Swanage 2003. An MC's view.

Swanage 2003. Third year in a row. Every single year of the 21st century. (Oh, yes it is, pedantically speaking, cos you know really when the century began.) And it gets easier each year. I now expect the unexpected: anticipate that all the things which can't possibly go wrong probably still will.

staying in Roy and Julie's newly furbished B&B this year...

Wow! <notreallyanadvert>What A Place</notreallyanadvert>. They didn't prepare me for this. Sure, I knew they'd been working on a B&B. And they were doing a good job. They would say that, wouldn't they? But honestly, there's good jobs, and Seriously Wow Jobs. And their place is a new definition of Seriously Wow. Phrases such as "superlatives fail me" fail me. This isn't a B&B. This is a Parador. Simply beautiful, welcoming, comfortable, spacious. And they've allocated a suite of rooms. Gosh. Star treatment or what? I'm gob-smacked. Not literally, obviously, cos that wouldn't be very friendly, but I believe it's a term in the common vernacular.

So, it's a beautiful sunny warm day at the seaside, and no duties until evening. What do you do? Walk along the prom and get some Fish and Chips, that's what. Yum yum. Then it's time to wander up to the Sandpit Field to see how the evening's gig is lining up. I've missed Bill Jones, but Mal Simms of Legacy is there. However, the other 75% of the band aren't. They're stuck in a humungous jam on the M27. No, not that sort of jam: traffic. "What time are you expecting to play then, Mal? " "From 7.30 for an hour or so. " "Hmmm, then why does the programme say 8.00? Might be a poor crowd at 7.30..."

Oh, there's Miranda Sykes (Bill Jones' bass player) sleeping in the back of her estate car. That's all right then. The floor technicians are still trying to fit together this huge lego-jigsaw which is the floor. But, hey, plenty time. Cos 75% of Legacy are in this jam, aren't they?

Then it transpires that the arrangement about me Mcing the Friday night gig hasn't quite made it through to Roy. He's been chatting up Bill and co about running times; so when I do the same, a period of confusion doesn't exactly reign, cos that sounds like at least confusion knows what it's doing, but it certainly has a deep influence for a while.

Anyway, with minutes to spare - enough for a sound-check - the rest of Legacy turn up, Roy and I sort out The Plan (he'll introduce the festival and then introduce me and I'll MC and get the bands off and on). 8 o'clock, we've an audience, we've a band, we've a floor, and we've Roy who - adrenalin can do funny things, can't it? - starts to introduce the gig, and the band, remembers he's not meant to do that, introduces me, and I go into affable MC mode. "Thanks, Roy, for doing my job for me. Cos I was going to say that. Then I was going to go on to say... etc etc etc."

Legacy are great. After the first couple of numbers - maybe the soundcheck wasn't quite all it could have been - the sound mix is good and the evening's starting to groove. And, as planned, at the appropriate time, I give the " two songs more before the spontaneous surprise encore" sign, and Paul goes "Ah. I was just going to say "we're going to do our last number now". Oh, poo. I wasn't sure whether only one wasn't the better choice anyway. So now they're going to do two. Never mind, it'll only be five minutes at most over. Cos their encore is to be this dead short acapella number. So imagine my surprise when, having whipped up the audience for the surprise spontaneous encore, they do a long set of tunes...

Bill, Miranda and Sarah are consummate pro's. And they do two fabulous sets and I don't have any more problems that night. Thanks, guys!

Saturday dawns. Surprisingly early. Time for a pre-full-English constitutional along the cliff tops. Lovely. As is the full-English. Yum. Of course, we're into the "don't panic, Mr Mainwaring" mode already. Pete Wilson, ace soundsman and supplier of PA for the open-mic last year, is also staying at Roy and Julie's and is able, therefore, to inform me that he's not doing so this year. Hmmm... Roy tells me not to worry, tho', he's got it sorted and the pa will be getting there for about 11, when he'll be going to the White Horse to see it's all okay. And so, at 11, sure enough, there's: one mic stand, one mic and one lead. A little less than a full rig, you might say. We're also unaware that the pa - which does exist and is allocated - is in Jon's (he of The Lucy Lastic Band) car or that Jon can't remember where he's parked it. It's these little things which would have made me a tad anxious in previous years. Call it experience or call it blind stupidity, but there's no panic this year. Cos Jon finds his car, finds that all the roads that he needs to use to get to the White Horse are closed to traffic (apparently there's a folk festival going on), finds a tortuous route around the closures, and we get the rig set up with, more-than-a-few minutes to spare. Sounds nice, too.

A great afternoon: thank you to LizzieB, Alex & Noleen, Vikki & Jon, Steve & Pru, Fallacy (aka Phil & Ruth), Keffler's Three, Mal Simms, Dave, Alan & Fred, Terry & Fred and LizzieB & Lorna. I know none of you will begrudge me allocating the "turn-of-the-show" award this year to Jonny and Vikki - two-thirds of Serious Kitchen, who have a paid marquee gig later the same day. A spell-binding set, which had the whole pub mesmerised. And they thought they were just popping in to say "hullo". I didn't get where I am today by missing chances like that. So let that be a warning to you all.

