Morris As Comedy - Some Common Threads

A couple of weeks ago in a Soho junk shop, I found two books of comic strips of The Cloggies, the classic Private Eye comic-strip clog dancing dating from the 1960s. A favourite strip is on the left. After practice, we noticed a couple of things about it

• Bells on the arms
• No musician in sight
• A recurring theme of disciplinary panels and authority
  

All three things are also true of last year's Life With Bells On movie. So I wonder if there's a reason Morris (or clog) has to always be that way in any comedy production, regardless of what medium, whether strip or film.

Certainly bells on the arms look good visually (even if they don't add much to the sound) and in any fantasy where you don't actually have to perform, a musician can be a needless complication. And Morris is an anarchic activity which shows up well when set against authority figures

One other thing I found on the Cloggies' Wikipedia page, is that there was actually a real side called the Cloggies, formed in tribute to the Bill Tidy cartoon. Their finest hour, bringing to a close a student performance of John Milton's Comus, got a snotty review from the Guardian theatre critic, which the lads quite rightly regarded as "a complete vindication of all they had stood for".

Comus, of course, is the perfect vehicle for any celebrity Morris, as it was performed in Cambridge in 1908 by a team (left) including the poet Rupert Brooke and the mountaineer George Mallory (more details here).

St George's Day at Hays Galleria

Hays Galleria, by London Bridge, has a 3 storey high vaulted ceiling that resonated brilliantly when we tapped our sticks on the stone floor.

We were there as guests of Balls Brothers, Hays Galleria, who were opening a new bar there. They had an evening of St George's day related things, as with the knights dancing with us here.

Terry Frisch had his first dance out with us this night and did admirably.

Great Ormond Street Hospital

The 17th Holborn Scout & Guide Group meets in Great Ormond Street Hospital to provide Scouting and Guiding for the children who are patients there, meeting every Tuesday evening from 6.30 - 8.00pm, in the Activities Centre at the Hospital.

They invited us along for the Tuesday before St George's Day, to celebrate the occasion, and we had a fine time with them; showing, teaching and talking about morris dancing

A wave of Morris enthusiasm greets our new term

We moved into Cecil Sharp House on Tuesday nights - just as the Morris Media Frenzy hit. Peter, Michael and I have all been interviewed for the radio, along with - it seems - just about every dancer in the country.

The practical result has been a lot of new dancers showing up at Cecil Sharp House, and converging with us and a solid group who have been learning under John Russell (form the the Beaux of London).

London Pride members have been joining John's group, as well as having our own fortnightly practice alongside. For me, John's sessions have been the biggest, most engaging and most energetic morris practices I can remember. Tuesday night saw up to 24 dancers learning Adderbury Lads A Bunchum, along with Headington Bean Setting and Trunkles, and the Fieldtown Nutting Girl jig.

Into the national publicity, comes the movie, Morris: A Life With Bells On. A gentle British comedy about a somewhat fantasised world of Morris dancing - it's struggling to get distribution, but is visible in several village screens in Dorset. A campaign is underway to get it screened in more places!

The Morris Media Frenzy

Well, it's a slow news week. There's only the end of the financial world to report, so what else should we have but a burst of reporting on the "death of Morris".

The Morris Ring sent out a Press Release in December which they thought had "sunk without trace". That was until Monday, when stories started appearing in the Times and the Telegraph and then all over.

The release said Morris could be "extinct" in 30 years. The Federation and the Open Morris, and pretty much every dancer in the land jumped up to say No Way, and by and large the media took them at their word.

I had an email read on the PM programme, and then appeared on the Jeremy Vine Radio 2 show with Kitty - following an excellent turn by Simon Care of Moulton. Meanwhile Peter Kanssen was on Radio 6, and then on local London Radio.

I then had a call from a non-flappable Mail journalist, whose leisurely feature for Saturday's paper had been suddently rescheduled for tomorrow - given the urgency of the news - giving her a three hour deadline to fill.

