It wasn't too long after that I was asked to come and give a hand with the music for the morris side Bernie was involved with, along with Ken Langsbury and several others who we knew slightly.  This side quickly evolved into the Gloucestershire Old Spot Morris Dancers ... who became quite well-known within a year or so!  It was also where I learned how to lead a band for playing dance music.

Another activity in Cheltenham was a recently formed song and music session at the Old Swan Inn, which eventually gave birth to The Old Swan Band - with Bernie as one of the fiddlers, and Ken as singer and 'front man'.

Bampton Morris:

It was at Bampton that I learned how to play for dancing on my own, and to realise that this is one of the greatest joys a musician can have.  Playing a double jig with two really good dancers having quite different styles (say, Francis and Roy Shergold) is the most thrilling musical experience I have ever had.  Hopefully, you make them dance better, and they make you play better ... and at the end, with all three of you with one foot in the air, you know that there's absolutely nothing that could be better!

Thirty years later, with several of the younger dancers also playing fiddle or melodeon, I felt able to bow out and let them get on with the tradition on their own - which they seem to be doing very well!

I could mention at this point that Gloucestershire Old Spot Morris Dancers were invited guests at Bampton from their very first year, appearing at around seven o'clock on the Monday evening for many years.  As an adjunct to that, the Old Swan Band's playing of Speed the Plough was almost immediately taken up by Bampton for a double sidestep dance which quickly became the obligatory final dance, played by both Bampton and Old Spot/Old Swan musicians together - the only Bampton dance to use more than one musician.  More recently, almost any musician in the crowd has been invited to join the Speed the Plough band.  This photo just recently came into my possession (thanks Ali and Martin) showing what must have been the very first instance of a Bampton Speed the Plough, because Robin Lister (trumpet) was an original member of the Old Swan band, who left very soon after its formation.

The Old Swan Band:

By the Sidmouth Festival of 1975, Robin and Bernie had left, Ron Field had joined on banjo and autoharp and the name had become The Old Swan Band.  Dan Quinn and cronies were not quite yet Flowers and Frolics.  The two groups met in The Ship public house in Sidmouth and fell into each other's arms.  One group played a tune, the other responded in kind - from different ends of the pub!  Gradually, we came together as one and we all played together for the rest of the week.  Roger Digby came up with the phrase "Nights that passed in the Ship".

We agreed to meet up at the Admiral Mann in north London on New Year's Eve for a repeat performance.  Both bands, other invited musicians and associated personnel were crammed into one tiny pub room, all around one table in the centre of which stood a large yellow dustbin filled with beer, replenished at intervals.  What a night!

The sessions during the years that followed, whether at festivals, or at the English Country Music Weekends initiated by us in 1976, or simply at one group's invitation to the other, were heady, exciting affairs.

In particular, I remember one marvellous afternoon at Loughborough Folk Festival (1977?) under a magnificent, huge old cedar tree, and a hot sun, when members of just about every significant English country music band of the day played together in a joyous session of this 'new' music that we had just discovered.

Significantly, one of our heroes - Bob Cann, Oscar Woods, or Jim Small from Cheddar - would often be found playing along at one of these sessions.  They were only too pleased to discover that their playing was enjoyed by others and only too eager to pass on their tunes.  The source of the music was never forgotten, and to all of you overheard playing Old Swan Band, Flowers and Frolics and New Victory Band medleys, tune-for-tune and note-for-note, I can only say "You were listening to the wrong people".

Meanwhile, outside in the big wide world, the Old Swan Band were playing for dances and annoying a lot of people used to the reels-based Brands Hatch style of the EFDSS-type bands.  The band played slowly and you actually had to dance, for heaven's sake, and not just walk or run around the room.  Any exhortations to speed up were waved aside.  Slowly the point was driven home - you could, and should, dance to this music.  Then, of course, the rules were gradually relaxed.  The point had been made.

The band was dragged, rather reluctantly, into the recording studio.  Martin and I had already recorded with John Kirkpatrick on his album of Cotswold Morris tunes Plain Capers earlier in the year, but the band was not, as a unit, all that happy about recording, thinking of themselves as a live dance band.  The result, No Reels (the battle cry of the day!), accurately captured the spirit of the band's music - strong, measured, tuneful.  Mel Dean (on concertina and trombone) had joined by the time of the second record, Old Swan Brand, a slightly more relaxed affair which included songs from various band members.  Both recordings consisted mainly of material from southern English country sources.

