shut up and i looked around at people gawking at the odd ball(that would be me). years later i realized he was a lowlander pretending to be a gael. i didn't understand that back then but people want to get "folkie cred" by pretending to be gaels.was he hot with me afterwards, he claimed i was trying to publicly embarrase him--i was just singing it the way we did back home. i really wish they would wait to do play gael untill after they have been refused a few jobs or a place in a university course(as i was ) before they play the holy gael.

am i a cynic?YES

there used to be so many poncy gits pretending to be gaels back then who may have once know some one who actualy met and talked to an actual gael once when they were on holiday on skye or ireland. what can i say? that's why for years i stopped calling what i do folk and called it traditional music. now they have co opted the term traditional music so i just say celtic music from nova scotia and new foundland with a few ole vieux acadie chants!!

so other than the occasional lecture i was way too unsophisticated to understand back then( i really was fresh off the turnip truck)i had a great time. and outside i saw the tallest and oddest woman i ahd ever seen. she saw me staring and began to upbraid me. again later i realized she was a he and i was a rube from a place so rural we not only rarely had in door plumbing but had few in door ideas as well. i had at the time worked on a fish boat and in a carpet factory and that was pretty much it, and had dropped out of school so i didn't even have grade twelve.we rural nova scotians used to go to the city and smile and act friendly and expect people would be nice to us--good fucking luck with that!!!!(see bruce cockburns song going down the road for a great story of those days)

now on the bright side i found a home first in a squat huse populated with a couple of finnish dope dealers, a cuban political activist and a couple of buskers-- who were the ones who took me along and showed me the ropes for busking. then the house burnt to the ground and i found a spot on a huge river boat that was divided up into tiny rooms near battersea bridge. last year i went back there and a couple of the old boats were still there but much renovated and much spiffier and up market. we paid fourteen pounds a month for ourpart of the boat. divided three ways--buskers rent for sure. we had parties all the time. i often had to go visit friends to find a place to sleep as my room would have several people passed out thewre when i got home. i still am amazed the police didn't once pay us a visit. we couldn't aford heat, but during the coal strike--the edward heath coal strike--when every one lacked heat we charged a bottle of parafin fuel every so often for entrance to the parties.so we were the only warm place in london that winter.

i didn't go back to the troubador but i'm glad to say i went once. i got into busking and then went over to france and didn't revisit the uk for twenty years, but over all i had a ball there.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 20 Dec 10 - 05:50 PM

ollaimh,great post.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Roger Fleming
Date: 01 Jan 11 - 05:05 PM

Hi Bonnie & Barbara,
Do you remember Rosemary (forget her second name) who worked in the upstairs office at CSH. I would think she's no longer with us now.
When I organised the instrumental workshops on Tuesdays and ran the Folk Cellar on Saturday's for a while, payments for myself, the guitar and banjo teachers and the Folk Cellar guests were given through Rosemary who I was in regular contact with for many years.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 01 Jan 11 - 05:39 PM

I sure do - Rosemary Webb. She was lovely & warmhearted underneath that starchy exterior, and we shared a love of reading - Jane Austen in particular. Rosemary was the one who turned me onto Mary Webb's Precious Bane and we used to swap/loan books. I believe you're right that she's no longer with us. What a great place that was to work in. What a brill thread this is... gettin' all sentimentyfied just remembering everything...

Bonnie xxx

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 01 Jan 11 - 08:28 PM

""Is there anyone out there who frequented the pub on Friday nights around 1972/73? Folk Night (upstairs)..... The Nag's Head, York Rd Battersea.""

I was a regular much earlier than that, from about mid 65 till I left London in April 69.

A great club where the organisers took considerable pains to ease the nerves of newcomers.

There was also a Sunday night club out at Wych Cross near Hackney where I did several floor spots in the same period. I've been racking my brains without success and can't remember the name, but it was there that I first saw the very soft voiced John Foreman, the eccentric but utterly likeable Adrian May, and Johnny Silvo, who cleared my sinuses ultrasonically as I sat in the front row in the path of that incredibly powerful voice.

Can anybody refresh my memory as the the name of the club?