Around half three I realise that lunch has been a missing factor. That's full-Englishes for you. So Ross manages to rustle up a toasted cheese and ham, which does the job very nicely. Cheers, Ross. What with that and the pots-of-tea-on-demand, you're my idea of the ideal host.

Then it's up to the Middle School to find I've already missed The Great Northern Roadshow's soundcheck. But the Fraser Sisters are getting set up. How many instruments? At least a dozen. And the bass player is just that, so the other three are playing on average four-plus each. And voices. We're going to have to strip all that stuff down during the interval and reinstate Tom's rig for the second half. Tom's a star. I'm down to do "the interval set" and he insists I do it to the full audience, and he'll be my sound engineer. The only problem is, how are we going to fit the contractual two sets of one and a half hours, my set, and an interval into three hours? It sounds like the old "you can't fit two sets of one and a half hours, a floor-spot and an interval into a pint pot" issue.

Despite a rather garbled introduction for the Frasers (when I claim they used to play in The Old Rope String Swan Rubber Band or something) everything else goes off really well. Apparently I do the first chorus of "20, 18" as "18, 20, 16, 14..." but not many people noticed. I certainly didn't. But, hey! the audience are great. I suspect cheating ... some of them clearly already knew the song - but they sang really well, and it was no risk to get them to do the nearly obligatory "audience solo". Fabulous. Oh, and the other turns were pretty good, too. Tom, Pauline and Terry are so in control of their instruments, their repertoire, the patter and the audience. Watch, listen, learn... oh, and appreciate. A special night.

The weather forecast's been for a poor Sunday. But they lied. The wonderful sunny morning demands the expedition to Old Harry Rocks. And I haven't had the camera out all weekend yet, so, it'd be nice to just take in the dancers on the esplanade one last time, have an ice-cream ...and let the A351, M27, M3 and M25 all get nice and full. But even the traffic couldn't spoil a(nother) very special Swanage Festival.

And my mate Dave and his son George came too. Here’s what Dave says:

"Had a brilliant time. A different weekend for us this year as we saw only one main concert (my bum was particularly grateful for this) and we eschewed our usual quiet, respectable, campsite for, how shall I put it, a more colourful experience. George certainly saw another side of life! Friday we arrived late due to work commitments but caught the second set of the "Dead Plants", an Irish band, at the Royal Oak. Not exactly folk, more rockabilly ("we're really on the fringe of the festival"). However, a great set, even though everything appeared to be held together by tape. The drum kit was particularly unusual consisting of a snare, a small cymbal and a suitcase (doubling as a bass drum).

"Back to the campsite for more music around the fire until the small hours, a couple of hours sleep(-ish) and then more music around the campfire. I don't recall ever playing guitar quite so early in the morning before but when someone is beating a bongo at 6.30 a.m. you have to decide whether to beat 'em (no pun intended) or join 'em. Eventually we took the steam train down to Swanage for a cooked breakfast in our favourite cafe and then a wander around the town, by this time awash with Morris sides. After a visit to the main field for a rummage through the various stalls and a listen to the music up there, we returned via the steam train to the campsite to pick up the guitar. The site was deserted except for one body lying between the tents. Our initial fears were put to rest when it moved. Apparently it was 'not feeling very well'. Back to the town for the sing around at the White Horse and to watch the main parade, a bite to eat and back again to the site for a snooze.

"One advantage of our campsite was that it was only 15 minute walk to the main concert so we arrived in plenty of time to get a good seat. The Fraser Sisters were excellent with a good variety of songs, tunes and instruments. A rather strange visual set up though, with the sisters on either side and the centre dominated by the lanky guitarist!

"Then to The Great Northern Roadshow. I realised I had seen Pauline and Tom before... at Swanage!. Tom's between numbers' patter is fantastic and his vocal phrasing quite unusual; they are also technically brilliant but as neither George or I are big fans of pipes (which tended to dominate) nor even too many jigs & reels, the dreaded numb bum started to set in. Back to the campsite and straight to sleep, generally managing to ignore the noise as other campers arrived. No bongos to disturb us (I think the player was comatose by this point). There didn't appear to be much of a music session but the night was quite eventful, including a fight, but George and I slept through most of it.

"Sunday was more relaxing with a breakfast in the town, a few souvenirs bought and then return to the campsite for a bit more guitar playing and to strike camp.

"The journey home was happily uneventful then straight into a hot bath.

"I can't wait 'till next year.

"p.s. Oh yes, there was some bloke called Hamish doing the MCing at the White Horse and at the main stage. He's not at all bad really.

"p.p.s I still think your version of Lowlands of Holland is best."