For our third album, Gamesters, Pickpockets and Harlots, the material was gathered solely from Gloucestershire and its near neighbours.  Mel Dean and Ron Field had left by then and Paul Burgess and Richard Valentine had joined on fiddle and piano.  Danny and I left the band in 1982.

ECMW:

Aided by other OSB members, we organised a weekend centred on the Town Hall in our home town of Cricklade, Wilts, and spilling out for sessions into most of the seven pubs.  Despite (maybe even because of) our inexperience in such organisational tasks, everyone attending did their best to be helpful, the townspeople were most accommodating - and the weekend was a resounding success.

By the Saturday night there were calls for a second event the following year - which were eventually acceded to with some misgivings, since it was felt that, as the first one had been so good, the follow-up would be sure to be a disaster.  In the event, it was possibly even better - at least better organised!  In addition, we were able to invite Bob Cann and Oscar Woods as guests, supplementd by Jim Small and Ray Andrews turning up, invited by several of our Bristol friends.

The inevitable requests that the Weekend should become an annual event produced an unexpected response.  We proposed that, should there be further Weekends, they ought not to be at Cricklade, nor organised by us.  Our reasoning was that they would inevitably follow much the same policy every year, making the events predictable and boring, and that it was unfair on people wishing to attend from far-afield, who would always have to travel long distances.  We suggested that the Weekend should move to a different location, and be organised by a different group of people, every year.

So it was that the Weekends from 1979 moved around the country - to Suffolk (twice), Sheffield, Broseley, Derbyshire (twice), Gloucestershire, London, etc.  Some memorable times were had, and some wonderful music played.

Eventually, though, things began to run out of steam.  Looking back, it's difficult to find the precise reasons: the dwindling pool of remaining traditional musicians and singers; depression following Thatcher's re-election; the sheer hard work of organising the events; poor attendance at the 1985 Weekend ...  Whatever the reason was, the 1986 event never did get off the ground, and all concerned thought that the movement had run its course - regretted, but fondly remembered.

In 1995, the Old Swan Band were somewhat startled to realise that they were about to celebrate twenty years together, and it was felt that some sort of big party was in order.  Then someone noticed that the twentieth anniversary of the band's formation would necessarily coincide with the anniversary of the first English Country Music Weekend, and it was decided to merge the two events.

The celebration was held in June at Postlip Hall, Gloucestershire - and everyone turned up!  Almost every conversation overheard that weekend seemed to include the words "God!  I haven't seen you for ten (fifteen/twenty) years ... do you remember when ...  ".  The Saturday night dance was played by the Swan Band - starting with the original line-up (bar one) and changing through the evening to reflect the changes in the band over the years, finishing up with the current line-up, and everyone joining in for a grand finalé.  Members past and present played together again (for the first time in a couple of decades, in some cases), and all enjoyed themselves hugely.

There was no thought of re-starting the ECMW series afresh at that point, and nothing might have happened had it not been for an unfortunate circumstance.  Mel Dean, one-time OSB member, died late in 1995, and comparatively few of his friends in music were able to get to the funeral.  It was decided to hold a commemorative dance in Haughley, Suffolk, in the summer of '96.  This gradually turned into a weekend, as more and more friends said they would be coming - and the upshot was that people started saying "Well, we've all come together two summers in a row; it looks like the ECMW is back on the road again."  And so it was.

The 1997 Weekend was held at Postlip (as had the 1982 event and the 20th celebrations), and the plan was that it would alternate between there and Haughley.  But John and Katie Howson eventually decided that they were too busy with other work to take on the whole of the organisation, and John Shorter (at Postlip) was willing to carry on there.  So a small committee was set up (Shorter, Howson, Stradling and Burgess) to co-ordinate the organisation and the ECMW returned to Postlip - hoping for much better weather - in 1998.