Our message through all these outlets: we're not extinct, we practice in Cecil Sharp House on Tuesdays, and all are welcome.

2008 Feast:: A New Squire and a New Era!

This year's AGM took place in a dark room, decorated with a parachute, fairy lights and red ribbons. To find it, we had to fight our way through the crowds of Portobello Road market.

With the Westway's motorway traffic humming gently past, three feet above our heads, we welcomed our guest, Graham Cox of the Cambridge Morris Men, who is our Ring area representative. We took care of AGM business, danced (of course), and then had tea (of course).

After a little more dancing, we moved out into the body of the Inn on the Green, handing the function room over for what sounded an interesting musical evening, and gently finding space amongst the tango class which was packing up. We then cooked our feast in the kitchen, alongside two barbecue chefs.

The pub is an eccentric and welcoming place, with (on this visit) Fuller's Jack Frost on the pump. There were books and table football available, but I'm not sure if we made use of those. And the nearby pound shop was able to make good the deficiencies of the kitchen: the club now owns twelve yellow glass soup bowls.

The main business of the day was to welcome and install Michael Runge as Squire. The blurry photo is here for proof. Congratulations Michael, and I hereby promise to serve faithfully under your leadership!

We also decided to move our practices to Cecil Sharp House, home of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. We will be there on Tuesday evenings at 8pm, starting on 20 January. We believe we will be the only Morris team practising in the House, and we hope the change of venue will encourage more people to come and join us.

Other things to say about the feast: the main course stew from Michael was splendid, as was his trifle. I think these alone would be a good enough reason to join LP. Also, to my shame, I'm sorry to say we forgot the toast to the Immortal Memory.

Who'll get custody of Bradford and Bingley's bowler hat?

asks the BBC - which raises a thought.

Ezra's one is falling apart. Maybe they could give it to him.

(disclaimer: London Pride Morris are not in any way related to Bradford and Bingley Building Society)

Notting Hill Pre-practice tour 15 Sept

We have this one to get us back in to the swing of Monday evenings. 

We did a brief show at the Ladbroke Arms, our usual after-practice haunt, and then off to the Uxbridge Arms, where Landlady Linda had just come back from holiday and was wonderfully welcoming. Ezra did another solo jig, and we had enough men to dance Lichfield Ring-of-bells (an 8 man dance)

Gillespie Park Ecology Centre 14 Sept

No photos of this I'm afraid as we were all dancing, and my camera was in use elsewhere too. We've enjoyed coming to the Ecology Centre for the last few years. 

One thing that I'll have to provide a photo of soon is Myrtle (the Westie) in her Baldrick and bells, which she showed off for the first time. She doesn't dance but sat at the side checking our stepping. 

Some more photos from the Canal Festival

Dancing well despite having just had his hips done, and evidently having done it before, this chap is John Shacklock, an old friend of Allan's. John took over from Allan as Bagman of Standon Morris Men, some years ago. John now has a narrow boat, which won the prize for best-decorated boat at the Canal Festival - his wife was accepting the prize round about the time these photos were taken.

Queen Caroline from the Kew Woodland Wonders surprised us by appearing incognito as a bargee

these and more are in a Flikr set here

Angel Canal Festival 2008

Once again, we had a good time at the Angel Canal Festival, even though the weather wasn't as good as it has usually been.







We danced three shows - not a lot of photos here, as I was dancing most of the time.







The last show was between two shows by Orleta, a wonderful Polish group that practise in Balham.

It's always a pleasure to see a dance group with a well-practiced set, bright, costumes and big smiles. They were enviably young and attractive too!

Corporate Morris Dancing again

Peter J, Allen and I were hired again by Rampage Events to teach morris dancing to teams from a different organisation. This time it was CBS, who weren't natural bonders like the Loctite people. We mistook the initials - maybe it was GBH..? (cue stick clashing...) they still enjoyed it though.