Don T.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: ollaimh
Date: 09 Jan 11 - 05:35 PM

as a postscript to my earlier story. when i was in londan last year i visited the cecil sharpe house singing night. they has post cards for sale. one had ewen mccoll on the telephone and a caption"hello folk police".

it seems lots of folks realize what a pack of bullshit meisters used to pousture about pretending to be traditional folk.

i had to buy a couple

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Marco P. McNeill
Date: 22 Jan 11 - 01:02 PM

http://www.paulmcneill.ch
http://paulmcneill.zimbalam.fr

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,hippiemalcolm
Date: 23 Jan 11 - 03:46 PM

The "Hole in the Ground' was in the basement of "the witches culdron" a restaurant/cafe in Belsize Village.
The Tinkers played every Friday night in the room above the Three Horseshoes Public House in Hampstead Village.
I still have my membership card to The Country Club behind Belsize Park, but that was too expensive to go to!!

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Mick Penning -Stoke
Date: 05 Feb 11 - 06:25 PM

Stumbled onto this site from (I think), checking out Nat Gonella. Don't no why I should get 'Folk' in my head whilst on Jazz, but anyway, I then saw, 'Does anyone remember the Nags Head, York Rd Battersea? I'll say I remember it. It featured in 'kicking off my 'career' as a 'named' Artiste on the Circuit (billed in the Melody Maker)-and ended it the same night!!!!!! A complete drunken disaster. Anyone unfortunate to have been there on that fateful night cannot but forget it.
It's a long story and the devil is in the detail, but to 'cut a strong hoary wart' -the first set (of two, with interval) -lived up to all the promise of my 'floor-spot' a month earlier, which had itself gone to secure the booking, 'top of the bill'..... the big time.
I was, at the time 'to-ing and fro-ing' between London and Paris -Busking in both cities... but with the intention of settling in Paris (which I did for a couple of years). Anyway, 'lodging in Fulham' at the time, I paid a 'chance' visit to the Nags Head, with guitar -hoping to get a 'floor spot' -not only did I get one -but I went down a bomb. So much did they all like my performance -a mixed bag of stuff, some originals from a fellow Stokie, that I was booked for late January -1973.
On the night, a mixture of elation and nerves -and a growing feeling that I had 'bitten off more than I could chew' (my fellow Stokie, on hearing of my success at getting the gig, shocked me by refusing to use any more of his stuff -his original material). I needed it to have enough for two sets -without struggling. I'd been too hasty -clutching at a chance in a million, taking the booking before consulting the gods.
Consequently, after the first set, as I said, going down really well, I had already had four pints of strong ale, nerves and a sense of impending disaster led me to 'neck' as much more as I could before going back upstairs to 'face the mob'.
I was kicked out after just two incoherent ramblings -'Here have the money and don't come back' -I can't remember much after that. Just went back to Paris -Charing X to Gare du Nord -and busked.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Max Johnson
Date: 06 Feb 11 - 08:04 AM

I'm a bit late to this party, but nm.

I used to have a flat in the mansion block directly opposite the Troubadour. Eric Leggoe and I used to sing there (First time we went, we spent the evening and got drunk on bootleg likker with Red Sullivan - the Troub was dry). When Threadbare Consort formed we used to go over after rehearsals. What a wonderful little club!
I'm trying to remember what the other leather bar was called. It was my local. (Yes it was!)

The 'Long Lankin with strobes' sounds very Magic Lantern - could it have been them? (Although they'd probably have used a torch with a windmill on the end and achieved the same effect).

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: GUEST,Max Johnson
Date: 06 Feb 11 - 08:43 AM

Mick Penning.

Cheer up mate - if you got paid, it was a successful gig.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 13 Feb 11 - 04:47 AM

It was the Coleherne, Max J

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Max Johnson
Date: 13 Feb 11 - 08:41 AM

Thanks Jock (Pogue Mahone), but I meant the other one, on the corner of Earls Court Road and Old Brompton Road. I think it's changed its name to O' Neills now. Less threatening than the Coleherne, but with a similar clientele. I lived next door, on Old Brompton Road.

To those trying to remember the name of the East End club, Was it the Three Blackbirds in Leyton/Walthamstow?

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 13 Feb 11 - 09:02 AM

Yep, that rings a bell with me, Max - they had a bomb scare while we were doing a gig there, so everybody had to troop outside and stand around. It was during the time I had that tiny old antique harmonium and I think we carried that out too, probably to while the time away playing. Great club -

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Kevin Sheils
Date: 13 Feb 11 - 12:14 PM

The Three Blackbirds in Leyton IIRC merged with the Navy Boot Club in Walthamstow at the The Lord Brooke to form The Chestnuts Club at the Chestnut Tree Lea Bridge Road. The merger was 1978 I recall, Max.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Max Johnson
Date: 13 Feb 11 - 01:20 PM

Wotcher, Kevin!