And the weather, the food and the organisation was much better and everyone had a great time.  The original rationale for the event moving to different locations was still sound, so it was suggested that Ripponden would be the venue for 1999.  Unfortunately, circumstances conspired against the local organisers - and once again John Shorter was willing - so we remained at Postlip for a further year.  Johnny Adams hosted the excellent 2000 event in Todmorden, and 2001 saw us returning to Suffolk for the third time - in this case, to the Museum of East Anglian Life in Stowmarket - under Katie Howson's supervision.  It proved to be a first class venue and another wonderful event.

2002 saw the ECMW move into the 'deep' West Country for the first time, to the Devon village of Chagford, where good weather, good pubs and the delightful Dartmoor concert on the Saturday combined to make another memorable event.  In 2003 we returned to the Sheffield area for the second time; Mark Davies hosted the event at the highest house in South Yorkshire, with astonishing views, fine pubs, fine weather and an absolutely superb Sunday afternoon concertina concert.

2004 and '05 were back in Postlip again, and 2006 saw our second venture into Shropshire (the third ECMW was in Broseley) - which seemed to be the hotbed of activity in musical terms at the time ... or so they kept telling us.

And they must have told us true, because 2006 in Bishop's Castle was utterly memorable - despite organiser Dave Hunt's unfortunate absence though illness.  So much so, in fact, that everyone was very happy to have the experience again - and give Dave the chance to actually enjoy it - so the ECMW returned to Bishop's Castle again in 2007.

Most readers interested in the ECMWs will be aware of the more recent events, so I will simply list them without comments;

2008 Whimple - organised by Jim Causley and Jason Rice.
2009 & 2010 Ampthill - organised by Taz Tarry.
2011 & 2012 Brightlingsea - organised by Liz Giddings and Roger Digby.
2013 & 2014 Winster - organised by Keith Kendrick and Sylvia Needham.
2015 & 2016 Bampton - organised by Gareth Kiddier and committee.
2017 & 2018 Abbots Bromley - organised by Angela & Roger Boydon and committee.
2019 Croston in West Lancashire - organised by Brian Read and friends.

Other bands:

E II began as being a very typical English dance band of the period - typical in style and format, but a very good example of the genre.  It all started with Dion Cochrane: (tenor banjo) and Lizzy Howe-Pellant: (melodeon), getting together when she played accordion, but she took to the melodeon very quickly, and they started playing spots at the Victory club in Cheltenham.  Paul Burgess, Flos Headford, Martin Brinsford and Dave Haines soon realized how good Lizzy was getting on the melodeon, so it was decided to make up a regular band for monthly dances at the club with her as the lead, and bringing in Richard Valentine on piano and as caller.  It ran for a couple of years in that form.

In the way of bands in general, personnel gradually changed over the years, and in around 1983, Danny and I, melodeon and percussion - newly parted from the Old Swan Band - were asked to join.  The other members at that time were Dion Cochrane, John Gill on bass, and Dave Haines on 1-row melodeon.

At the time, some of the band members - particularly Johnny Gill - were interested in reggae music, an interest that soon spread to African roots music.  We knew that reggae had followed rocksteady, which had followed mento ... and we reasoned that there must have been an earlier form of West Indian music which blended European dance music and African rhythms.  Many years later we discovered that this terrific dance music had been quite widespread and still exists in St Lucia and a few other islands - there it's called 'Kwadril Music'.

But in our ignorance, we decided to have a go at re-creating this early musical form - to be based mainly on Johnny Gill's reggae-style bass.  That is what you hear on the Musical Traditions CD -  the tracks were taken from three cassettes we recorded at the time.  The first, recorded in 1985, was called Demos ... sounds rather grand, but it was really only a demo tape to try to get ourselves some gigs.

By the time we made the second one, Promos, again just a 5-track promo cassette, in 1986, the band's personnel had changed a bit.  Dion had left, replaced by Jon Moore: lead guitar, Steve Goulding on drums, and we'd added two rhythm guitar players, Tom Greenhalgh (from the Mekons) and our son Barnaby - though they rarely played at the same time - although they are in this 1987 photo.  At the end of 1986 we recorded a further 6 tracks which, together with the 5 Promos ones were published as Ethos.  We mused, at the time, about calling our next cassette d'Artagnan - but the Cooking Vinyl record company came along with an LP offer, which resulted in Let's Polkasteady: Edward the Second, Cooking Vinyl COOK 007, in 1987.  I didn't include any tracks from that record, as it was fairly widely bought at the time, and the band had changed more personnel, developing a rather different sound.  They then decided to go 'professional' - and we didn't.

