I find it a little bit disconcerting when I book to see something new and I have attended a few things that have been new to me. Les Mis was one. I must admit I was not looking forward to that, The Cream at the East Ham Town Hall in the ’60s and not more than a couple of days ago the Shanty Folk at the Shottisham WI Trust Hall. I knew a couple of songs from Les Mis, but I did not know that they come from that Show. I knew the Cream members and the bands that they had been in, but all their songs on that night were new to me, and I had heard sea shanties but they do not form a perfect fit it in my CD collection. So with some trepidation I hauled my sorry butt down to the hall for what I thought would be an evening of yawns and fidgeting. Well, how wrong can you be!
There were five members of the Shanty Folk, four men and one lady, and they treated us to an evening of information on the origins of the shanties and an acapella rendition of each. After the first song I was tapping by feet and by the third I was singing along. I did hold back from the actions, but none of the rest of the audience appeared to, and you could not escape from participating in some way because it was so good. At the interval I enjoyed a glass of wine provided by the women of the S.WI, and got talking to one of the Folk who told me that they were once part of a choir in Sudbury and formed the Folk group about eight years ago.
It was very much a treat and if they come again then I will be there, probably at the back and most probably doing the hand actions. They also donated their fee, which they usually gave to the RNLI, back to the hall! The RNLI still got the contents of the donations bucket and when I last saw it there was plenty of notes in there.
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