Yes, you're right. I remember the Chestnuts opening - what a great club - hope it's still running. I'm sure I recall that The Blackbirds and the Chestnuts ran contemporaneously (:-O) for a while.

What I can't remember is, did they both do a Ladies' Christmas Panto in the same year? Those Ladies' Pantos were simply awesome! And very, very funny.

Do you remember Dave Roberts' (and other Earls of Essex's) summer Dejeurners?

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 07:55 AM

I remember the dejeuners in Highams Park. I don't think they were Dave's or the Earls but were held by associated folks and regularly attended by the Earls. There were also the Olympics by the ponds on Wanstead Flats.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 10:17 AM

the folk club that Dave Roberts was involved in was Stratford folk club held at Stage One, Deanery Road, wednesday night, we booked Bonnie Shaljean when she was with Catchpenny.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 10:21 AM

I remember it too... wow, that was a long time ago! Lotta water under the bridge since them days -

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 10:25 AM

the folk club that Dave Roberts/DaveSurman was involved in was Stratford folk club held at Stage One, Deanery Road, wednesday night, we booked Bonnie Shaljean when she was with Catchpenny.
I was also involved with the Three Blackbirds on a Friday night, this had previously been the Tower folk club, Rip Rippingale and EdCaines Rob Neal,Derek Simpson, had been involved with it, it moved downstairs and became the Three Blackbirds.
Alan Bearman started a folk club in walthamstow[I think] on a sunday, sometime after the other two clubs had been running.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 10:56 AM

Chris Timson[concertina chap]AnnGregson and Dave Rennolds[ he who accidentally introduced June Tabor as Jane Tuba.Dave Rennolds
AKA Somerset Dave, although he was from gloucestershire
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eek7M_nn3Q

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Max Johnson
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 11:35 AM

I posted here,I thought, to ask if anyone remembered the string quartet who used to play Haydn at the dejeuners in Highams Park. They were really good!

But the post isn't here, so I must have posted it somewhere else.
Wonder where?

Schweik - the Walthamstow club was the Chestnut Tree.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Kevin Sheils
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 01:09 PM

Max, ah the dejeuners, what good fun they were. I still see the main organisers from time to time.

Yes the Blackbirds predated the Chestnuts, Dick, I though I'd made that clear when I posted that the Blackbirds and Navy Boot (Alan Bearman's Sunday club) joined together to form the Chestnuts.

Although not a direct descendent of the Chestnuts, as they ran parallel and mutually co-operative for a while, Walthamstow Folk is still going strong on Sunday nights and now we're back at the Rose and Crown getting full houses. And we still have links back to the old Tower club as Dympna (Messenger that was) drops in from time to time and very occasionally her sister Sheila.

Mind you I still have links at Waltamstow to the old Enterprise at Chalk farm as at least one of our regulars was also a regular there in the late 60's and early 70s

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 02:21 PM

I moved to Suffolk in 78, so I not sure what happened at the Blackbirds once I was away.
I do remember Derek Brimstone having a great night at the Blackbirds, he did a couple [at least] of encores and he said to me and Derek Simpson "what a great club it was".

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 14 Feb 11 - 07:33 PM

I remember when Puddleduck played for an Earls' Christmas party, dancing the Dorset 4 hand reel. Of the other 3 hands, one was Dave Roberts dressed as a baby in a (largish) nappy, and one was Sandra dressed as a fairy. Wish I could remember (after about 35 years) who was the 4th...

Kitty

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Kevin Sheils
Date: 15 Feb 11 - 04:43 AM

Not me Kitty!

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Kevin Sheils
Date: 15 Feb 11 - 04:47 AM

Just mentioned it to Sandra, Kitty, and she remembers Dave in the Nappy but that year she claims she and her flatmates went as Charlie's Angels not as a fairy, although I remember her as a fairy in one of the Blackbird's Ladies Christmas pantomimes around that time.

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: Max Johnson
Date: 15 Feb 11 - 12:04 PM

Yep - I remember the ladies' panto with Sandra dressed as a fairy! I'm really wallowing in nostalgia now. Haven't wallowed like this for ages, in fact.
I missed Charlies Angels though :-(

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 15 Feb 11 - 12:49 PM

here is Dave Roberts in his prime, Dave was a great bloke, and really easy to work with.hope you enjoy this. he used to do this dance at stratford folk club on occasions, R I P Dave.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-rzRdgsquak

Subject: RE: Folk Clubs London 1960s & 70s
From: The Sandman
Date: 15 Feb 11 - 12:58 PM

HERE HE IS AGAIN.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMF4rpk_f-o what a great bloke