Many of the tunes we played, particularly on the Demos cassette, were traditional.  Later, we made up some new ones: Mr Prime's Polka and Sophie Bourbon's Hornpipe by Dave Haines, The Walls of Butlin's by me and Shantey - a Mekons tune.  Another Fine Mess was brought back from St Chartier by Lizzy and Dion - and we found its correct name by the time we recorded it again on Ethos.

The unusual arrangements were accredited as the responsibility of the whole band - but mainly they were dreamed up by Dave, Johnny or me.  This is particularly the case with The Cliffe Hornpipe, which is scarcely recognisable in the form you hear it on the CD - having turned into La Bamba by the end ... without our realising it!

Feckless, 1990-94

This consisted of Alan, Danny and me, plus Tony Engle on sax, John Eastaugh on bass, Phil Bird on electric guitar, and Steve Cricket on drums - a rather different sort of line-up, and some different names, to those I had been working with before.

For some reason, Ian Anderson tried to persuade me to do a solo CD ... not something I had ever done before.  I couldn't believe that anyone would want to listen to a whole CD of solo melodeon playing, so I said I'd only do it if I could use Feckless for most of the tracks - and Ian agreed.  Thus we made Rhythms of the Wold ... one of Anderson's 'joke' titles.

I still don't really know how good it was, but it certainly made a few people sit up and listen, and is (as far as I know) the only recording of mine to achieve a release in the States (on Green Linnet GLCD 3061).  Even more improbably, my playing of a couple of Bampton tunes from the CD ended up on a Microsoft encyclopaedia of world music CD-ROM.

The English Country Dance Band, 1994-98

We had no plans for recording, but a couple of local entrepreneurs got us to do a recording which appeared in 1995 as Barn Dance: English Country Dance Band.  Carlton 30360 00242 ... one of those labels that were sold on garage forecourts, supermarkets, etc.  We only got a one-time fee, but it sold rather well.  I discovered later that, in the year that Norma Waterson's The Very Thought of You (Hannibal Records, 1999) was runner-up in the Mercury Prize, our Barn Dance CD actually out-sold her Hannibal CD in terms of numbers, which is really rather depressing!

English Country Blues Band, 1982-83

There was an Epping Folk Festival in the late '70s where both Old Swan and Hot Vultures were on the bill.  Pretty sure it was 1979, we came to each other's gigs and formed some sort of mutual appreciation society!

Loughborough Festival 1980 was where it all really began.  Roy Harris used to give Maggie and Ian tickets each year even though he couldn't actually bill them because of the festival's music policy, but that year he said he had a free venue on the Sunday lunchtime and they could have it to do what they liked in (they'd already recorded with Pete & Chris Coe as guests on the last Hot Vultures LP Up The Line so he had an inkling!).  So they consulted with me and others, stuck a sign on the door saying 'An English Country Blues Band?' and waited to see what happened.  Basically, it was an interesting session with us, them, Coes, Kirkpatricks, Nic Jones and numerous others.

After that we decided a proper band was a good idea, initially Ian, Maggie and me, and occasionally Sue Harris when she was available and budgets permitted.  Not long after that Dingles Records offered us an album.  No Rules Dingles DIN 323, came out in 1982.  Somewhere in there was the famous 'carpet slippers' tour - those high-heeled Mexican army boots were all the rage with those of us of less than average height, but hell to drive in, so I always drove in slippers, with the boots in the back of the car.  I remember us staying the first night with Nic & Julia Jones, during which I suddenly realised my lack of alternative footwear!

We did a single of Don't Take Love in 1983 and the second album Home And Deranged, Rogue FMSL 2004 came out that same year.  Much later, most of the tracks from both were combined on the compilation CD Unruly,  Rogue FMSD 5027, 1983.

Tiger Moth, 1984-89, 2004-06

It didn't trouble the charts, but did create a demand for an album and for the non-existent band to be bookable.  So we put on our own debut gig to test it out at Farnham Maltings on Sat Feb 4th 1984 - which sold out in advance - and made the first album, Tiger Moth: Rogue FMSL 2006, also released in 1984.

