Another great series of events for BB in the first half of 2009, with plenty of opportunities for our promising new youthful members to show what they are capable of, and to stir some of the older ones to jump as high as the new boys – with mixed success.
The season started early with an evening at the Armaleggan Ale on Saturday 14th March, a fine evening hosted by Armaleggan and featuring good dancing from a number of good guest teams. After an excellent buffet it was time for some party pieces, and Jameson once again ably represented us with his song of the Dunns, an innocent sounding song, but secretly revealing much intrigue and conspiracy amongst the Dunn family, who seem to spend much of the day running, possibly because of the rhyming potential. Then a week later on 21st March we were at the Oxford Folk Festival for a day, which was blessed with unseasonably fine weather. A procession round town was followed by dancing outside some of the magnificent architectural masterpieces of Oxford, though it must be said the gargoyles outside the Bodleian Library were giving us some particularly twisted looks. And on a couple of occasions we had two sets of 6 dancers up, the first time BB have been able to field this many dancers publicly this century.
The next event was a St. George’s Day dance out on Thursday 24th April, again this year visiting the Suffolk Lodge Residential Home in Wokingham before heading on to The Olde Leathern Bottle where we were made to feel very welcome.
Sunday May 17th saw us in Brighton for the Brighton Morris Day of Dance. Some torrential rain at the beginning of the day (but not of course on us), forced an unscheduled start in the King & Queen pub near the Royal Pavilion, where all the sides did 1 or 2 very cramped dances before the sun came out and the day’s planned schedule resumed. Our tour took us to the Basket Makers and Pump House pubs before dancing in front of the entrance to the pier, and then finally back at Pavilion Gardens for a massed stand of all the day’s fine teams. Our Dance of The Little Fairies included one of our invitations to the audience at the end to ‘join us through the magic arch’ which they duly did, causing no little chaos while doing so plus arm-ache for the BBs holding their sticks aloft – especially for those more junior members present unused to such nonsense.
The following weekend was the Spring Bank Holiday, when we once again attended the Chippenham Folk Festival for the first time since 2004. This turned out to be very rewarding for all the BBs who took part, though it was a pretty intensive schedule by morris standards. Over the 3 days we had 2 workshops, 2 processions, an evening dance spot, a 15 minute Arena stage spot on our own, much street dancing, and in particular 2 Big Caper shows with The Outside Capering Crew. The number of available BB performers varied a bit by day, but for much of the time we had our 3 younger lads with us though they were also practising and performing with NYFTE for much of the weekend. Overall though the side acquitted itself extremely well, with particular highlights being the 1 hour Big Caper show at the Constitutional Hall on the Saturday evening (for which we had spent much of the afternoon rehearsing), and also a surprisingly good set during a Playford dance on the Sunday evenning, where everything just clicked with the 4 dances we did. The 1 hour Big Caper show was based mainly on a programme developed for previous festivals, but with some new material including the Pirates Jig from the crew followed by our sword dance where we were dressed as pirates (aaarrrhhh….). Our new boys slotted in remarkably well, including in the Finale where Alun, Mark and Will all performed some bacapipes before, in the final sequence, Alun soared over the Crew in a final leapfrog while Rob and Jerry did the same over 3 BBs each. “As good as a West End show” said one member of the audience afterwards (allegedly while fumbling for his white stick), and from other later comments it seemed like all the audience enjoyed it. Not sure about the ‘green room’ provided for us though – accessed by a door at the back of the hall, it could best be described as a heavily overgrown small back garden and dumping ground. Still, we didn’t want to seem too precious ….. The Sunday also saw us do a shortened (40 minute) version of the show on the main Arena stage, featuring some different material which also went very well though for a variety of reasons not quite as fluent as the earlier show. All in all though a great weekend for us.
Sunday 7 June saw us again at the Kirtlington Lamb Ale, another regular event for us in recent years. A slightly depleted team got itself even more depleted when Jerry’s calf muscle went during the second part of the procession around the village, though he then became a handy drum banger, Bob being off for the day being a Mabel Gubbins. Despite this the side, abetted by young Will and Mark, acquitted itself very well throughout a range of dances, except perhaps during a slightly disastrous version of Jolly Jockey sticks at the Dashwood, where there was a lot less catching than throwing. However we were able to bounce back next dance with a high spirited Knees Up. For the afternoon show spot in the playground, we were a bit worried beforehand being rather late in the schedule and with storm clouds gathering, but the threatened rain held off nad we were able to do a creditable Boggle with Swords.
On the following Saturday, 13th June, we were invited for the first time to Abingdon Traditional Morris’s ‘Mayor’s Day’ traditional event – one of the first Morris Fed sides to be invited to this prestigious event, and certainly the first featuring female musicians, though Simon and Jameson have both been regular attendees (as spectators) over the years. The day, blessed by particularly sunny weather, turned out to be great fun – featuring amongst other things a ‘mock mayor’ election – an election taking place every year for one of Abingdon to be elected as the new ‘Mayor of Ock Street’, voted for by members of Abingdon Morris and the residents of Ock Street. Although the post these days is symbolic, over 200 people vote, and the new mayor traditionally is charged with keeping the current civic mayor up to scratch. After the election takes place, visiting morris sides (this year Saddleworth Morris, Chipping Camden and ourselves) take turns to carry the new mayor from pub to pub on a type of sedan chair. And it’s pretty heavy too. Other features of the day were dancing in a variety of places around Abingdon, including the magnificent open vaulted County Hall, where we put on a pretty good set in front of a good audience of the other morris sides and locals. Throughout the day, we moved from one place to another by a walking procession led by the ‘Ock Street Horns’ – a huge pair of ox’s horns which we can testify easily stops traffic when their carrier steps out into the road to lead the procession to the next spot, which happened frequently throughout the day. Overall we very much enjoyed the dancing, of which there turned out to be quite a lot (we managed 30 dances during the day, 21 different ones, which we think is a record for us for one day). We also thoroughly enjoyed Abingdon’s fine hospitality during the day, including a tea which was a proper tea (sandwiches, pork pie, loads of cake etc), and an excellent supper in the imposing Checker Hall, one of the remaining parts of Abingdon Abbey. During the supper there were various musical entertainments, and Jameson once again sang of his friends the Dunns before the whole day was dunn and everyone dunn and gone home.
