A Session Diary

Festive Greetings to the Sessioneers!

We find ourselves in the hiatus which is the middle of the syncretized* English winter festival. It must be one of the most mixed up and muddled festivals of the year. Please note, I do not in any way shape or form advocate ‘Winterval’ or some such silly pseudo-PC term for what is a perfectly respectable and long standing winter event. Christmas is just fine.

Those of us who live in the Northern hemisphere, have to cope with days getting longer and shorter in the annual cycle and it’s nice to know when it reaches the turnaround point so we have something to look forward to. So add together Winter Solstice (Pagan), Dies Natalis Solis Invicta (Roman), Yule (Germanic/Scandinavian) and Christmas and add a touch of Saturnalia and a fair dollop of material commercialism and here we are in the middle of the sales.   No matter that Jesus wasn’t born on December 25th (think of it as his official birthday), nor that the calendar shifted by 12 days anyway in 1752. Hoorah for a couple of Bank Holidays! And then there is St Stephen’s day and then the Plough Stots and it’s Easter before you know it.

But what of the sessions?

Well, the Irish session continues to thrive although it hasn’t picked up or held onto new sessioneers as well as hoped. We must keep up a concerted campaign. The regulars had a very enjoyable Christmas meal on the 23rd and many thanks to the staff at the George for everything. The session started a little later than normal because of that at around 9:00 and one new sessioneer with Bodhran was sitting there waiting. Apparently, the previous week he got lost and arrived after closing time.

Lara, our current student-with-fiddle from Indiana (near the Kentucky border) was there for her first English Christmas Dinner with her father. It was a pleasure sharing our cultural differences and enjoying conversation and humour with them both. Sadly, a couple of our party were ill and could not make the meal and session, but I hope they are well now and that we see them in the new year.

There will be no Irish session this week, so back to normal on January 6th which just happens to be Little Christmas in Ireland (Epiphany, Twelfth Night, Old Christmas Day, whatever). Take your decorations down.

The Thursday entertainment has been taking place with the annual carols on the week before Christmas and something happening on Christmas Eve which was unexpected. The Bear must have been heaving! (yes, savour any of the images that you now have in your mind). I haven’t had a report yet of exactly what. Distance, Weather and family prevented me going.

A Happy New Year to all, especially the loyal and regular readers who urge me to keep writing this lunacy, and Good Sessioning in 2010.

*Look it up!

The Irish session is still going well although some of the early rank-swellers seem to have fallen by the wayside. Never mind. It’s better than it was and fingers crossed it will get better. Come on all you chaps and chapesses, it’s not hard to find.  Just head to towards Maidstone, Ashford, Faversham or Canterbury (unless you live nearer to Molash than these places)  and head for Challock. Challock has a (is a ?) roundabout where these 4 roads intersect (actually 2 roads, the A251 and A252).

That means repectively:

• A20 / A252
• A251 North /A252
• A251 South/A252
• A28 / A252

The George is on the A252 on the outskirts of Molash and very easy to find. Easy to park as well. Good beer – Adnams. Reasonably priced in these days of inflation (£2.70). Coffee, food, friendly locals and staff. What more could you want?

In the snug last week, we were discussing various country dances that we have been party to and the venues that they were held in. AndyBanjo recalls one gig with an enormous set of 50 or 60 couples where one on the objectives was for top and bottom couples to change places. This involved such high speed movement that we contemplated the Large Country Dance Collider where if a collision were to take place, certain sub-particles would be released. These are called Cloptons of course and are fundamental to a unified theory of ECD. There are other particles released although some believe they permeate free space all the time. Like the Reverson which magically transposes instructions and bodies along the R-L symmetry leading to the time honoured cry ‘The Other Left’. Also the Drifton which affects particularly square sets where a member will start to drift away from the rest leaving a partnerless particle which then remains in a highly charged state.

I must mention the Sunday session at the Ship at Ospringe. In the window were two wire frame figures which others tried to persuade me were angels with a mechanical trumpet that raised and lowered. I think they are Daleks. If you’re passing, have a look. They might become as famous as the Faversham nativity scene with Mary, Joseph, baby Jesus and the Polar Bear. (It’s above Freeman Hardy and Willis in its normal place).

Don’t forget that Advent is the time to get your sprouts on boiling in time for Christmas. If you delay, they won’t be nearly mushy enough or grey enough.

We’re still debating a session at Wing-ham, gateway to the East where the scent of brassicas hangs in the air like … well school kitchens really but that’s not the point.

Let’s see what tonight brings.

Au revoir, mes brave sessioneers.