I think we decided this was much more fun - and louder - so we knocked the ECBB on the head (last gig was Towersey Festival, I think) and concentrated on Tiger Moth for the next few years.  We did the second album in 1988, Howling Moth, Rogue FMSD 5012, then a pair of 12" singles with Flaco Jimenez, Dembo & Kausu etc as Orchestre Super Moth in 1989.  By then Ian had moved into London, that damned magazine was taking up too much of his time, nobody else really wanted the burden of organising it all, so it quietly slid into unofficial retirement after Bracknell Festival 1989.  Most of both LPs and the 12"s were compiled on the CD Mothballs, Rogue FMSD 2012, 1996.

We did one gig in the mid-'90s as a benefit for John Maxwell, and then re-formed for 2004-2006, including Ben Mandelson, Fran Wade (fiddle) and Danny, doing Sidmouth (2004 was Sidmouth's 50th and Tiger Moth's 20th anniversary), a couple of Womads and The Big Chill.  Then we called it a day.  That Sidmouth gig was probably the most exciting one I've ever been involved in - the marquee was rammed, everyone played really well, we remembered all the arrangements, and it couldn't have been better.  By the end of the night, every item of clothing I had on - even my socks - were drenched in sweat.

Thanks to Ian Anderson for reminding me of the details of these two bands ... surprising how little I can remember of things organised by other people!  And I should also thank Ian for his support of MT Records (free quarter-page advert for many years, purely because he liked what we did), together with his unbounded enthusiasm for traditional musics from around the world, and his encyclopaedic knowledge of the subject.

Phoenix: 2004 - 2018

As might be expected, Phoenix came into being out of a fire.  The regular Monday evening music session at the Prince Albert pub in Stroud came to an abrupt halt in the summer of 2004, when 'the bleeding pub caught fire'.  Actually, it wasn't a terribly serious fire, and thankfully no one was hurt - so we all expected it to be back in business in a week or so.  Strangely though, the chain which owns the pub had other ideas, and it was over six months before The Albert reopened ... yet, mercifully, not turned into a theme pub!

I had been one of the initiators of the session, and was not one to go without music for six weeks, let alone six months, so I was soon to be found knocking on the door of two other session regulars, Fran Wade (fiddle) and Kevin Bown (double bass and piano), who lived just 100 yards up the road from me.

As may be imagined, it wasn't long before new tunes began to replace the old session repertoire, and the trio realised that we had the makings of a new band.  Martin Brinsford (mouthorgan), another local Albert session regular, was invited to join, as was an old friend of Fran's, Mike Pinder (fiddle), who was just about to take early retirement.

All of us were seasoned band musicians, but we tried not to bring 'the same old repertoire' of tunes into the new band.  Phoenix play a fairly eclectic mix of music - mainly English, of course, but with contributions from right across western Europe, and even North America, but these are tunes you may not have heard much before, at least, not in England.  Phoenix loved playing together, we loved these tunes - and hoped that others would enjoy and play them, too.  To that end, we recorded After the Fire: Phoenix.  Firebird FBR 001, in 2006.

Steve Harrison replaced Martin Brinsford in mid-2011, and not only played a storm but also provided the band with a PA, and Annie Dearman acting as soundperson.  We produced a second CD with some 43 more less-than-well-known tunes, forged into 15 new dance sets by several years of playing for dancing at numerous clubs and festivals.  All Fired Up: Phoenix.  Firebird FBR 005, 2016.  When Steve died in 2018, we decided that Phoenix should also close down.

The Melodeon:

I blame Ian Anderson for calling me a 'melodeon guru' - because I'm really not that good a player ... although I do think I'm a pretty good dance band musician.  But I think my melodeon playing has, generally, been just about good enough for what I was doing at the time.  Over a long life in music I've obviously had a good many influences - Oscar Woods, Bob Cann and Scan Tester in the early years - but I've never been good enough to be able to copy them, technique-wise ... and I'm glad of that.  The stuff that I've heard and liked does gradually seep in to my music, but not in hideously obvious ways, it just becomes a natural element of the way in which I play.  The one thing that typifies all the traditional performers I've ever known is that they're quite unselfconscious about the music that they play.  They don't rationalise - and I'm pretty much the same in my melodeon playing.  What I do is what I am, nothing's been put there, it's happened naturally.  I know the way I play now is different from the way I played thirty years ago, but precisely how, I neither know nor care.