We only managed to see 5 of the 7 teams that were coming down the river. Maybe they got lost and took a wrong turn - up the Fleet or the Effra or maybe the Wandle?

Here's Allen keeping supple by dancing a Princess Royal while waiting for the trainees:

Eventually the chickens needed feeding and we had to go home. But spending an afternoon chatting in the sun outside a pub isn't too hard a chore...

Chelsea (and Kensington)

At the Anglesea Arms, and then the Scarsdale Tavern in Edwardes Square

the weather had been threatening downpours all day, but the magic of the morris kept it away, and we had a nice evening's dancing. And pleasant audiences too.

Bloomsbury Tour

at the Norfolk Arms and Rugby Tavern (sorry I only had my camera out at the Norfolk Arms)

we were joined by Dan Kenning, who is now working in these part, but work is too busy to bring whites too :(

The Norfolk Arms is quite a gastro-pub these days, but the patrons still enjoyed the show, as did a coach-load of american tourists, before going off to investigate the darker recesses of London

Myrtle came along as official morris-beast-in-training

and enjoyed dancing Bonny Green Garters

after that over at the Rugby tavern. It was the barman's first day, poor thing, and I've been very lapse lately in warning pubs we were coming. He was getting worried that he'd lose his job by the pub losing it's licence on the first day he'd worked. 

We reassured him that Morris wasn't included in the music licensing laws "because it isn't entertaining" (?) 

and even more:

that the chances of us still noisily dancing after 10pm were fairly slim....

Loctite Adhesives

Peter J, Allan and I were booked for the day by Rampage Events doing a corporate team building exercise for Loctite Adhesives. The contestants were going down the river and doing different tasks at points on the way - a bit like the Generation Game.

They stuck with it and were very tenacious. 

We decided to score for style, effort, energy and beards. 

Not many points on the beard front

Good fun, and loads of points to all of them for everything else

Fitzrovia: Duke of York and The Fitzroy Tavern

We were joined by a mystery man in the audience who seemed to know all the dances: Andy Roberts in civvies, Andy's now the foreman of Allington Morris, having moved away from London.

There was a stag night in a local pub, so we blessed the groom-to-be by dancing a Rose around him guaranteeing plenty of fertility

Flagons of beer around...

Unfortunately no photos; from me, anyhow - I forgot my camera.

Allan wasn't too upset...

A few of us had thought we might be able to come for a garden party his local Quakers were organising.

In the event only Antony made it, and I'd phoned up to say I wouldn't after Allan had left home. I had visions of Allan arriving with no-one else around. 

In the end however they found someone who knew the tunes, borrowed a recorder, and did some jigs.

Sheltered Schemes in Notting Hill

Another visit to the sheltered schemes where I work. Much enjoyed by all.

Kensington Tour

No photos of the Elephant and Castle yet, though some may follow from a generous member of the audience.
We were a fairly bare side - someone else's diary crashed this time...
But we still managed to do a good show, to an appreciative audience.

After that up to the Uxbridge Arms, where we were watched by 5 year old Matthew, who'd stayed up specially - " and this is a special dance for Matthew..." and the locals, who are a good bunch. One went to the same schools as Noah and Ezra, and they all agreed they were the best schools ever.

One group had thought they might have a quiet evening to discuss the forthcoming redesign of their webpage - buckman-coats.com. It's going to be what Burberry etc. wanted to be but didn't. Apparently. We were assured that Lord Buckman himself would have been an avid morris dancer if there was a lady to impress.

And Ezra danced a jig all by himself!!




Next time he'll have to do it with bells on!
...but very well done...

Thaxted Ring meeting

Off for the Thaxted Morris Ring meeting, here's Ezra and myself dancing a jig in Finchingfield
Noah and Ezra heading for the coach.
those are eggs, and they didn't break them.
this should hopefully (if I've done it right) be a bit of the background sound from the weekend - everywhere there's bells ringing.