It was another lovely evening in the company of the Hoy-at-Anchor Folk Club yesterday.
Not wanting to risk travelling the motorways at peak times, I set off early and took the gear over to Westcliff-on-Sea in the late afternoon. With advice from my wife, whose father was brought up in that part of Southend, I headed for Priory Park to park up for a hour and have a sarnie before moving on to meet Rob, who was travelling by train from central London, at the club. So, I can now say that I have seen the Prittlewell Priory site and the famous Priory Park bandstand, and I commend them to you.
The Hoy-at-Anchor folk club is held in the front bar area of the sizeable British Legion club in Westcliff-on-Sea. By the time we arrived, Club President Tony Prior was already hard at work with other club members, setting up for the night. The seats were laid out and the impressive club banner (see picture) was up and ready. We got the gear in and began tuning up.
On what was a warm evening, the room filled up steadily and all were treated to an excellent round of floor singers. Amongst highlights of John Barleycorn, Lillibulero and a bit of Flanders and Swann, Tony Prior did an excellent rendition of Donovan’s Gold Watch Blues and the Hoy Shanty Crew were called upon to do a short set.
Both of our two sets seemed to go down well with audience members keen to engage and ask about the stories behind the songs. Indeed, it was nice to be reacquainted with a couple that had been with us at the Festival at the Edge a few weeks earlier in Much Wenlock.
I’m pleased to report that the Hoy audience needs no encouragement to join in on choruses and learns them very quickly. So, we were not short of support in giving our songs some volume.
Many thanks to Steve Ramm, Tony Prior, MC for the night Jane and all the members of Ho-at-Anchor Folk Club for another enjoyable evening and we look forward to returning to Westcliff-on-Sea to perform there at some time in the future.