Stating it as simply as that sounds rather dismissive, so I really should admit that there have been a couple of events in my melodeon playing life which have affected the way I play, even though I didn't realise it at the time.  I mentioned that skiffle had been the start of it all for me and, of course, I had no idea that Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music was the basis of so much that was played by British skiffle groups in the late-Fifties.  I only realised this when it was re-released by Smithsonian Folkways on six CDs in 1977.  So it was that when I was asked to join Ian and Maggie in The English Country Blues Band, I did have an inking of the chord structure of much of the stuff they were doing - but my melodeon playing (unlike Tony Hall's) was entirely melody-based, not chord-based.  Ian has said he wanted to "sing and play the blues with an English accent", and to try to do that I would need to avoid the tricks that Americans had used - primarily that of playing 'backwards' in another key - which is what the Cajuns and Norteno players do.  I'd still be playing 'in an American accent', which would have been pointless in these circumstances.  So, the very act of trying to play this music in an English way, actually involved me in coming up with a different way of approaching these fairly familiar tunes, which left an indelible mark on my playing thereafter.

Exactly the same thing happened when I became friends with I Tre Martelli and La Ciapa Rusa, back in the Seventies, and wanted to join in with their music.  The reason for this was slightly more 'techy' than a move from melody-to-chord-based playing, so please indulge me for a moment.  Both English and Italian box players use diatonic instruments, and play in (broadly) the same keys, but for several historical reasons the European box-of-choice is a G/C, whereas the English use a D/G.  So we can all play in G ... but G is the 'inside' row on a Brit box, but the 'outside' row on a continental one - which changes which accidentals and alternatives fall easiest to hand on each.  If that were not enough, the continental G row is an octave lower than the Brit one so, generally we play in the lower octave, while they play in the upper octave.  And anyone who's played a box or mouthorgan will tell you, the upper and lower octaves are laid out quite differently - again changing which accidentals and alternatives fall easiest to hand.  Add the fact that playing the 'right' chord also affects which row you take the tune note from, and you'll begin to see that playing Italian tunes on an English D/G can be a very difficult dance

Back in the day when people like me were beginning to learn the melodeon, it was always described as a 'simple' instrument ... it isn't!  I actually think it might well be amongst the most complicated.  You can play tunes in a simple way - but to play them the way you want to play them can be an extremely complicated process.  To play any short phrase almost always demands decisions to be made because, on a diatonic box like the standard British D/G, almost all of the notes you will be using are available on both rows, but usually in different directions, ie. either push or pull.  This immediately requires you to decide which to use, based on which chord you'll be wanting to play at that point in the tune, and/or which direction the previous and next notes will be - resulting in either a 'smooth' or 'lumpy' phrase - which will depend on the nature of the tune and/or the way you want it to sound.  This question frequently occurs at the end of a line, where the final note may fall easily on the 'key row' you're mainly playing in (either D or G), but not with the 'correct' chord.  This means that you need to get the note from the other row, thus allowing you to also get the alternative chord.

I would also add that many otherwise perfectly capable box players seem unaware that the 'third chord' in the key of D is G.  Playing in G they will happily, and correctly play C as the 'third chord', but in D they don't seem to know what to do, or realise that the G chord is what they need, and that this requires them to move to the G row to get it.

What this music means to me:

Its appeal, apart from being a great tune, was precisely that it was 'so far removed from modern taste'.  We were, I think, unconsciously looking for ways to reclaim some sort of identity and cultural heritage in the face of the increasing Americanization of our world - and the rising tide of badly-played Irish music amongst our English contemporaries.  And it was precisely because it wasn't one of the pop-song tunes of our parents' generation, who had left us a legacy of World wars, the Holocaust, rationing, austerity, nuclear threat, sexual repression (the list seemed endless) that caused it to appeal so strongly to us.  We picked on that tune particularly, for the same set of complicated reasons that we preferred (say) Fred Jordan to Martin Carthy, or - more apposite - Bampton to Headington.

But the fact that the music and the players were available to us provided a focus for the undefined yearnings for a music we could begin to call our own.  Almost uniquely, at that time, it was something we could fight for - whereas our adult experience of the world prior to that had been defined by our fighting against things.