Our first gathering of the year over at The John Harvey Tavern was a good start for twelve of us, but unfortunately Tina is off sick from work and couldn’t come out. The weather was at freezing point, but that didn’t cool our spirit to enjoy a good sing. Adrian suggested that we start with Sussex Wedding Song, then we continued with Jim The Carter Lad and with smiles on our faces we were ready for Poor Froze Out Gardeners, The Magpie, Wassail, Wassail All Over the Town, Sugar Wassail and Here We Come A-Wassailing, before a last glance at Christmas with The Moon Shone Bright.
Without Tina to pitch our starting note quickly and to give us a clue of the tune there was a lot of strange noise before each song took off along a fairly accurate route. We started the second half with The Woodcutter’s Song, and then a few of us managed to sing The Cruel Mother (a Chichester Workshop song!) so that the rest of the group knew why we didn’t often rehearse this tale of woe for public performance! The Turmut Hoer brought us back to our senses and we were quick to find the right pitch. A request for the more modern They Won’t Let Us Go To Sea Anymore had us in stitches as we never did manage to all agree on the key and we churned along like a restless tide. Country Life, followed by All Things Are Quite Silent brought us near to the end of our evening with so many more to sing, but Gooches (Harvey’s) Beer and Fathom The Bowl won with an extra present-day verse from Mac.
We look forward to Tina’s return in so many ways!
Welcome to our website for singers who want to learn and sing traditional and new South Downs folk songs, sung in the traditional way. "Put another barrel on, landlord, and pull a pint for me! The ale here in Sussex is the best we all agree!"
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